More than 107,000 people in the United States are currently on the national organ transplant waiting list. Globally, at least 668,160 patients were actively waitlisted across 75 countries in 2024, and even that number underestimates the real need since many countries lack formal tracking systems. Every 8 minutes, another person is added to the U.S. list.
Waiting List by Organ Type
Kidneys dominate the waiting list by a wide margin. As of December 2025, 94,015 people were waiting for a kidney, making up roughly 87% of all candidates. The liver waiting list had 9,022 candidates, followed by the heart at 3,929 and the lung at 977. Smaller numbers of people wait for pancreas, intestine, and multi-organ combinations, but these four organs account for the vast majority.
The kidney’s outsized share reflects several realities. Chronic kidney disease is extremely common, driven largely by diabetes and high blood pressure. Dialysis can keep patients alive for years, which means people accumulate on the list rather than being removed. And while kidneys can come from living donors (you only need one to live a healthy life), the supply still falls far short of demand.
How Long the Wait Typically Lasts
Wait times vary dramatically depending on which organ you need, your blood type, your geographic region, and how sick you are. Kidney candidates face the longest waits. The median wait time for a kidney fell to about 4 years as of 2021-2022, down from a peak of over 5 years between 2015 and 2018. That improvement is real, but 4 years on dialysis takes a serious toll on the body.
Hearts and lungs tend to move faster through the list because patients waiting for these organs are often critically ill and prioritized accordingly. Liver allocation also factors in medical urgency. But “faster” is relative. Even weeks or months of waiting can be dangerous when your heart or lungs are failing.
The Gap Between Supply and Demand
In 2024, the U.S. performed 48,149 organ transplants, a record high and a 23.3% increase over the previous five years. Of those, 41,119 came from deceased donors and 7,030 from living donors. That’s real progress, but it still means fewer than half the people on the waiting list received a transplant in a given year.
The consequence of that gap is measurable in lives lost. In 2023, an average of 13 people died each day while waiting for a transplant. That’s actually an improvement from 16 deaths per day in 2021, reflecting both the increase in available organs and policy changes in how organs are allocated. Still, roughly 31,853 patients died while on waiting lists worldwide in 2024 alone.
Racial Disparities on the Waiting List
Black Americans make up about 13% of the U.S. population but 27% of all organ transplant candidates. The disparity is sharpest for kidneys, where Black patients represent 29% of those waiting. This is largely because Black Americans experience higher rates of the conditions that cause kidney failure, including diabetes, high blood pressure, and certain genetic kidney diseases.
The imbalance isn’t just about who needs organs. It also affects who donates them. Black Americans account for roughly 13% of organ donors. Because tissue matching plays a role in transplant success, particularly for kidneys, a smaller donor pool can mean longer wait times and fewer compatible matches for Black patients. This creates a cycle where the communities with the greatest need face the most difficulty getting transplants.
For liver transplants, the racial picture looks different. Black patients make up about 6% of liver candidates, closer to their share of the general population. Heart transplant candidates show a pattern similar to kidneys, with Black patients representing nearly 29% of those waiting.
Why the Global Numbers Are Likely Much Higher
The 668,160 patients waitlisted globally in 2024 came from just 75 countries that formally track and report transplant data. Much of Africa, South Asia, and Southeast Asia either lacks transplant infrastructure entirely or doesn’t maintain waiting lists in the way that wealthier countries do. The World Health Organization and the Global Observatory on Donation and Transplantation have consistently noted that official waiting list figures underestimate the true demand for organs worldwide.
In many countries, patients who would benefit from a transplant never get listed because the surgery simply isn’t available to them. The gap between people who could be saved by a transplant and people who actually receive one is far wider than any waiting list can capture.