The population of the European Union in the coming decades will start to decline and may shrink by about 53 million people by the end of the century. This is shown by the updated EUROPOP2025 forecasts of Eurostat, which use 2025 as the base year and cover the period until 2100. According to them, the population of the EU will decrease by 11.7% – from about 451.8 million people in 2025 to 398.8 million by 2100.
The new calculations are more pessimistic than the previous round of projections from 2023, when a decline to 419.5 million people was predicted by the end of the century. In other words, within two years, the expected "minus" has deepened by over 20 million people – a signal for even lower birth rates and revised migration scenarios.
Peak until the end of the 20s, then – a steady decline
According to the latest Eurostat data, the EU population at the beginning of 2025 is around 451.8 million people. The number of residents is expected to continue to grow slightly for a few more years, reaching a peak of approximately 453.3 million people around 2029. After that, the models predict a sustainable downward trend and shrinkage below 400 million by 2100.
Growth in the 2020s is almost entirely due to net migration, which compensates for the negative natural increase – more deaths than births. In 2023 alone, migration added about 2.8 million people to the EU population, while the natural increase was negative – minus about 1.2 million people. In the medium term, even this migration "buffer" is no longer sufficient to reverse the trend.
Bulgaria: from over 7 million to under 6.7 million in one generation
Bulgaria feels these processes in a concentrated form. According to official data, the country's population at the end of 2025 is about 6.68 million people – approximately over 2 million less than the peak from the end of the 80s. Thus, Bulgaria remains among the EU countries with the fastest shrinking population.
The demographic structure is also highly distorted. The average age in our country already exceeds 45 years, which places the country among the oldest in the union. The proportion of people over 65 is over 22%, while children under 15 are under 15% – i.e. more than one in five Bulgarians is a pensioner, and every seventh child is growing up in a society with fewer and fewer workers.
This directly affects the economy. Analyses by Bulgarian and European institutions show that the demographic decline – a combination of negative natural increase, high mortality, low birth rate and emigration – takes away a significant part of the potential for growth. The lack of labor is increasingly felt in healthcare, education, industry and the IT sector.
Aging Europe, even more aging Bulgaria
On the scale of the EU, the forecasts chart a sharp aging. The proportion of people aged 80 and over is expected to increase from about 6% in 2025 to 16% by the end of the century. Parallel to this, the share of children and young people (0–19 years old) will shrink from 20% to 17%.
Even more indicative is the decline in the 20–64 age group – the main "core" of the labor market. Its share in the EU is projected to decrease from about 58% to 50% by 2100. For Bulgaria, where this process has already advanced, this means fewer workers, more pensioners and increasing pressure on the pension and health system.
Eurostat estimates that by 2070, the costs associated with aging – pensions, healthcare, long-term care – could reach about a quarter of the GDP of the member states. In countries with lower economic potential like Bulgaria, this share may prove even more difficult to finance.
Migration – a life raft for the EU, but not for Bulgaria
The updated Eurostat models clearly show that migration has become the main demographic life raft for the EU. Older scenarios indicate that with zero migration, the union's population could shrink by up to 34% by 2100, and with severely restricted migration – by about 17%.
For Bulgaria, however, migration often reinforces the negative trend, instead of mitigating it. For decades, the country has been losing young and active people who are realizing themselves in other EU countries and beyond. This means not only fewer taxpayers and workers today, but also fewer children tomorrow.
Retaining young people, attracting Bulgarians from the diaspora, and well-managed labor migration from third countries are key topics without which the demographic picture can hardly be reversed. Without such policies, the risks are clear: even greater shortage of staff, depopulation of entire regions and growing inequality between different parts of the country.
What this means for the future of Bulgaria
The combination of rapid aging, shrinking population and limited economic growth puts Bulgaria in a particularly vulnerable position compared to the overall European demographic decline. While the EU as a whole loses 11.7% of its population by the end of the century, our country has already lost over 10% in the last two decades alone – and the trend continues.
Demographic forecasts are not a sentence, but a clear signal. If Bulgaria does not use the remaining years for targeted reforms – in education, healthcare, social policy and migration – the statistics for 2100 will not be just dry numbers, but a daily reality: fewer people, higher dependence and a narrower horizon for development.