A quintile is a statistical value that represents 20% of a given population. It is a type of quantile, which is defined as equal-sized segments of a population. Quintiles are used to create cut-off points for a given population, and a government-sponsored socio-economic study may use quintiles to determine the maximum wealth a family could possess in order to belong to the lowest quintile of society. Quintiles are often used in reference to economic differences by politicians and policy-makers, and health organizations sometimes use quintiles to show distributions of health statuses.

A population or sample divided into five equal groups, according to values of a particular variable, is called a quintile. The first quintile represents the lowest fifth of the data (1% to 20%), the second quintile represents the second fifth (21% to 40%), and so on. The top fifth (80% to 100%) is also called the upper quintile.

Quintiles are calculated by dividing data into fifths, which is similar to how you divide data to find a median. The procedure involves grouping the given data into five equal quantifiable numbers to determine a total from the given data. Secondly, measuring a certain quantity as a share of the total helps calculate the quintiles for any given data.

Quintiles are used to compare indicator values by comparing an economys position to other economies for which there are data. For example, if Germany falls within the second quintile for female business owners as a percentage of total business owners, it means that 20% of economies have a lower share of female business owners than Germany, and 60% of economies have a higher share of female business owners than Germany.