EU: share of people who exercise or play sport regularly 2013-2017, by country

This statistic displays the results of a survey on the share of people who exercise or play sport at least five time per week in the European Union in 2013 and 2017, by country. The survey was conducted via face-to-face interviews and gathered data from 27,919 respondents in 2013 and 28,031 respondents in 2017. In 2017, Finland, Slovenia, Spain and Sweden exhibited the greatest share of respondents that engaged in exercise and sport five times per week or more, while the lowest proportion can be seen in Italy, Bulgaria and Greece. In comparison to the results from the 2013 survey, there has been a significant increase in Malta in the share of respondents that exercise or play sport at least five times per week. Contrastingly there has been a substantial decrease in the share of respondents that exercise or play sport regularly or with some regularity in Croatia, Greece and Austria.

Reasons for participation

People participate in sport for a variety of reasons, to improve health and fitness, to relax, to have fun and to improve physical performance are some of the most frequently offered motives. Several of these reasons can be considered to be beneficial to both the state and the individual, the most obvious among these include health and wellbeing, social cohesion, and public spending. As such many global governments offer substantial investment into sports facilities events and promotion, for example in 2017, the General State Administration spent a total of 143 million euros on sport related investments, which is reflected in the high share of respondents that engaged in exercise and sport at least five times per week. More information about sports in Europe can be found in the Dossier: Fitness industry in Europe.