Germany Population in 2026
Germany is the most populous country in the European Union and the nineteenth most populous in the world — but it is living through one of the most consequential demographic crises in its modern history. According to Destatis (the Federal Statistical Office of Germany), the country’s population stood at 83,467,117 on 31 December 2025, the most recent official count. Broader estimates incorporating mid-year 2026 projections from the United Nations World Population Prospects 2024 Revision put the figure at approximately 83.6–84 million, with worldpopulationclock.net — drawing on both Destatis and UN data — placing residents at approximately 84 million in mid-2026. Germany remains the EU’s largest member state by population, representing 1.01% of the total global population and 11.25% of Europe’s population. The demographic story underneath that headline figure is stark. Germany registered approximately 654,300 births in 2025 — the lowest number since 1946, the first full year after World War II — while deaths reached approximately 1.01 million. The resulting birth deficit of roughly 352,000 is the largest in Germany’s postwar recorded history, according to Destatis’s April 2026 report. This was the 53rd consecutive year in which Germany recorded more deaths than births.
Immigration is the sole mechanism keeping Germany’s population from contracting sharply. Net migration of approximately +320,000 per year partially offsets the natural decrease of around −370,000, producing a total net population change of roughly −50,000 annually — meaning the country is in marginal overall decline despite substantial immigration inflows. The baby boomer generation is currently transitioning from working life to retirement, creating what Destatis’s 16th coordinated population projection — presented on 11 December 2025 — describes as an imminent structural shift: by 2035, one in four Germans will be aged 67 or over, compared to one in five today. Between 20.5 and 21.3 million people are projected to be of pensionable age in Germany by 2038 — an increase of 3.8 to 4.5 million from 2024 levels. Under a moderate scenario, Germany’s population by 2070 is projected at 74.7 million, with a range of 63.9 to 86.5 million across all 27 projection variants.
Interesting Facts: Germany Population 2026
| Fact | Figure |
|---|---|
| Official population (Destatis, 31 Dec 2025) | 83,467,117 |
| UN WPP mid-2026 estimate | ~83,644,258 |
| World population rank | 19th |
| EU population rank | 1st (most populous EU state) |
| Germany as % of world population | 1.01% |
| Germany as % of Europe’s population | 11.25% |
| Population density | 240 people per km² |
| Total land area | 348,560 km² |
| Annual births (2025, Destatis) | ~654,300 |
| Annual deaths (2025, Destatis) | ~1.01 million |
| Birth deficit (2025) | ~352,000 — largest in postwar history |
| Consecutive years of natural population decrease | 53 (since 1972) |
| Total fertility rate (2024, Destatis) | 1.35 children per woman |
| Net migration per year (est.) | ~+320,000 |
| Total net population change per year | ~−50,000 |
| Median age (2026) | ~46.7 years |
| Male/female split | 49.38% male / 50.62% female |
| Life expectancy at birth | 81.5 years (79.2 male / 83.9 female) |
| Urban population share | ~75.7–77% |
| People with foreign background (2025) | 31.1% of population |
| Largest religion (2026) | No religion / unaffiliated — 39.3% |
| German ethnicity share | ~85.4% |
| Population aged 65+ (2024) | ~22% |
| Projected population aged 67+ by 2035 | 1 in 4 (25%) |
| Projected population 2070 (moderate scenario) | 74.7 million |
Source: Destatis (Federal Statistical Office of Germany) press release December 11, 2025 (16th Coordinated Population Projection); Destatis press release April 29, 2026 (2025 births/deaths); Destatis press release July 17, 2025 (2024 TFR 1.35); Wikipedia Demographics of Germany (citing Destatis 31 Dec 2025); WorldPopulationReview.com 2026 (UN WPP 2024 source); Worldometer 2026 (UN WPP 2024 elaboration); worldpopulationclock.net (Destatis + UN data)
The 31.1% foreign background share — reported by Destatis’s 2025 microcensus — is one of the most significant demographic facts about modern Germany. That category is deliberately broad: it includes foreign nationals, naturalised citizens, ethnic German repatriates from Eastern Europe, and the children of all these groups. It reflects the sustained immigration inflows since the 1990s, the mass arrival of over a million asylum seekers primarily from Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan after 2015, and the subsequent arrival of over a million Ukrainian refugees after 2022. Together, these waves have fundamentally reshaped the German population’s composition. The 2024 microcensus found that after German (spoken at home by 81.34% of residents), the most widely spoken languages at home were Turkish (2.61%), Russian (2.27%), Arabic (1.70%), English (1.26%), and Polish (1.19%), each with over one million speakers — a linguistic map of a century of migration.
