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The world of international development assistance is in the midst of three concomitant revolutions, leading to the emergence of a truly global policy. First, the goals that development aid is asked to pursue have been broadened. Financing access to essential services and protecting global public goods have gradually been added to its traditional objective of ushering convergence between less and more developed economies. Second, faced with this new array of challenges, the world of development aid has demonstrated an impressive capacity to increase the number and diversity of its players. Third, following innovations in mainstream financial markets, the instruments used have themselves mushroomed. Surprisingly, however, this triple revolution in goals, actors and tools is yet to impact the way we measure the financial volumes dedicated to this emerging global policy and the concrete impacts it aims to achieve. This paper argues for the need to move from the conventional measure of official development assistance to the construction of clearer benchmarks for what ultimately matters: resources and results that are fit for international development in the twenty-first century.