A systematic review has used data from the Global Burden of Diseases, Injuries and Risk Factors Study to report the burden of gastro-oesophageal reflux disease (GERD) in 195 countries between 1990 and 2017. From 144 location-years of prevalence data, a mean estimate of age-standardized prevalence for all locations in 2017 was determined, ranging between 4,408–14,035 cases per 100,000 population. The highest values were in the USA, Italy, Greece and New Zealand, and the lowest were in high-income Asia Pacific regions, east Asia and European countries including France, Iceland, Denmark and Switzerland. Although global age-standardized prevalence was stable between 1990 and 2017, the all-age prevalence increased by 18.1%, suggesting that the epidemiology of GERD has not changed but that the burden of disease is increasing as a result of ageing and population growth.