What Are the Most Common Mental Health Disorders?

July 23, 2026
, Anxiety, Depression, Mental Health

Summary: The most common mental health disorders are anxiety disorders and depressive disorders. Anxiety includes disorders like generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), social anxiety disorder (SAD), and specific phobias, while depressive disorders include major depressive disorder (MDD), dysthymia (PDD), and bipolar disorders (BD I&II).

Key Points:

Media outlets began reporting on increases in mental health disorders before the COVID-19 pandemic.
The pandemic may have exacerbated upward trends in prevalence for mental health disorders such as anxiety and depression.
New studies include prevalence trend data from 1990-2019 and 2019-2023, which allow us to assess the impact of COVID on mental health.
Understanding prevalence trends allows us to plan our treatment response now and in the near future.

Are We Really in a Mental Health Crisis?

If you follow health and wellness news online at all, you’ve probably seen your share of headlines warning about increasing mental health problems among virtually all age groups in the U.S. We can track the relevance of these headlines by referring to a series of public health advisories on mental health related topics published by the Office of the Surgeon General of the United States (OSG):

That’s an average of one mental health advisory per year over the past six (6) years. That leads to the logical conclusion that there must be something happening.

Is it a crisis? Is it an epidemic?

Those words may feel like an overstatement, but when suicide became a leading cause of death for young people age 10-24 in the 2010s, those words feel less like an exaggeration and more like a hard reality we need to face.

However, before we go further, we should find out whether the prevalence of mental health disorders is increasing. We have reliable data for prevalence both around the world and here in the U.S. That will help us understand whether using language like crisis and epidemic is appropriate or unnecessarily alarmist, and also allow us to report on what the most common mental health disorders are, both around the world and here in the U.S.

Mental Health Disorders: Data From the Global Burden of Disease (GBD) Studies

Researchers recently conducted large-scale review of the worldwide prevalence of mental health disorders based on data collected for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2023. The details on mental health in the publication “Updated Trends in the Global Prevalence and Burden of Mental Disorders, 1990–2023: A Systematic Analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2023” are the source of the global statistics we share below. Here’s how the study authors summarize their goal:

“The 2023 iteration of the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study (GBD) estimated prevalence, incidence, and health burden for 375 diseases and injuries, including 12 mental disorders. We assess past, current, and emerging trends in the prevalence and burden of mental disorders across sexes and age groups, for 21 regions, 204 countries and territories, from 1990 to 2023.”

The researchers cite the following impetus for focusing on mental health disorder data 2023 GBD:

“The Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries, and Risk Factors Study (GBD) 2021 estimated that 1·1 billion individuals across the globe were living with a mental disorder in 2021, making mental disorders the sixth-leading cause of all health burden and the second leading cause of disability globally across all ages.”

To establish accurate prevalence estimates, the research team gathered information from 50+ studies on mental disorders, over 2000 sources on prevalence, and 200+ additional general studies on the impact of mental health disorders and related factors. The publication includes the latest prevalence data and observed increase in prevalence of the following mental health disorders and conditions:

Anxiety disorders
Depressive disorders
Dysthymia
Bipolar disorders
Schizophrenia
Autism spectrum disorders
Conduct disorder
Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder
Eating disorders
Intellectual disabilities
Other mental health disorders

Let’s take a look at what they found.

Mental Health Disorders: Are They Increasing, Decreasing, or Staying the Same?

First, the general trends, which appear to indicate a steady increase over the past several decades.

Trends in Worldwide Mental Health Between 1990-2023

Totals:
- 1990: 599 million
- 2019: 970 million
- 2023: 1.17 billion
Worldwide increase 1990-2019: 61.9%
Worldwide increase 2019-2023: 20.62%
Total worldwide increase 1990-2023: 95.5%

That set of data contextualizes the prevalences and increases we’ve observed in the past several years. Prevalence of mental health disorders increased by 62 percent over 30 years (1990-2019), then increased 1/3^rd of that amount in just over 1/10^th the time (2019-2023).

That’s something that caught our attention, and which we should be concerned about. It supports the warnings we all heard before COVID and indicates that the pandemic may well have increased the rate at which mental health disorders are increasing worldwide.

The figures show the overall rate of mental health disorders is increasing with each passing year. Understanding these default facts on the ground can help us calibrate our expectations and prepare our resources for the changes and increases in patient needs implied by these steady, upward increasing trends.

Now let’s look at the prevalence and trends by disorder.

Mental Disorders Worldwide Between 1990-2023

Schizophrenia:

1990: 15 million
2023: 27 million
Increase: 79%

Major depressive disorder (MDD):

1990: 102 million
2023: 236 million
Increase: 131%

Dysthymia:

1990: 48 million
2023: 89 million
Increase: 85.6%

Bipolar disorders:

1990: 21 million
2023: 36 million
Increase: 68.7%

Anxiety disorders:

1990: 182 million
2023: 470 million
Increase: 158.6%

Anorexia nervosa:

1990: 2.5 million
2023: 4.0 million
Increase: 57.8%

Bulimia nervosa:

1990: 8.1 million
2023: 14 million
Increase: 75.1%

Autism spectrum disorders (ADHD):

1990: 30 million
2023: 52 million
Increase: 72.4%

Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD):

1990: 66 million
2023: 86 million
Increase: 31.1%

Conduct disorders:

1990: 31 million
2023: 40 million
Increase: 28%

Intellectual disability (IDID):

1990: 57 million
2023: 69 million
Increase: 21%

Other mental disorders:

1990: 70 million
2023: 128 million
Increase: 83%

Again, we see observational data supporting the idea we may well be in a mental health crisis or ongoing epidemic of poor mental health. Researchers observed significant increases in every major mental disorder and category of mental health disorder included in the study.