The TFR of 1.35 in 2024 — confirmed by Destatis in July 2025 — is the lowest recorded since 2012 and represents a 2% fall from the 1.38 figure in 2023, following sharper declines of 8% and 7% in 2022 and 2023 respectively. Destatis noted that the pace of decline “slowed significantly” in 2024, but the absolute level remains dramatically below the 2.1 replacement threshold. The average age at first birth for women has risen to approximately 30.5 years — several years higher than two decades ago — compressing the childbearing window further. Germany last recorded a natural population increase in 1971, meaning the country has now run a natural population deficit for over half a century, sustained entirely by immigration.
Germany Population by Federal State in 2026
Population by Federal State (Largest States, Destatis 2025 estimates)
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North Rhine-Westphalia |████████████████████████████████████████| ~18.0 million
Bavaria |████████████████████████████ | ~13.5 million
Baden-Württemberg |████████████████████████ | ~11.3 million
Lower Saxony |████████████████ | ~8.1 million
Hesse |████████████ | ~6.4 million
Berlin |████████████ | ~3.9 million
Saxony |████████ | ~4.0 million
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16 federal states total | Source: Destatis / worldpopulationclock.net 2026
| Federal State | Population (2025/2026 est.) | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| North Rhine-Westphalia | ~18.0 million | Most populous state |
| Bavaria | ~13.5 million | Second most populous |
| Baden-Württemberg | ~11.3 million | Third most populous |
| Lower Saxony | ~8.1 million | Fourth |
| Hesse | ~6.4 million | Fifth |
| Berlin | ~3.9 million | Capital city-state |
| Saxony | ~4.0 million | Largest eastern state |
| Saxony-Anhalt | Declining fastest (eastern) | Ageing + emigration |
| Thuringia | Declining (eastern) | Ageing + emigration |
| Brandenburg | Declining (eastern) | Ageing + emigration |
| Hamburg | Only state with birth increase (2025) | +0.5% |
| Mecklenburg-W. Pomerania | Steepest birth fall (2025) | −8.4% |
Source: worldpopulationclock.net (Destatis + UN WPP 2024 data); Christian Daily International, April 29, 2026 (citing Destatis 2025 state-level birth data)
North Rhine-Westphalia at approximately 18 million residents is Germany’s most populous state and one of Europe’s most densely populated regions — home to the industrial Ruhr Valley, the cities of Cologne, Düsseldorf, and Dortmund, and a large proportion of Germany’s Turkish-origin community, which arrived as Gastarbeiter (guest workers) from the 1960s. Bavaria at 13.5 million is the second largest and consistently among Germany’s strongest economic performers, hosting BMW, Siemens, and Allianz headquarters alongside a high-tech corridor stretching south of Munich.
The East-West demographic divide persists three and a half decades after reunification. Eastern states — Saxony-Anhalt, Thuringia, and Brandenburg — are ageing and declining fastest, combining a structural deficit from the birth collapse of the early 1990s (when the eastern TFR briefly fell to 0.772 in 1994) with continued emigration of younger workers to western Germany and abroad. The 2025 Destatis state-level birth data confirmed the divergence dramatically: Hamburg was the only state to post birth growth (+0.5%), while Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania recorded the steepest fall at −8.4%. Eastern Germany’s birth decline of 4.5% in 2025 outpaced western Germany’s 3.2%, continuing a pattern that population projections suggest will produce pronounced regional depopulation in eastern states well before 2050.
Germany Age Structure and Ageing Population in 2026
Germany Population Age Structure — 2026 (UN WPP / Destatis)
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0–14 years |████████████ | ~13%
15–64 years |██████████████████████████████████████████ | ~63–65%
65+ years |████████████████████████ | ~22%
67+ years |██████████████████████ | ~20% (1 in 5)
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Median age: ~46.7 years | Global median: 31 years
By 2035: 1 in 4 Germans will be 67+ | Source: Destatis 16th Projection, Dec 2025
| Age Structure Metric | Data |
|---|---|
| Median age (2026) | ~46.7 years |
| Global median age comparison | 31 years |
| Population under 15 | ~13% |
| Population aged 15–64 | ~63–65% |
| Population aged 65+ | ~22% (~18.4 million) |
| Population aged 67+ (2024) | 1 in 5 |
| Population aged 67+ (2035 projection) | 1 in 4 |
| People of pensionable age in 2038 | 20.5–21.3 million |
| Increase in pensionable-age population to 2038 | +3.8 to +4.5 million |
| Annual births (2025) | ~654,300 (lowest since 1946) |
| Annual deaths (2025) | ~1.01 million |
| Daily births (2026 est.) | ~1,889 |
| Daily deaths (2026 est.) | ~2,854 |
| Daily net migration | ~+434 |
| Net daily population change | ~−531 |
Source: Destatis 16th Coordinated Population Projection, December 11, 2025; Destatis birth/death 2025 press release (Christian Daily International, April 29, 2026); WorldPopulationReview.com 2026 daily rates (UN WPP 2024)
Germany’s median age of approximately 46.7 years is among the highest of any large country in the world — reflecting a demographic structure built by decades of below-replacement fertility combined with rising life expectancy. The country’s 22% share of residents aged 65 and over will rise to 25% by 2035 according to Destatis’s December 2025 projections — at which point the baby boomer generation, born between roughly 1955 and 1969, will have fully entered retirement. Between 20.5 and 21.3 million people are projected at pensionable age in Germany by 2038, compared to approximately 17 million today.
