00:00Where is the EU's population growing the most?
00:06As of January 2026, the EU's population was estimated to have grown by 706,000 inhabitants
00:14from the year before, reaching a total of 452 million, according to the latest data from
00:20Eurostat. This was the fifth consecutive year of population growth in the EU, following a drop in
00:262021 during the COVID-19 pandemic. The bloc's population is also 8 million higher than in
00:322016. This figure doubles if we zoom out to see how it's changed over the past two decades.
00:39Population growth is slowing, though. On average, the population increased by 3 million people per
00:45year in the 1960s, but this has fallen to 600,000 people per year in the 2010s. Eurostat said that,
00:52since 2012, the negative natural change in the EU population, which means more deaths than births,
00:58has been compensated by positive net migration. The population of specific EU countries ranged from
01:0483.5 million in Germany to 600,000 in Malta. The five most populous countries made up two-thirds of
01:12the bloc's population – Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Poland. Some of the bloc's smallest countries
01:19saw the highest population growth rate, however. Malta increased by 24 per 1,000 people,
01:25followed by Cyprus and Luxembourg.
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