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My grandmother has a morbid sense of humour not untypical of the English. She used to quip that she wouldn’t live to receive her state pension, insisting that “everyone in our family dies before 65.” Imagine our delight, and her bemusement, when we all got together last month to celebrate her 90th birthday.

Perhaps she should’ve expected a good innings. There has been a remarkable increase in life expectancy in recent decades in much of the world. To see how to eke out more years still, researchers often look at places with a high proportion of old people. One such study formed the basis of our recent article on why Australians appear to outlive their Anglophone peers. Read it, and other stories on longevity, to see if you should expect to attend more nonagenarians’ birthday parties in future—perhaps even your own.

Michelle Hennessy, Graphic detail editor

Editor’s picks

Why do Australians live so long?

A new study finds they far outlive people in other English-speaking countries

Living to 120 is becoming an imaginable prospect

Efforts to slow ageing are taking wing

Why southern Europeans will soon be the longest-lived people in the world

Diet and exercise, but also urban design and social life

How to live to one hundred

Have good genes and move to East Devon

What strategies actually work to fight dying?

A prominent biologist tackles a morbid topic

Can fasting help you live to 100?

An Italian doctor thinks it can – and he’s got a diet to sell you

Places claiming to be centenarian hotspots may just have bad data

Adopting birth certificates appears to cut the lifespans of the very old