India, in Infographics: Environment
In Nearly 11 Years, Delhi Had 14 Good Air Days And 167 Severe Ones, 94% Of Them Between November And January
Every Day Of Delhi’s Air Quality Index Since 1 January 2016, From The CPCB’s Daily Bulletins, Coloured By Category. Hover Or Tap A Day.
Each Thin Bar Is One Day, Coloured By The CPCB Category Of Delhi’s 4 PM AQI. Hover Or Tap A Day For Its Value. Pick A Category To See Only Those Days. On A Phone, Each Year Is A Column Running From January At The Top To December At The Bottom.
Good Air Days
14
Of 3,937 With A Reading
Severe Days
167
94% In November To January
Very Poor Or Worse
886
23% Of All Days
Worst Day
497
6 November 2016
The Bottom Line
In 3,937 Days With A Reading Since 2016, Delhi’s Air Was Good On 14 And Severe On 167, 94% Of Those In November To January. The Yearly Average Has Eased From 256 To 200, But Every Winter Still Runs Very Poor To Severe.
What The Data Shows
Winter Is The Problem
Of 167 Severe Days Since 2016, 157 Fell In November, December Or January. The Worst Reading Was 497, On 6 November 2016.
Clean Air Is Rare
Delhi Had A “Good” Day, An AQI Of 50 Or Below, Only 14 Times, 10 Of Them In The July To September Monsoon. Even The Monsoon Is Mostly Satisfactory Or Moderate.
Slowly Less Bad
The Yearly Average Fell From 256 In 2016 To 200 In 2025, And Severe Days From 26 To 8. The Cleanest Full Year Was 2020, The Covid Lockdown Year, At 185.
Read With Care
One Number A Day
The Bulletin Value Is The Average Of The Past 24 Hours At 4 PM Across Delhi’s Monitoring Stations: 7 In The 1 January 2016 Bulletin, 59 In November 2026. Hourly Peaks Run Higher.
Missing Days
24 Days Have No Delhi Figure: The Bulletin Was Not Published, Posted A Server Notice, Or Left Delhi Out. They Are Shown In Grey.
Capped At 500
The Index Tops Out At 500, So The Worst Days Of Each Winter Look The Same On This Scale Even When Pollution Was Far Higher.
Sources & Method
Data
Every CPCB Daily AQI Bulletin From 1 January 2016 To 4 November 2026 Was Read Programmatically And Delhi’s Row Extracted; 26 Days Were Re-Checked Against Fresh Downloads. Categories Follow CPCB: Good 0 To 50, Satisfactory 51 To 100, Moderate 101 To 200, Poor 201 To 300, Very Poor 301 To 400, Severe 401 To 500.
Data: CPCB AQI Bulletins.