The pension and healthcare financing implications are profound. Germany’s pay-as-you-go pension system depends on an active workforce making contributions that fund current pensioners. As the ratio of workers to retirees narrows — driven by smaller cohorts born in the 1990s now entering their childbearing years but not producing enough children to replace themselves — pressure on the statutory pension system and long-term care insurance will intensify through the 2030s and 2040s. The Destatis projection’s 27-variant range of 63.9 to 86.5 million by 2070 reflects how dramatically different immigration policies could produce divergent outcomes, with only two of the 27 variants showing any population increase by 2070, both requiring high net migration combined with a marked increase in the birth rate.
Germany Migration and Foreign Population in 2026
Germany Foreign Background and Migration (2025, Destatis)
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People with foreign background |████████████████████████████████| 31.1% (~26M)
Foreign nationals (non-citizens) |████████████████████ | ~13–14%
Net migration per year |████████████████████████████████| ~+320,000
Annual immigration |████████████████████████████████████████████| ~1.1–1.2M
Annual emigration |██████████████████████████████ | ~800–900K
Ukrainian refugees (since 2022) |████████████████████████████ | ~1M+
Syrian/Middle East arrivals (post-2015) |████████████████ | 1M+ cumulative
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Top home languages after German: Turkish, Russian, Arabic, English, Polish
Source: Destatis 2025 microcensus; Wikipedia Demographics of Germany
| Migration Metric | Data |
|---|---|
| People with foreign background (2025 microcensus) | 31.1% of population |
| Net migration (annual estimate) | ~+320,000 |
| Annual births (in Germany) by non-German citizen mothers (2023) | 27.75% |
| Top home language after German | Turkish (2.61%) |
| Second language at home | Russian (2.27%) |
| Third | Arabic (1.70%) |
| Fourth | English (1.26%) |
| Fifth | Polish (1.19%) |
| Post-2015 Syrian/Iraqi/Afghan asylum inflow | Over 1 million |
| Ukrainian refugee inflow post-2022 | Over 1 million |
| Destatis foreign population tables (latest) | 31 December 2025 |
| Population growth without immigration since 2015 | Would have declined significantly |
Source: Wikipedia Demographics of Germany citing Destatis 2025 microcensus; Destatis Foreign Population tables 31 December 2025; worldpopulationclock.net (Destatis + BAMF data 2026)
Germany has absorbed two of Europe’s largest refugee waves in a single decade: more than a million asylum seekers primarily from Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan after 2015, and more than a million Ukrainian refugees after Russia’s February 2022 invasion. Both inflows added to a sustained background level of EU labour migration — primarily from Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, and Italy — that has driven the foreign background share from approximately 20% in 2010 to 31.1% by 2025. A Destatis analysis confirmed that without the increased immigration since 2015, Germany’s population would have declined significantly well before 2026. Immigration has not merely offset natural decrease — it has been the sole driver of any population growth at all.
In 2023, 27.75% of all babies born in Germany were born to mothers without German citizenship, reflecting both the size of the foreign-born population and its younger age structure. The 2024 microcensus found that nearly 96% of births to mothers with European non-German citizenship in 2023 came from EU countries, while 13.84% of all births were to mothers with citizenship from countries outside Europe and Turkey — indicating a diverse and growing range of origin countries contributing to Germany’s birth statistics. The top five home languages data — Turkish, Russian, Arabic, English, Polish, each with over one million speakers — gives a more granular picture of the communities that make up Germany’s 31% foreign-background population.