The Most Common Mental Health Disorders: Prevalence of Anxiety, Depression, Other Disorders

Now we’ll break down that data by order of prevalence in 2023, from greatest to least.

Mental Disorders in Order of Prevalence, 2023

Anxiety disorders: 470 million
Depressive disorders: 236 million
Other: 128 million
Dysthymia: 89 million
Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD): 86 million
Intellectual disability (IDID): 69 million
Autism spectrum disorders (ADHD): 52 million
Conduct disorders: 40 million
Bipolar disorders: 36 million
Schizophrenia: 27 million
Bulimia nervosa: 14 million
Anorexia nervosa: 0 million

The most common mental health disorders are anxiety and depression, followed by other, dysthymia (mild but persistent depression), and attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Those figures are eye-opening: combined, over half a billion people on earth report a diagnosis of anxiety or depression, with another half billion reporting the presence of one or more of the less common mental health disorders.

Do we call this a crisis?

We’ll reserve judgment on what to call our current situation. What we do know is that millions of people need professional support every day. We’ll look at the data for the U.S. in a moment. First, we’ll break down that data by percentage of increase from 1990-2023, from largest to smallest.

Mental Disorders by Size of Increase, 1990-2023

Anxiety disorders:6%
Depressive disorders: 131%
Dysthymia: 85.6%
Other: 83%
Schizophrenia: 79%
Bulimia: 75%
Autism spectrum disorders: 72.4%
Bipolar disorders: 68.7%
Anorexia: 57.8%
ADHD: 31.1%
Conduct disorders: 28%
Intellectual disability: 21%

These data align with the prevalence data for the first three categories, after which they diverge. In contrast to prevalence data, the researchers observed greater increases in schizophrenia, eating disorders, and autism spectrum disorders than the expected increases in ADHD, intellectual disabilities, and conduct disorders.

The Most Common Mental Health Disorders in the U.S.

We covered the world. Now let’s look closer to home, and find out what the most common mental health disorder are here at home.

Here’s the latest data from 2024 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (2024 NSDUH), an annual nationwide survey over 70,000 U.S. citizens that’s our standard reference source for mental health facts and figures.

First, the big-picture mental health data in the U.S.

Adults With Any Mental Illness (AMI) in 2024 in the U.S.:

Any mental illness: 23.4%
- Serious mental illness: 5.6%
Past two-week anxiety:
- Mild: 14.3%
- Moderate: 4.7%
- Severe: 2.7%
Past year depression:
- Moderate: 8.2%
- Serious: 5.6%

Now let’s look at the prevalence of mental health disorders among U.S. adults from most to least common.

Mental Health Disorders in U.S. in Order of Prevalence

Sources: Mental and Substance Use Disorders Prevalence Study (MDPS), 2024 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (2024 NSDUH), The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), The National Alliance on Mental lllness (NAMI)

Anxiety Disorders: 19.1%
Major Depressive Disorder: 15.5%
Co-occurring Substance Use Disorder and Mental Illness: 8.1%
Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: 4.1%
Bipolar Disorder: 2.8%
Bipolar I Disorder: 1.5%
Borderline Personality Disorder: 1.4%
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder: 1.2%
Schizophrenia Spectrum Disorders: 1.2%
Schizophrenia: less than 1%

Our prevalence figures in the U.S. mirror, for the most part, those reported in the Global Burden of Disease (GBD) reports. The data from the U.S. includes data on addiction and disorders like PTSD and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), which were not measured in the GBD data.

Despite these differences, what looking at the U.S. and world data side by side shows us is that we’re all facing similar challenges:

Anxiety and depression are increasing everywhere researchers look and count.

In closing, we’ll elaborate on why that’s news we can handle.

Effective Treatment for Mental Health Disorders

Anxiety and depression are the most common mental health disorders: that’s the answer to the question we pose in the title of this article. We can handle that news because anxiety and depression are the disorders we have the most experience in treating, and they’re also the two mental health disorders for which treatment consistently works.

We know that with a combination of psychotherapy, medication when needed, family support, lifestyle changes like healthy eating, exercise, improved sleep hygiene, and complementary supports like stress reduction, education, and expressive therapies, we can help patients even with severe anxiety and depression manage symptoms and live a full and productive life.

In addition, with recent developments in areas like precision psychiatry, psychedelic psychotherapy, the potential of medications like ketamine, psilocybin, and Spravato®, and the success of brain stimulation technologies like transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) in helping patients with treatment-resistant depression and depression with suicidality, we know we’re ready to help patients with the most common mental health disorders get the treatment they need to live the life they want.

We know we can help because we see success every day. If you’re one of the millions of people with a common mental health disorder such as anxiety or depression, we’re ready to help. And if you have a less common mental health disorder, such as schizophrenia, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), or post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), we know how to help you, too.

Finding Help: Resources

If you or someone you know needs professional treatment and support for a mental health disorder in the San Diego area, please contact us here at Crownview Medical. If you’re not in the San Diego area, you can find support through the following online resources:

The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI): Find a Professional
The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH): Finding Treatment
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA): Finding Help
American Psychiatric Association (APA): Treatment Locator
SAMHSA: Early Serious Mental Illness Treatment Locator

Angus Whyte

Angus Whyte has an extensive background in neuroscience, behavioral health, adolescent development, and mindfulness, including lab work in behavioral neurobiology and a decade of writing articles on mental health and mental health treatment. In addition, Angus brings twenty years of experience as a yoga teacher and experiential educator to his work for Crownview. He’s an expert at synthesizing complex concepts into accessible content that helps patients, providers, and families understand the nuances of mental health treatment, with the ultimate goal of improving outcomes and quality of life for all stakeholders.