Continued warming intensifies heatwaves, burdening human health across Asia. Given the distinct vulnerabilities to heat exposure between urban and rural populations, we project future changes in summer heatwave exposure and assess urban–rural exposure inequity throughout 2021–2100 under SSP1-2.6, SSP2-4.5, and SSP5-8.5 scenarios across 18 Asian countries. Results suggest substantial exposure increases in the future against the baseline, primarily driven by climate change. With ongoing urbanization, urban–rural exposure inequity will continuously rise, with India and China emerging as the hardest-hit countries. Generally, urban and rural population exposures tend to increase in the future, whereas urban will contribute 76 % of the total growth on average during 2021–2060 and 90 % during 2061–2100. This inequity can be largely derived from the disparity in urban–rural compounding effects induced by simultaneous changes in climate and population. Furthermore, a novel normalized index is developed to potentially indicate the relative need for developing and implementing future country-level heatwave adaptation measures between urban and rural. Our findings highlight the necessity for tailored adaptation strategies for individual countries, prioritizing the urban for China, Japan, South Korea, North Korea, and Malaysia, and equal emphasis placed on implementing heatwave adaptation measures in rural as in urban for Mongolia, as well as Nepal, Bangladesh, and Cambodia under SSP2-4.5. Additionally, incorporating age structures reveals that future population aging will narrow the urban–rural adaptation needs for elderly (60+) adults while widening those for younger (<60) adults. We also emphasize the uncertainty of future exposure changes and their urban–rural inequity, which should be considered for decision-making. Our findings can inform future country-level planning of targeted heatwave adaptations in both urban and rural to cope with continuously increasing heatwave risks. The proposed method can also help assess future exposure inequity to other climate risks between urban and rural populations, which is critical for prioritizing resources and promoting equity in urban–rural climate adaptation policy.
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