Germany’s Largest Cities in 2026
Germany's Largest Cities by Population (2025/2026 estimates)
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Berlin |████████████████████████████████████████████████| ~3.9 million
Hamburg |████████████████████████ | ~1.9 million
Munich |█████████████████████████ | ~1.55 million
Cologne |████████████████████ | ~1.1 million
Frankfurt |█████████████████ | ~775,000
Stuttgart |████████████████ | ~630,000
Düsseldorf|████████████████ | ~620,000
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Urban population: ~75.7–77% | Source: Destatis / worldpopulationclock.net 2026
| City | Population (2025/2026 est.) | Federal State |
|---|---|---|
| Berlin | ~3.9 million | City-state; capital |
| Hamburg | ~1.9 million | City-state; only 2025 birth growth |
| Munich | ~1.55 million | Bavaria |
| Cologne | ~1.1 million | North Rhine-Westphalia |
| Frankfurt am Main | ~775,000 | Hesse; EU financial hub |
| Stuttgart | ~630,000 | Baden-Württemberg |
| Düsseldorf | ~620,000 | North Rhine-Westphalia |
| Leipzig | ~625,000 | Saxony; eastern growth exception |
| Dortmund | ~590,000 | North Rhine-Westphalia |
| Dresden | ~560,000 | Saxony |
| Urban population share | ~75.7–77% | — |
Source: worldpopulationclock.net Germany federal state data (Destatis + UN WPP 2024); Destatis current population tables 2025
Berlin at approximately 3.9 million residents is Germany’s capital, largest city, and most internationally diverse urban centre. Its population includes one of the largest Turkish-origin communities outside Turkey — a legacy of the Gastarbeiter programme that brought hundreds of thousands of Turkish workers to West Berlin in the 1960s and 1970s — as well as substantial communities from the Middle East, Southeast Europe, and increasingly East Africa. Hamburg, at approximately 1.9 million, was the notable demographic outlier in 2025: the only German state to record birth growth (+0.5%), driven by its younger and more internationally mobile population.
Munich continues its trajectory as Germany’s most economically dynamic major city, with consistently strong inward migration from across Europe and beyond, driven by the concentration of tech, automotive, financial, and insurance sector employers in the broader metropolitan area. Frankfurt functions as Germany’s financial capital and the home of the European Central Bank, with an exceptionally high proportion of non-German residents — approximately 30% of Frankfurt’s population holds foreign citizenship, the highest share of any major German city. Leipzig stands out among eastern cities as one of the few that has managed sustained population growth since 2000, driven by an arts and culture scene and lower costs of living that have attracted younger residents.
Germany Population Projections and Future Trends in 2026
Germany Population Projections — Destatis 16th Projection (Dec 2025)
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2026 (now) |████████████████████████████████████████████████████| ~84 million
2030 (UN) |████████████████████████████████████████████████████| ~84.5 million (peak)
2040 |████████████████████████████████████████████████████| ~83 million (est.)
2050 |████████████████████████████████████████████████ | ~82 million
2070 (moderate)|████████████████████████████████████████████ | 74.7 million
2070 (low) |████████████████████████████████████████ | 63.9 million
2070 (high) |████████████████████████████████████████████████████| 86.5 million
2100 (UN medium)|████████████████████████████████████████ | ~71 million
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Source: Destatis 16th Coordinated Population Projection, Dec 2025; UN WPP 2024
| Projection Metric | Data |
|---|---|
| Population 2026 (current) | ~83.6–84 million |
| Projected peak (UN WPP 2024 medium) | ~84.5 million by 2030 |
| Projected population 2050 | ~82 million |
| Projected population 2070 (moderate) | 74.7 million |
| Projected population 2070 (range all variants) | 63.9–86.5 million |
| Projected population 2100 (UN medium) | ~71 million |
| Previous 2022 projection for 2070 | 70.2–94.4 million |
| Downward revision reason | Declined net immigration + reduced birth rate |
| Variants showing population increase by 2070 | 2 of 27 (high migration + high fertility) |
| Population without any immigration since 2015 | Would have declined significantly |
Source: Destatis 16th Coordinated Population Projection, press release December 11, 2025; UN World Population Prospects 2024 Revision (via Worldometer / worldpopulationclock.net)
Germany’s 16th coordinated population projection, presented by Destatis in December 2025, delivered a notably more pessimistic outlook than its 2022 predecessor. The projected 2070 range of 63.9–86.5 million compares to the previous projection’s 70.2–94.4 million — a downward shift driven by two compounding factors: the continued decline of the fertility rate since 2022 and a reduction in net immigration in recent years as Germany’s asylum and migration policies tightened under successive coalition agreements. The moderate scenario projection of 74.7 million by 2070 implies a loss of roughly 9–10 million residents from today’s level over 44 years.
Only two of the 27 projection variants show any population increase by 2070, and both require a combination of high net migration — substantially above current levels — and a marked increase in the birth rate, which current trends do not suggest is forthcoming. The Destatis team explicitly noted that the revisions from the 2022 projection reflect changed baseline conditions: smaller starting immigration inflows and a lower fertility rate entering the projection period. For Germany’s pension and social security system, the implications of the moderate scenario are significant — a population of 74.7 million with one in four people over retirement age implies a dependency ratio that no current policy framework has fully planned for.
Disclaimer: The data research report we present here is based on information found from various sources. We are not liable for any financial loss, errors, or damages of any kind that may result from the use of the information herein. We acknowledge that though we try to report accurately, we cannot verify the absolute facts of everything that has been represented.
