Malta’s population reached 588,254 at the end of 2025, a 2.4% increase on the previous year driven entirely by net migration, according to figures published by the National Statistics Office to mark World Population Day on 11th July.

Net migration stood at 13,906 people over the period, up nearly a third on the previous year. Non-EU citizens accounted for 78.1% of that inflow. Natural population increase, meanwhile, collapsed by 49.2% to just 98 people, as births edged down 0.8% to 4,338 and deaths rose 1.4% to 4,240.

PwC’s summer economic update projects that Malta’s population could reach 636,000 by 2030, based on assumptions of a partial slowdown in net migration towards pre-pandemic levels. Were that to materialise, population density would rise from approximately 1,862 people per square kilometre today to around 2,013, extending what is already the fourth-highest population density of any country in the world.

The demographic profile of that growth is sharply concentrated. Some 31.1% of residents – 182,693 people – are now non-Maltese nationals, with 56.9% of the foreign population aged between 20 and 39. Children under 18 account for just 14.3% of the total population, a smaller share than the 18.4% aged 65 and over, underlining the pace at which Malta’s citizen base is ageing.

Geographically, the pattern is equally pronounced. Foreign residents make up 43.9% of the population in the Northern Harbour district and 38.8% in the Northern district, while the Western district remains 85.4% Maltese.

With natural increase now negligible, Malta’s economic output and public finances rest ever more heavily on continued migration at scale. That structural dependency shows little sign of easing. It has also reshaped the housing market, where demand from a rapidly expanding resident workforce has pushed rents and property prices to levels widely described as an affordability crisis.

For businesses and policymakers, the central question is whether Malta’s infrastructure, public services and labour market governance can absorb growth at this pace. On current trajectories, the island’s population density within four years would sit comfortably among the highest of any sovereign state on earth.