Question: How many people live in Sweden?

Demographics of Sweden



The demography of Sweden is monitored by Statistics Sweden (SCB). As of August 2018, the population of Sweden was estimated to be 10.2 million people,[1] making it the 90th most populous country in the world.[2] The three largest cities are Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmö. Approximately 85% of the country's population resides in villages with 200 persons or cities.[3] Six out of ten Swedes do not live in an urban system with 50,000+ inhabitants, as defined by OECD.
Historical populationsYearPop.±%1570 900,000—1650 1,225,000+36.1%1700 1,485,000+21.2%1750 1,780,700+19.9%1800 2,347,300+31.8%1850 3,482,500+48.4%1900 5,136,400+47.5%1950 7,041,900+37.1%1970 8,081,300+14.8%1980 8,318,000+2.9%1990 8,590,600+3.3%1995 8,837,500+2.9%2000 8,882,800+0.5%2005 9,047,700+1.9%2010 9,415,600+4.1%2015 9,851,000+4.6%2018 10,223,500+3.8%Source: Historical figures - Sveriges land och folk,[4] Modern figures - Statistics Sweden [1] As of:[5] 2018 data[6]
Sweden census 2005
The 2005 Swedish census showed an increase of 475,322 compared to the 1990 census, an average increase of 31,680 annually. During the 1990s, birth rate increased by more than 100,000 children per year while death rates fell and immigration surged. In the early 2000s, birth rate declined as immigration increased further, with the context of unrest in the Middle East, upholding steady population growth.[7][8]
Ethnicity
The majority of the population are Swedes or Swedish people. The Sweden Finns are a large ethnic minority comprising approximately 50,000 along the Swedish-Finnish border, and 450,000 first and second generation immigrated ethnic Finns, mainly living in the Mälaren Valley region. Meänkieli Finnish has official status in parts of northern Sweden near the Finnish border. In addition, Sweden's indigenous population groups includes the Sami people, historically a nomadic reindeer herding group that has been native to Fenno-Scandinavia for at least 5000 years.[9] Today, the Sami language holds the status of official minority language in four municipalities in the Norrbotten county.
Immigrants from the Middle East have been a rapidly growing share of Sweden's population. According to the government agency Statistics Sweden, the number of immigrants born in all of Asia (including the Middle East) rose from just 1,000 in 1950 to 295,000 in 2003.[10] Most of those immigrants came from Iraq, Iran, Lebanon and Syria, according to Statistics Sweden.[10] A significant number of Syrian Christians have also settled in Sweden. Since the European migrant crisis, Syrians became the largest group of foreign-born persons in the Swedish civil registry in 2017 with 158,443 people.
Additionally, the birth rate among immigrant women after arriving in Sweden is higher than among ethnic Swedes.[11] Taking into account the fact that immigrant women have on average fewer children than Swedish women of comparable age, the difference in total birth rate is only 0.1 children more if the woman is foreign born – with the disclaimer that some women may have children not immigrating to and not reported in Sweden who are not included in the statistics.[12]
Total Fertility Rate from 1630 to 1900
The total fertility rate is the number of children born per woman. It is based on fairly good data for the entire period. Sources: Our World In Data and Gapminder Foundation.[13]


















Vital statistics since 1900
Data according to Statistics Sweden, which collects the official statistics for Sweden.[14]

Current vital statistics
[15]
Number of births:
from January-November 2017 =  107,175
from January-November 2018 =  107,469
Number of deaths:
from January-November 2017 =  83,713
from January-November 2018 =  84,103
Natural increase:
from January-November 2017 =  23,462
from January-November 2018 =  23,366
Life expectancy from 1751 to 2015
Sources: Our World In Data and the United Nations.
1751-1949


1950-2015

Source: UN World Population Prospects[17]
==Population statistics== growth phase from 8.8 to 9.3 million over 2004 to 2010).]]



At the housing and population census 1990 the Swedish population stood at 8 587 353 out of which 4,242,351 male and 4,345,002 female.
According to a 2012 survey there were 1 473 256 foreign born within the country making up 15% of the population.[18][19]
The demographic profile of Sweden has altered drastically due to immigration patterns since the 1970s. Since 2012, the number of immigrants to Sweden has increased while the number of emigrants have decreased. Today, about one-fifth of Sweden's population has an immigrant background.[20]
Though there are no official statistics on ethnicity, according to Statistics Sweden around 1,921,000 (20.1%) inhabitants of Sweden were of a foreign background in 2012. This background included: indigenous population of Swedes with Finnish and Sami minorities, and foreign-born or first-generation immigrants like Turks, Greeks, Finns, Yugoslavs, Danes and Norwegians. 
Population little increases during 2004-2012 have mainly been attributed to immigration from Muslim-majority countries like Iraq, Afghanistan, and Somalia. This implies a larger influx of Muslim immigrants as opposed to any other religious group.[20]
Demographic statistics according to the World Population Review.[20]
One birth every 4 minutes
One death every 6 minutes
One net migrant every 13 minutes
Net gain of one person every 7 minutes



