A man of 178 cm is taller than about 84% of the world’s men, but only 27% of Dutch men and 98% of Indian men. Say which pool before you say how tall.
Height is close to bell-shaped inside a country, with a spread of about 4% of the mean, and countries differ by far more than that: the average man is 182.5 cm in the Netherlands, 177.5 in the UK and 165 in India. The world is a mixture of all of them weighted by population, so its median man is about 169.5 cm and the same 178 cm sits at the 27th percentile in one place, the 84th in the world and the 98th in another. One spread above the mean is the 84th percentile; two is the 98th.
The country figures are means of adults born in 1996 and the spread is modelled, not measured, so the middle is good and the far tails are not. It uses sex but not age, and it is a description of a population: a percentile says nothing about health, ability or what you should be.
Estimate with the rule, then check it against the calculator that models it properly.
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