About Empty Glass

The Empty Glass is an interactive experience that visualizes access to safe drinking water using a simple, familiar object: a glass.

Select a country and watch the glass fill based on the share of people with access to safely managed drinking water. In many parts of the world, the glass remains far from full.

By translating data into a physical metaphor, the project reveals how uneven access to safe water still is, without relying on complex charts or reports.

Launched around World Water Day, the experience invites reflection on how something as basic as safe drinking water remains unequally distributed across countries.

Data sources: WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP) and World Bank population estimates. Values update as new data becomes available.