Press release No. 446 of 11 December 2025

• Population projection looks at the demographic development in Germany and the Länder up to 2070
• Baby boomer generation is entering retirement: number of people of pensionable age set to increase by at least 3.8 million by 2038
• Number of people of working age will decrease by at least 4.0 million by 2070
• If births, life expectancy and immigration develop at a moderate rate, fewer than 75 million people will be living in Germany in 2070

WIESBADEN/BERLIN – In Germany, one person in four will be aged 67 or older in 2035. This is the conclusion reached by all variants of the 16^th coordinated population projection, which the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) presented at a press conference in Berlin (only in German) on 11 December 2025. By way of comparison, just one person in five was 67 years or older, and therefore of retirement age, in 2024. "The baby boomer generation is currently in the middle of transitioning from working life to retirement. Much smaller birth cohorts will follow", says Karsten Lummer, head of the "Population" department at the Federal Statistical Office. "All calculation variants indicate that the number of people aged 67 and over will increase steadily up to 2038. Depending on how life expectancy increases, there will then be 20.5 to 21.3 million people of pensionable age in Germany. Compared with today, that represents an increase of 3.8 to 4.5 million", explains Elke Loichinger, head of the "Demographic analyses and model calculations, natural population change" section at the Federal Statistical Office. Depending on the calculation variant, the share of people aged 67 and over will increase from 20% in 2024 to between 25% and 27% in 2038.

"In Germany, there are already 33 persons of retirement age for every 100 persons of working age. In 2070, this will have increased to 43 persons of retirement age in the best case scenario", says Karsten Lummer. "In the worst case - with a consistently low birth rate and low net immigration - the old-age dependency ratio could be as high as 61, and therefore almost twice the rate it is today", Lummer adds. "Consequently, there would be fewer than two people paying into the old-age protection systems for each person receiving benefits from these systems."

Number of people aged 80 and over will increase significantly from the mid-2030s

Within the 67-plus population, the development of the number of people aged 80 and over is important when assessing future nursing care needs. In 2023, half of the 80-and-over population in Germany was in need of long-term care. Over the next five years, the number of people aged 80 and over will initially drop slightly, as the small birth cohorts of 1945 to 1949 will turn 80 during this time. As the baby boomer generation continues to age, however, the 80-and-over population will increase considerably from the mid-2030s, rising from 6.1 million in 2024 to around 8.5 to 9.8 million in 2050. In the period from 2050 to 2070, the number of people aged 80 years and older is expected to be between 7.4 and 10.0 million.

Even high immigration cannot prevent decline in economically active population

According to the 16^th coordinated population projection, the number of people of working age (20 to 66 years) will drop in the period to the mid-2030s as the large cohorts of the baby boomer generation retire and are replaced by younger, smaller cohorts. The resulting gap cannot be closed by the assumed migration surpluses.

In 2024, 51.2 million people in Germany were of working age, that is aged 20 to 66 years. All variants of the 16^th coordinated population projection indicate a declining number of people in this age group in the future. Assuming a moderate development in the birth rate and life expectancy together with high net immigration, the number of 20 to 66-year-olds is expected to be 45.3 million in 2070. If net immigration is moderate, the economically active population will drop to 41.2 million by 2070, and could even fall to 37.1 million if net migration is low. A smaller decline of around 4.0 million people would only occur in a scenario where the birth rate increases significantly and net migration is high.

In 2070, Germany's population will be between 63.9 million and 86.5 million

In all likelihood, there will be fewer people living in Germany in 2070, the end of the projection period, than there are today. Assuming a moderate development in the birth rate, life expectancy and net migration - the three demographic components - Germany would then have a population of 74.7 million. A slight increase in the population occurs in only two of the 27 projection variants, both of which are built on high net migration and a marked increase in the birth rate. Overall, the projected population in 2070 is in the range from 63.9 to 86.5 million. By way of comparison, in the 15^th population projection in 2022, Germany's population in 2070 was projected to be between 70.2 and 94.4 million, depending on the variant. The difference is due to changes in the baseline situation as a result of the decline in net immigration and the reduced birth rate, and the ensuing lower assumptions for the development of these two components.

Regional differences in the development of the population

According to the results of the 16^th coordinated population projection, the population in the non-city Länder of western Germany will remain stable, at best, in the coming decades. The population would decline, however, if annual net immigration to Germany were below 350,000.

Under all the scenarios considered, there will be fewer people living in the non-city Länder of eastern Germany in 2070 than there are today. Compared with 2024, the population in these Länder will be 14% to 30% smaller in 2070.

By contrast, assuming high or medium net immigration, the city states of Berlin, Hamburg and Bremen can expect their population to grow. However, if net immigration is consistently low, a steady decline in the population of up to 11% compared with 2024 is also possible in the city states in the period to 2070.

The population in the non-city Länder of eastern Germany is already significantly older, on average, than the population in the non-city Länder of western Germany and the city states: in 2024, the 67-plus population accounted for 24% of the population in the non-city Länder of eastern Germany, and for 20% and 17%, respectively, of the population in the non-city Länder of western Germany and the city states.

In 2024, there were 12.7 million people in the 67-plus age group in the non-city Länder of western Germany. This number is projected to rise until 2039, with around 16.3 million senior citizens - an increase of roughly 30% - living in these Länder by then. Only minor changes are expected after that. Starting at 3.0 million in 2024, the number of people aged 67 and over in the non-city Länder of eastern Germany will continue to increase and reach its peak in 2038. As the number of people aged 67 and over in the non-city Länder of eastern Germany has already risen sharply in the past, the increase - ranging from 11% to 16% - will be significantly less pronounced here than in western Germany, however. A decline in the number of people aged 67 and over in the non-city Länder of eastern Germany can be expected from 2039 onwards. Due to the younger age structure, the development of the population in the city states will be completely different to that of the non-city Länder: at 1.1 million in 2024, the number of people aged 67 and over in the city states will rise steadily in the coming decades and is expected to reach between 1.6 and 1.7 million in 2070, an increase of 50% to 58% on 2024.

Methodological notes:

Long-term population projections are not predictions or forecasts. They provide statements based on "if X, then Y" scenarios and demonstrate how the population and its structure would change under certain assumptions. The 16^th coordinated population projection is based on three assumptions for each of the components 'fertility', 'life expectancy' and 'net migration' (only in German). The outcomes for the resulting 27 variants and the additional three model calculations illustrate the range of possible developments up to the year 2070, and therefore show how fertility, life expectancy and migration influence the development of the population. Nine variants were calculated for the Länder.

More information:

Detailed results for all the variants and model calculations for Germany and for nine variants disaggregated by Land and groups of Länder (non-city Länder in western and eastern Germany, and city states) are available as an internet article (only in German), as statistical reports (only in German) and are also provided in the GENESIS-Online database (Tables 12421).

All documents for the press conference on "A changing population – assumptions and results of the 16^th coordinated population projection" are available on the press conference website.

Furthermore, the animated population pyramids for Germany and the Länder, which are provided on the website of the Federal Statistical Office, illustrate the changes in the age structure of the population in the period to 2070 according to different variants presented in the 16^th coordinated population projection. In these applications, the results can be analysed according to users' individual preferences.