 The lack of spatially accurate and detailed population distribution data poses a challenge to measuring the impact of population growth on society, economy and environment and tracking progress towards the United Nations sustainable development goals. The disaggregation method can obtain the spatial distribution of population with greater granularity by transforming statistical population data from irregular administrative units into regular grids while preserving the original population count. This paper discusses research advances in population disaggregation, its role in monitoring and evaluating SDG indicators, and proposes future work from two perspectives, challenges with spatial disaggregation and disaggregated population as an essential SDG variable. This article was authored by Yu Chou, Xu Ashing Jiao, Duchen Fan and others.