Demographic statistics according to the CIA World Factbook, unless otherwise indicated.[21]
Population
9,960,487 (July 2017 est.)
Religions
Church of Sweden (Lutheran) 63%, other (includes Roman Catholic, Muslim, Orthodox, Buddhist, Baptist and Jewish) 17% (2016 est.)
Age structure
0-14 years: 17.43% (male 892,462/female 843,375)
15-24 years: 11.31% (male 581,025/female 545,971)
25-54 years: 39.42% (male 1,993,590/female 1,933,080)
55-64 years: 11.58% (male 578,942/female 574,479)
65 years and over: 20.26% (male 931,593/female 1,085,970) (2017 est.)
Total fertility rate
1.88 children born/woman (2017 est.) Country comparison to the world: 141st
Median age
total: 41.2 years Country comparison to the world: 41st
male: 40.2 years
female: 42.2 years (2017 est.)
Population growth rate
0.81% (2017 est.) Country comparison to the world: 128th
0.93% (2013 est.)
Mother's mean age at first birth
29.1 years (2015 est.)
Birth rate
12.1 births/1,000 population (2017 est.) Country comparison to the world: 167th
11.78 births/1,000 population (2013 est.)
Death rate
9.4 deaths/1,000 population (2017 est.)
9.37 deaths/1,000 population (2013 est.)
Net migration rate
5.3 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2017 est.) Country comparison to the world: 23rd
6.75 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2013 est.)
Life expectancy at birth
total population: 82.1 years Country comparison to the world: 16th
male: 80.2 years
female: 84.2 years (2017 est.)
Net birth surplus rate
2.40 births/1,000 population (2013 est.)
Infant mortality rate
total: 2.6 deaths/1,000 live births Country comparison to the world: 218th
male: 2.9 deaths/1,000 live births
female: 2.3 deaths/1,000 live births (2017 est.)
2.75 deaths/1,000 live births (2010 est.)
Dependency ratios
total dependency ratio: 58.5
youth dependency ratio: 27.4
elderly dependency ratio: 31.1
potential support ratio: 3.2 (2015 est.)
Unemployment, youth ages 15-24
total: 20.4%
male: 21.2%
female: 19.6% (2015 est.) Country comparison to the world: 65th
School life expectancy (primary to tertiary education)
total: 18 years
male: 17 years
female: 20 years (2014)
Urbanisation
85% of total population (2010 est.)
Rate of urbanisation: 0.6% annual rate of change (2010-15 est.)
Population projections
In 1950 Sweden had fewer people aged 10-20 with more people ages 20-30 and 0-10. In 2017 the ratio of male to female remains steady at about 50-50. As a whole the graph broadens with people appearing to live longer. In 2050 its predicted that all ages will increase from below 300,000 males and females to above 300,000 males and females. With about 50,000 people living to the ages of 90-100. In 2100 the graph is shaped as a rectangle with people of all ages and genders remaining steady. It narrows slightly at the top of the graph with about 250,000/300,000 males and females living to be 90-100 years old.[22]
Statistics Sweden projects the following population development in Sweden:[23]

Eurostat projects a population in Sweden reaching 11,994,364 people in 2040 and 14,388,478 in 2080.[24]
Migration
Immigration



