'Yes we did' Barack Obama reflects on his time as president

US President Barack Obama has summed up his time in the White House ahead of Donald Trump's inauguration on 20 January, stating "yes we did".

The Democrat made his comments in an interview with NBC News' Lester Holt, during which he said his spirit was unchanged as he watched footage of himself on his victorious election night in 2008.

Holt showed Obama a clip of an elated crowd chanting "yes we can", and asked Obama "did you?", to which the president responded "yes we did", echoing comments he made during his farewell speech.

"That idealism hasn't left," Obama explained to Holt.

"Look, I'm grayer. People like to note the additional wrinkles. But my spirit is unchanged. It's undaunted. I continue to believe that, as frustrating as sometimes it can be, American democracy moves the ball forward."

The president outlined his achievements during the past eight years, in particular the introduction of the Affordable Care Act, which is facing repeal under Trump.

"If you had told me at the beginning of my presidency that eight years later, the economy would be stabilised, we would have cut unemployment in half from its peak, that the stock market would've recovered – if you told me that we provided 20 million people health insurance that didn't have it before, I would've said, 'We did OK,'" Obama said

The Obamas are set to leave the White House on the morning of the inauguration, giving staff just six hours to remove the Obamas' possessions and set up for the arrival of Trump.