Births in Italy are down more than 6% in 2025 compared to 2024, data from the National Institute of Statistics Istat show.

Between January 1 and July 31 this year, 13,000 fewer births were registered than in the same period last year, or a decrease of 6.3%. As for 2024, the overall decrease, on an annualized basis, was 2.4%.

This is an all-time record for under-birth rate, a downward trend that has continued uninterrupted since 2008.

Over the past 17 years, the trend has resulted in a “loss” of 207,000 births.

According to the relevant research, the under-birth rate is due both to a change in the overall attitude of potential parents, and to the de facto limitation of their total number, since they are citizens who were born from the mid-1970s onwards.

In 2024, the average number of children for every woman living in Italy was 1.18. Last year it was 1.20, while the previous negative historical record was set in 1995, with 1.19 children per woman.

Finally, the country’s National Institute of Statistics stresses that this decrease also concerns women who migrated to Italy from foreign countries. The average number of children, in this case, last year was 1.79. In 2023 it was 1.82, while in 2010 it was 2.31.