Population growth in China 2000-2023

The graph shows the population growth in China from 2000 to 2023. In 2023, the Chinese population decreased by about 0.15 percent or 2.08 million to around 1.41 billion people.

Declining population growth in China

Due to strict birth control measures by the Chinese government as well as changing family and work situations of the Chinese people, population growth has subsided over the past decades. Although the gradual abolition of the one-child policy from 2014 on led to temporarily higher birth figures, growth rates further decreased in recent years. As of 2023, leading countries in population growth could almost exclusively be found on the African continent and the Arabian Peninsula. Nevertheless, as of mid 2021, Asia ranked first by a wide margin among the continents in terms of absolute population.

Future development of Chinese population

The Chinese population reached a maximum of 1,412.6 million people in 2021 but decreased by 850,000 in 2022 and another 2.08 million in 2023. Until 2022, China had still ranked the world’s most populous country, but it was overtaken by India in 2023. Apart from the population decrease, a clear growth trend in Chinese cities is visible. By 2023, more than 66 percent of Chinese people lived in urban areas, compared to merely 36 percent in 2000.