In 2023, Peru produced 2.6 million metric tons of copper. The ten leading countries in world copper production as of 2022 were Chile, Peru, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, China, the United States, Russia, Indonesia, Australia, Zambia, and Mexico.
Major countries in world copper production
Chile, the world's leading copper producer by far, produced an estimated 5.3 million metric tons of copper in 2023. In second place was Peru, with an estimated copper mine production of 2.6 million metric tons that same year. The world's third-largest copper producer from mines is China. In 2023, China produced an estimated 1.7 million metric tons of copper from mines, about a third of Chile's production.
The leading copper mines in the world
The largest copper mines in the world are located primarily in the largest copper producing nations in the world. As Chile is the world's largest producer of copper, it is not surprising that three of the world's ten largest copper mines based on capacity are located there. At the top of the list is the Escondida mine, located in the Atacama Desert in Chile's Antofa*gasta Region. It had a capacity of some 1.5 million metric tons of copper in 2022, which is nearly twice the capacity of the world's second-largest copper mine, located in Indonesia.
