Vienna is soon to be a city of two million inhabitants

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Vienna could reach the two-million mark earlier than expected – as early as this year and not just in 2027. This is because the city grew faster last year than in decades.

This is mainly due to immigration, and there again, primarily those who fled the war in Ukraine. Vienna once had more than two million inhabitants – the 1910 census counted 2.08 million.

“In 2022, Vienna has grown by about 50,000 people, solely due to immigration. Half of that is due to immigration from Ukraine,” Ramon Bauer, head of Vienna’s provincial statistics, told “Wien Heute.” A quarter of the growth is also due to immigrants from the countries from which many refugees came in 2015 – mainly Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq and Iran.

Strongest growth since records began
It is the strongest growth since annual records began in 1962 when there was a small drop in population, which became larger in the 1960s and 1970s: Vienna shrank. Things went uphill again in the 1990s. The previous peak occurred in 2015, after which there was a plus, but not so clearly until last year.

As of January 1, 2023, 1,982,000 residents lived in the city. According to current figures, there are still 18,000 people short of the two-million mark. The situation in Ukraine makes forecasting difficult because it is unclear whether people will stay in Vienna, go back, or more will come. What is clear in any case is that the influx is making Vienna a young city.

Average age just over 41
“In terms of average age, we are just over 41 at the moment. All the other federal states are older. In Vienna, the strongest age group is primarily the 20 to 40 generation. This is mainly due to immigration,” says Bauer. Young adults are a particularly mobile generation, he said. And many immigrants are young adults.

Four out of ten people living in Vienna were not born in Austria. Population growth is distributed differently among the districts. There was an increase in all communities, the largest being Donaustadt, with 4.4 percent.