How many Jehovah's Witnesses are there?

Question

Wikipedia claims that ~8 million Jehovah's Witnesses are engaged in evangelism, and their annual memorial of Christ's death has ~20 million attendees. But it doesn't exactly answer the question of how many members that Church has. My uninformed guess is that if there are 20 million attendees to the celebration, there could be up to 40-60 million witnesses (under the assumption that many of them not really actively practicing their faith).

So, how many Jehovah's Witnesses are there? Is there any official statistic? Who counts as a "member"?

Answer 1

According to this article there are three steps necessary to become one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. First is to learn what the Bible teaches by means of their free home Bible study program. Second is to put what they learn into practice.

Step 3: Get baptized. In the Bible, baptism is compared to a burial. (Compare Romans 6:2-4.) It serves as a symbol of dying to a past course of life and beginning a new one. Your baptism, then, is a public acknowledgment that you have completed the first two steps described by Jesus and are asking God for a clean conscience.—Hebrews 9:14; 1 Peter 3:21.

This question explains that before an unbaptized publisher is approved for baptism, they should attend congregation meetings and share in the work of spreading the message to other people and conducting home Bible studies with interested persons.

Previously, at the conclusion of the baptism talk, the speaker asked the baptism candidates to stand and answer the following two questions in a loud voice:

1. Have you repented of your sins, dedicated yourself to Jehovah, and accepted his way of salvation through Jesus Christ?

2. Do you understand that your baptism identifies you as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses in association with Jehovah’s organization?

Only after an associate has been baptized do they come under the authority of the Governing Body and the Elders and become recognized member of the organization.

During service years 1985, 1986, 1988 and 1990 over 155,000 Witnesses were disfellowshipped or "excluded" mainly for sexual immorality or gross misconduct. A Witness can only be disfellowshipped if they have been baptized.

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1986003#h=43

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1987683#h=16

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1989884#h=14

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1991843#h=36

The 2023 statistics show that 8.6 million people worldwide (annual average) have been recorded as associating with Jehovah's Witnesses based on the number who are actively engaged in proselytizing but that does not tell us how many are baptized members who are answerable to the organization.

Answer 2

There are 8,816,562 Jehovah's Witnesses according to their website. Jehovah's Witnesses members are:

... only those who are actively preaching the good news of God’s Kingdom each month.

...

...we count as Jehovah’s Witnesses only those who preach to others and who report that activity, not those who merely identify themselves as Witnesses.

So the membership count doesn't necessarily track all members just proselytizing ones.

Answer 3

From the Official 2023 Service Year Report of Jehovah’s Witnesses Worldwide: Grand Totals:

• Number of Lands Reporting: 239

• Total Congregations: 118,177

• Worldwide Memorial Attendance: 20,461,767

• Memorial Partakers Worldwide: 22,312

• Average Publishers Preaching Each Month: 8,625,042 [* JW note: A publisher refers to one who actively publishes, or preaches, the good news of God’s Kingdom according to Watchtower Society teaching. Last 5 words mine.]

• Peak of Publishers: 8,816,562 [* my note: once a year a special move is made to get interested people joining with JWs in their proselytising work.]

• Total Number Baptized: 269,517

These are some of the statistics on that official web-page. From it, the figure of 20,461,767 shows the total number of active Jehovah’s Witnesses including all others interested enough in them to come along to their annual ‘Memorial’ event. Of nearly 20 and a half million attenders, only 22,312 identified themselves as hoping to get to heaven (by partaking of the emblems of bread and wine). No others partook.

It seems safe to say that there are on average 8,625,042 active people who would consider themselves to be Jehovah's Witnesses, and that number would include all Memorial partakers. But given that there is a massive rise in numbers once a year at their Memorial, those additional ones could be considered as fringe, or occasional attenders plus newly interested people.