Ukraine loses more than a million people annually: demographer names reasons for crisis

Ukraine is facing an acute demographic problem: the country’s population is shrinking by more than a million people every year. This alarming trend due to high mortality, low birth rate and large-scale migration has been significantly aggravated against the background of the ongoing war.

As Focus.ua reported, citing a comment by the deputy director for research at the Mykhaylo Ptukha Institute for Demography and Quality of Life Studies of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Oleksandr Hladun, to the TSN.ua news and analysis website, the assessment of the demographic situation is complicated by the fact that the Justice Ministry registers data only on the territories controlled by Ukraine.

According to the expert, on average, during the four years of the war in the controlled territories annually about 185 thousand babies were born, while about 505 thousand people died. Thus, the natural decline in population averaged 320 thousand people per year.

The migration factor is also added to this. If we average the data on migration across the western border of Ukraine, the annual reduction due to departure is approximately 830 thousand people. Summing up natural loss and migration, Ukraine loses about 1 million 150 thousand citizens annually.

Oleksandr Hladun also emphasized that these figures may be incomplete, as there is a problem with taking into account those who left illegally or did not have the necessary documents at the beginning of the full-scale invasion. In addition, the loss of population comes at the expense of the occupied territories, which also makes it difficult to make an accurate assessment.

Population decline in Ukraine has been observed since 1993, but the current war has significantly exacerbated this trend. Earlier it was reported that in 2025 mortality in the country significantly exceeded birth rate: for one newborn there were three dead, and birth rate decreased by 4.5%.

Forecasts are also disappointing: up to 2.7 million Ukrainians may not return from abroad, and once the war is over, they may be joined by hundreds of thousands of men who now have no right to leave. This indicates that Ukraine is rapidly approaching a serious demographic crisis.

Recall, earlier we reported that after the end of the Russian-Ukrainian war, Ukraine will have to face a number of serious social challenges, one of which is a demographic crisis. Statistics indicate that Ukrainians who left the country over the past three years are mostly reluctant to return.