Press release No. 133 of 2 April 2024
Consumer price index, March 2024:
+2.2% on the same month a year earlier (provisional)
+0.4% on the previous month (provisional)
Harmonised index of consumer prices, March 2024:
+2.3% on the same month a year earlier (provisional)
+0.6% on the previous month (provisional)
WIESBADEN – The inflation rate in Germany is expected to be +2.2% in March 2024. That is the lowest figure since April 2021 (+2.0%), and in May 2021 the inflation rate also stood at +2.2%. The inflation rate is measured as the change in the consumer price index (CPI) compared with the same month a year earlier. Based on the results available so far, the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) also reports that consumer prices are expected to increase by 0.4% on February 2024. The inflation rate excluding food and energy, often referred to as core inflation, is expected to be +3.3%.
| Overall index / subindex | Weight | December 2023 | January 2024 | February 2024 | March 20241 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| per thousand | percent | ||||
| 1: Provisional figures. 2: Core inflation. 3: Household energy and motor fuels. | |||||
| Overall index | 1,000 | 3.7 | 2.9 | 2.5 | 2.2 |
| Overall index excluding food and energy2 | 821.41 | 3.5 | 3.4 | 3.4 | 3.3 |
| Services | 503.36 | 3.2 | 3.4 | 3.4 | 3.7 |
| Goods | 496.64 | 4.1 | 2.3 | 1.8 | 1.0 |
| including: | |||||
| Energy3 | 73.90 | 4.1 | -2.8 | -2.4 | -2.7 |
| Food | 104.69 | 4.6 | 3.8 | 0.9 | -0.7 |
Energy prices in March 2024 were 2.7% lower than in the same month a year earlier despite the discontinuation of the brake on energy prices as of January 2024 and the introduction of a higher carbon price also from January 2024, which affects the price of fossil fuels such as motor fuels, heating oil and natural gas. March 2024 (-0.7%) was also the first month since February 2015 (-0.2%) in which food prices fell below the level of the same month of the previous year. Food prices were also substantially lower again than the general rate of price increase.
Inflation Calculator for personal rate of inflation:
Consumers can use the Personal Inflation Calculator (only in German) of the Federal Statistical Office to adapt their monthly consumption expenditure on individual product groups according to their own consumption patterns and to calculate their personal inflation rate.
Methodological notes:
The consumer price index (CPI) and the harmonised index of consumer prices (HICP) differ in coverage and methodology. In contrast to the HICP, the CPI also includes household expenditure on owner-occupied housing, games of chance and broadcasting fees. In addition, the HICP product weights are updated annually and past data are generally not revised (only in German). As the weight of housing is much smaller in the HICP basket, price increases in other product groups have a larger impact on the HICP than on the CPI.
More information:
The final results for March 2024 will be released on 12 April 2024.
