Demographics of the European Union

The demographics of the European Union show a highly populated, culturally diverse union of 28 member states. As of 1 January 2016, the population of the EU is about 510.1 million people.

The most populous member state is Germany, with an estimated 82.1 million people, and the least populous member state is Malta with 0.4 million. Birth rates in the EU are low with the average woman having 1.6 children. The highest birth-rates are found in Ireland with 16.876 births per thousand people per year and France with 13.013 births per thousand people per year. Germany has the lowest birth rate in Europe with 8.221 births per thousand people per year.

The European Union has a significant number of global cities. It contains 13 of the 60 cities which compose the 2008 Global Cities Index, as well as 16 of the 41 "alpha" global cities classified by GaWC (including London, Paris, Milan, Amsterdam and Brussels among others). The following is a list of the ten most populous cities, urban areas and urban zones in the European Union, with their population:

The movement of people within the Union i.e. internal migration, remains limited; it has traditionally followed two patterns:

Citizens from the European Union make up a growing proportion of immigrants in Spain. They mainly come from countries like the UK and Germany, but the British migration case is of particular interest due to its magnitude. The British authorities estimate that the real population of UK citizens living in Spain is much bigger than Spanish official figures suggest, establishing them at about 1,000,000 and about 800,000 being permanent residents.

At present, more people immigrate into the European Union than emigrate from it. Immigration is a controversial issue in many member states, including Belgium, Sweden, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, France, and the UK.

In 2010, 47.3 million people living in the EU, or 9.4% of the total population, had been born outside their resident country. Of these, 31.4 million (6.3%) had been born outside the EU; 16.0 million (3.2%) had been born in another member state. The largest absolute numbers of people born outside the EU were in Germany (6.4 million), France (5.1 million), the United Kingdom (4.7 million), Spain (4.1 million), Italy (3.2 million), and the Netherlands (1.4 million).

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