Clinical instrument

World Health Organization Well-Being Index (WHO-5)

A 5-item self-report of subjective psychological well-being over the last two weeks. Administer under clinician oversight.

This is a clinical instrument. It is not publicly self-administered; a clinician assigns it through a secure patient link.

You learn how good your general well-being has been over the past two weeks.

For anyone who wants a quick sense of their overall well-being lately.

It comes from international public health research on positive well-being.

Sample result, example data. Illustrative chart with invented scores; it does not describe any real respondent.

World Health Organization Well-Being Index (WHO-5) box

What this test is

Welcome. A 5-item self-report of subjective psychological well-being over the last two weeks. Administer under clinician oversight.

The measure

The World Health Organization Well-Being Index (WHO-5) was developed by Topp and colleagues (2015). It has 5 items, each answered on a 6-point (At no time … All of the time) scale.

Topp, C. W., Østergaard, S. D., Søndergaard, S., & Bech, P. (2015). The WHO-5 Well-Being Index: a systematic review of the literature. Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, 84(3), 167–176.

At a glance

Items

Response scale

6-point (At no time … All of the time)

Est. time

~1 min

Access

Assigned only · no per-report charge

Time frame

Past 2 weeks

Score

0 to 100 well-being percentage

What it measures

Five statements make up the index: having felt cheerful and in good spirits, calm and relaxed, active and vigorous, fresh and rested on waking, and having had a daily life filled with things of interest. Each is rated by how much of the time it was true over the past two weeks, from at no time to all of the time. Unlike most mood measures, every item is positively worded, so the index asks about the presence of well-being rather than the presence of symptoms.

The index was developed through the World Health Organization (WHO) Collaborating Centre for Mental Health as a brief measure of subjective well-being for primary care and population research. A systematic review by Topp, Østergaard, Søndergaard and Bech (2015) found that it had been used across a wide range of settings and countries and that it worked well both as an outcome measure and as a first-step screen for depression.

The five ratings are summed and converted to a percentage, so scores run from 0 to 100. Higher scores indicate greater well-being over the past two weeks; lower scores indicate reduced well-being, and the report explains where a score falls within the published interpretive ranges. A low score suggests that a fuller assessment of mood may be useful; it is not a diagnosis.

The index is used in primary care, in chronic illness services and in research to monitor well-being and to flag possible depression, often before a longer measure is given. On this site, the PHQ-9 asks directly about depressive symptoms, the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS) separates positive and negative emotion, and the Kessler Psychological Distress Scale (K10) measures general distress.

Validity evidence

High construct validity as a unidimensional measure of well-being and adequate sensitivity as a depression screen (Topp et al., 2015).

Example item

“I have felt cheerful and in good spirits”

At no timeSome of the timeLess than half of the timeMore than half of the timeMost of the timeAll of the time

Illustrative only. During administration items are presented one screen-set at a time; response-key direction is never shown to respondents.

Scoring & interpretation

Responses are averaged onto a 0–100 scale and compared against published screening cutoffs.

The report explains which published screening bands your score falls in and what they mean.

References

Bech, P. (2004). Measuring the dimension of psychological general well-being by the WHO-5. Quality of Life Newsletter, 32, 15-16.
Topp, C. W., Ostergaard, S. D., Sondergaard, S., & Bech, P. (2015). The WHO-5 Well-Being Index: a systematic review of the literature. Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, 84(3), 167-176.

Sample report preview

The report shows your total score and where it falls across the range of possible scores, followed by a plain-language explanation of what scores in that region describe. Where the instrument has published interpretive bands, the report names the band and what it means. It closes with notes on how to read the result and on when a conversation with a qualified professional may be useful.

Report contents
Section	What it shows
Score	Your scale score, computed with the published scoring key.
Score bands	Where your score falls among the published bands listed on this page.

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