As of 2017, Statistics Sweden reported that around 2,439,007 or 24.1% of the inhabitants of Sweden were from a foreign background: that is, each such person either had been born abroad or had been born in Sweden to two parents who themselves had both been born abroad.[25] Also taking into account people with only one parent born abroad, this number increases to almost a third in 2017.[26]
Demographics
According to Eurostat, in 2010, there were 1.33 million foreign-born residents in Sweden, corresponding to 14.3% of the total population. Of these, 859,000 (64.3%) were born outside the EU and 477,000 (35.7%) were born in another EU Member State.[27][28]
The twenty largest groups of foreign-born persons in the Swedish civil registry in 2017 were:[29]
 Syria (172,258)
 Finland (150,877)
 Iraq (140,830)
 Poland (91,180)
 Iran (74,096)
 Somalia (66,369)
 Yugoslavia (65,877)
 Bosnia and Herzegovina (58,880)
 Germany (50,863)
 Turkey (48,299)
 Afghanistan (43,991)
 Norway (42,028)
 Thailand (41,240)
 Denmark (40,563)
 Eritrea (39,081)
 China (31,333)
 India (29,673)
 Romania (29,546)
 Chile (27,996)
 United Kingdom (27,685)
The seven successor states of Yugoslavia and their historic counterparts (Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Kosovo and "Serbia and Montenegro") had a combined population of 172,308 persons residing in Sweden in 2017 which would make them the  largest foreign-born group if counted as one group.
The ten most common countries of birth among immigrants getting registered in Sweden during 2016 (including asylum seekers who came in 2015) were the following:[30]
 Syria (+51,540)
 Eritrea (+6,580)
 Poland (+5,078)
 Iraq (+4,901)
 India (+4,247)
 Somalia (+3,794)
 Afghanistan (+3,607)
 Finland (+2,969)
 Germany (+2,666)
 Iran (+2,469)
History
World War II
Immigration increased markedly with World War II. Historically, the most numerous of foreign born nationalities are ethnic Germans from Germany and other Scandinavians from Denmark and Norway. In short order, 70,000 war children were evacuated from Finland, of which 15,000 remained in Sweden. Also, many of Denmark's nearly 7,000 Jews who were evacuated to Sweden decided to remain there.
A sizable community from the Baltic States (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania) arrived during the Second World War.[31]
1945 to 1967
During the 1950s and 1960s, the recruitment of immigrant labour was an important factor of immigration. The Nordic countries signed a trade agreement in 1952, establishing a common labour market and free movement across borders. This migration within the Nordic countries, especially from Finland to Scandinavia, was essential to create the tax-base required for the expansion of the strong public sector now characteristic of Scandinavia. 
This continued until 1967, when the labour market became saturated, and Sweden introduced new immigration controls.
On a smaller scale, Sweden took in political refugees from Hungary and the former Czechoslovakia after their countries were invaded by the Soviet Union in 1956 and 1968 respectively.
Contemporary immigration
Since the early 1970s, immigration to Sweden has been mostly due to refugee migration and family reunification from countries in the Middle East and Latin America.[32]
The first group of Assyrians/Syriacs moved to Sweden from Lebanon in 1967. Many of them live in Södertälje (Stockholm).[33][34] There are also around 40,000 Roma in Sweden.[35]
Immigration of Iraqis increased dramatically during the Iraq War, during 2003 to 2007. A total of 8,951 Iraqis came to Sweden in 2006, accounting for 45% of the entire Iraqi migration to Europe. By 2007, the community of Iraqis in Sweden numbered above 70,000. In 2008, Sweden introduced tighter rules on asylum seekers.[36]
Language

The Swedish language is by far the dominating language in Sweden, and is used by the government administration.
Since 1999, Sweden has five officially recognised minority languages: Sami, Meänkieli, Standard Finnish, Romani chib and Yiddish.
The Sami language, spoken by about 7,000 people in Sweden, may be used in government agencies, courts, preschools and nursing homes in the municipalities of Arjeplog, Gällivare, Jokkmokk and Kiruna and its immediate neighbourhood.
Similarly, Finnish and Meänkieli can be used in the municipalities of Gällivare, Haparanda, Kiruna, Pajala and Övertorneå and its immediate neighbourhood. 
Finnish is also official language, along with Swedish, in the city of Eskilstuna.

During the mid to late 20th century, immigrant communities brought other languages, among others being Persian, Serbo-Croatian, Arabic and Neo-Aramaic.[37]
Religion

The majority (66%) of the population belongs to the Church of Sweden,[38] the Lutheran church that was disestablished in 2000. This is because until 1996, those who had family members in the church automatically became members at birth. Other Christian denominations in Sweden include the Roman Catholic Church (see Catholic Church of Sweden), several Orthodox churches in diaspora, Baptist, Pentecostal, Neo-pietistic (nyevangeliska) and other evangelical Christian churches (frikyrkor = 'free churches'). Shamanism persisted among the Sami people up until the 18th century, but no longer exists in its traditional form as most Sami today belong to the Lutheran church.
Jews were permitted to practice their religion in five Swedish cities in 1782, and have enjoyed full rights as citizens since 1870. The new Freedom of Religion Bill was passed in 1951, and former obstacles against Non-Lutherans working in schools and hospitals were removed. Further, that bill made it legal to leave any religious denomination, without entering another. There are also a number of Muslims, Buddhists, and Bahá'í in Sweden, mainly from immigration.
See also
Statistics Sweden
Municipalities of Sweden
Demographical center of Sweden
Immigration to Europe
List of countries by immigrant population
Aging of Europe
Notes




 – Official Data Base available in English