China last year registered the lowest number of births since records began, marking the fourth consecutive year of population decline as policymakers grapple with a demographic crisis.
On Monday, the government reported that 7.92mn babies were born in 2025, down from 9.54mn the year before, and the lowest number of births since 1949. Last year, 11.31mn people died. China’s population fell by 3.39mn to 1.405bn.
The figures, which come after a one-off rise in births in 2024, indicate that China is still not seeing the benefit from measures seeking to bolster the fertility rate — the average number of children born to a woman over her lifetime — following the loosening of its “one-child” policy in 2016.
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