01 / Why this matters
Law can decide whether a life is protected, tolerated, or punished.
Legal status shapes safety, family, movement, and recognition. We start here because the global data is strongest.
Visual report / Public data / Updated 2026-06-05
Pride by
A data-led story about criminalisation laws, public evidence, and why a green map can still hide a harder question.
Photo: Raphael Renter / Unsplash. Data: ILGA World and legislation.gov.uk (© Crown copyright, Open Government Licence v3.0).
Scroll02 / What we looked at
We looked at 239 countries and territories.
Each dot is one country or territory. Hover any dot to see which one.
03 / No criminalisation
Of these, 172 record no criminalisation of same-sex acts.
That matters. But it is not the same as full equality, safety, or recognition.
04 / Criminalisation remains
But 53 still criminalise or restrict same-sex acts.
Penalties run from fines to prison. This is where the map stops being reassuring.
05 / The most severe
And 12 record the death penalty, or its possibility.
Here legal status is not abstract. It is a question of survival.
06 / Not so simple
And 2 are unclear, or vary by region.
One colour can hide a lot. In the US, for example, the law differs by state.
A world at a glance...
The map is useful. It is not enough.
Green does not mean equal.
Russia reads green here, yet bans “LGBT propaganda.” The UK reads green too. We wanted the story behind that colour.
So we ran the UK’s legislation through Parsewise
UK in depth · How the green was built
The UK’s rights did not arrive all at once,
everywhere, or finished.
Behind one green tile on the world map sits half a century of separate Acts of Parliament. We parsed the landmark laws with Parsewise to read the story straight from the statute books.
1967→201952 years · 9 landmark laws
Photo: Anna Kozlova / Pexels.
The legislation, in order
Fifty-two years, one law at a time.
Every row is a real Act or statutory instrument, parsed by Parsewise. Scroll to watch the same right reappear in different places, years apart.
United KingdomEngland & WalesScotlandNorthern Ireland
1967
Eng & WalesSexual Offences Act 1967
This law decriminalised homosexual acts in private between two consenting men aged twenty-one or over in England and Wales.
Section 1
2000
UK-wideSexual Offences (Amendment) Act 2000
This law established an equal age of consent for same-sex and opposite-sex acts by lowering it from eighteen to sixteen.
Section 1
2004
UK-wideGender Recognition Act 2004
This act introduced legal gender recognition, allowing transgender people to apply for a certificate to change their legal gender.
Section 9
2004
UK-wideCivil Partnership Act 2004
This Act introduced civil partnerships, a new legal relationship giving same-sex couples legal recognition and rights for the first time.
Section 1
2010
UK-wideEquality Act 2010
This law provided anti-discrimination protection based on sexual orientation, gender reassignment, and marriage and civil partnership.
Section 4
2013
Eng & WalesMarriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013
This Act made same-sex marriage lawful in England and Wales.
Section 1
2014
ScotlandMarriage and Civil Partnership (Scotland) Act 2014
This law legalised same-sex marriage in Scotland, giving same-sex couples the same right to marry as different-sex couples.
Section 4
2017
UK-widePolicing and Crime Act 2017
This law established a process to pardon and disregard historical convictions for abolished homosexual offences.
Section 101E
2019
N. IrelandThe Marriage (Same-sex Couples) and Civil Partnership (Opposite-sex Couples) (Northern Ireland) Regulations 2019
This law legalised same-sex marriage and opposite-sex civil partnerships in Northern Ireland.
Regulation 3
Source: legislation.gov.uk, © Crown copyright, Open Government Licence v3.0. Parsed with Parsewise.
Straight from the statute book
The receipts.
sexual-offences-act-1967.pdf
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1967Eng & Wales
Sexual Offences Act 1967
Parsewise highlighted · page 2
“An Act to amend the law of England and Wales relating to homosexual acts.”
Decriminalised private homosexual acts between two consenting men aged 21 or over, but only in England and Wales. Scotland waited until 1980, and Northern Ireland until 1982.
Section 1
civil-partnership-act-2004.pdf
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2004UK-wide
Civil Partnership Act 2004
Parsewise highlighted · page 1
“An Act to make provision for and in connection with civil partnership.”
Gave same-sex couples legal recognition for the first time, though as a separate status from marriage, which was still nine years away.
Section 1
gender-recognition-act-2004.docx
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2004UK-wide
Gender Recognition Act 2004
Parsewise highlighted · page 1
“An Act to make provision for and in connection with change of gender.”
Created the UK’s first legal route for transgender people to change their legally recognised gender.
Section 9
equality-act-2010.pdf
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2010UK-wide
Equality Act 2010
Parsewise highlighted · page 7
“12 Sexual orientation”
Made sexual orientation a protected characteristic, outlawing discrimination in work, services and public functions.
Section 4
marriage-ssc-ni-regulations-2019.pdf
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2019N. Ireland
The Marriage (Same-sex Couples) and Civil Partnership (Opposite-sex Couples) (Northern Ireland) Regulations 2019
Parsewise highlighted · page 7
“But a marriage between parties of the same sex may be solemnised”
Same-sex marriage reached Northern Ireland only in 2019, more than five years after England, Wales and Scotland. The map’s green arrived unevenly.
Regulation 3
“We can only see a short distance ahead, but we can see plenty there that needs to be done.”
Alan TuringConvicted in 1952. Pardoned in 2013.
Behind every dot, a document.Behind every document, a life.
A map can tell you where the world stands today. The documents behind it tell you how it got there, and how much is still unfinished.
Made withby the Parsewise team