WHO-5 Well-Being Index
WHO-5Permission: Free for research use. Free for non-commercial academic research, with no licence fee. Cite the original publication.
A 5-item self-report scale of subjective psychological well-being over the past two weeks; brief and widely used as a depression screen.
Ready-to-cite methods sentence
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Run WHO-5 in Folio Surveyor
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Reliability & validation
Response anchors
At no time · Some of the time · Less than half of the time · More than half of the time · Most of the time · All of the time
Known limitations
Free to use with copyright acknowledgment (WHO). Very brief; a low score is a screen, not a diagnosis, and ceiling effects occur in generally healthy samples.
Original citation
World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe (1998). Wellbeing measures in primary health care/The DepCare Project: Report on a WHO meeting, Stockholm, Sweden, 12-13 February 1998. WHO Regional Office for Europe.
Questions researchers ask
What does the WHO-5 measure?
A 5-item self-report scale of subjective psychological well-being over the past two weeks; brief and widely used as a depression screen.
How many items does the WHO-5 have?
The WHO-5 Well-Being Index (WHO-5) has 5 items.
Is the WHO-5 free to use?
The WHO-5 is free to use for non-commercial academic research. You don't need to pay a license fee, but you should always cite the original publication.
Who developed the WHO-5, and how do I cite it?
World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe (1998). Wellbeing measures in primary health care/The DepCare Project: Report on a WHO meeting, Stockholm, Sweden, 12-13 February 1998. WHO Regional Office for Europe.
Related scales
Library entry verified September 2026. Metadata is provided for reference; item wording is available inside Folio Surveyor, subject to each instrument's licensing.