It is estimated that Russia had the largest population among Central and Eastern European countries, with 145.2 million people in 2024. The following largest countries in terms of population size were Poland, with 38.7 million, and Ukraine, with 37.4 million.

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During the 1950s and 1960s, the population of Eastern Europe grew by approximately 1.3 percent each year, although it varied per country. The Soviet Union and Poland saw the largest growth, with annual increases of 1.5 and 1.4 percent respectively. While most countries saw significant population growth in this period, East Germany's population actually decreased, from 18.4 million in 1950 to 17.1 million in 197. This was due to the high rates of Westward migration in the 1950s, before border restrictions became much more stringent after 1961.

In 2024, Russia had the largest population among European countries at 144.8 million people. The next largest countries in terms of their population size were Turkey at 87.5 million, Germany at 84.5 million, the United Kingdom at 69.1 million, and France at 66.5 million. Europe is also home to some of the world’s smallest countries, such as the microstates of Liechtenstein and San Marino, with populations of 39,870 and 33,581 respectively. Europe’s largest economies Germany was Europe’s largest economy in 2023, with a Gross Domestic Product of around 4.2 trillion Euros, while the UK and France are the second and third largest economies, at 3.2 trillion and 2.8 trillion euros respectively. Prior to the mid-2000s, Europe’s fourth-largest economy, Italy, had an economy that was of a similar sized to France and the UK, before diverging growth patterns saw the UK and France become far larger economies than Italy. Moscow and Istanbul the megacities of Europe Two cities on the eastern borders of Europe were Europe’s largest in 2023. The Turkish city of Istanbul, with a population of 15.8 million, and the Russian capital, Moscow, with a population of 12.7 million. Istanbul is arguably the world’s most famous transcontinental city with territory in both Europe and Asia and has been an important center for commerce and culture for over two thousand years. Paris was the third largest European city with a population of 11 million, with London being the fourth largest at 9.6 million.

The number of internet users in Eastern Europe was forecast to increase between 2024 and 2029 by in total 12.9 million users (+5.97 percent). This overall increase does not happen continuously, notably not in 2028 and 2029. The number of users is estimated to amount to 228.9 million users in 2029. Notably, the number of internet users of was continuously increasing over the past years.Depicted is the estimated number of individuals in the country or region at hand, that use the internet. As the datasource clarifies, connection quality and usage frequency are distinct aspects, not taken into account here.The shown data are an excerpt of Statista's Key Market Indicators (KMI). The KMI are a collection of primary and secondary indicators on the macro-economic, demographic and technological environment in up to 150 countries and regions worldwide. All indicators are sourced from international and national statistical offices, trade associations and the trade press and they are processed to generate comparable data sets (see supplementary notes under details for more information).Find more key insights for the number of internet users in countries like Southern Europe and Northern Europe.

This map shows the population density in North-Eastern Europe in 2011. This map is extracted from the cartographic atlas made on the occasion of the merger of the Alsace, Champagne-Ardenne and Lorraine Regions in January 2016. It is available on the website of the Grand Est Region. This map was designed for A3 format, landscape.

Lithuania had the fastest-growing population in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), at an annual rate of 1.14 percent in 2022. Estonia ranked second, with the population growth of 1.03 percent year-on-year. In most CEE countries, the population marked a decrease from the previous year. Ukraine reported the most dramatic population decline, at nearly 14.2 percent.

In 2023, Ukraine had the fastest growing population in Europe. As a result of Ukrainian citizens who had fled Russia's invasion of the eastern European country in 2022 returning to the country in 2023, Ukraine's population grew by 3.68 percent compared to 2022. Excluding this special case, the European countries which saw the greatest population growth in 2023 were Luxembourg, Norway, and Ireland. Overall, Europe's population declined by 0.09 percent in 2022, with this varying by region from a 0.31 percent decline in eastern Europe to an increase of 0.33 percent in northern Europe. All of the countries which saw the largest declines in their population in 2023 were central and eastern European countries which had hosted large numbers of Ukrainian refugees in 2022. Moldova, one of Ukraine's closest neighbours, saw its population decline by 3.6 percent, while Poland's population declined by 2.2 percent, and Slovakia's by 1.8 percent.

Aggregate indicators at the level of the country for 7 countries of the East Bloc from the areas of economy, defense, population and society.

Topics: 1. Population and society: population density; population growth from 1970 to 1978; infant mortality and life expectancy; degree of urbanization; rate of provision with running water and sanitary facilities; residential furnishings and housing conditions; hospital beds and doctors per capita; proportion of children in kindergartens; proportion of women in various branchs of the economy; religious affiliation; divorce rate; training level of the population; education expenditures; employees in technology and science; scientific book production; social mobility.

1. Economy: growth rate of the gross national product; GNP per capita; public investments; merchandise import and export; proportion of employees and proportion of production in the individual sectors of the economy; average income; meat consumption and supply of calories; trade with Comecon countries, capitalist and under-developed countries; trade deficit and foreign debt; growth of import and export as well as of income; work productivity; working hours needed for selected goods; capital intensity; provision of households with telephone, television, cars and other durable economic goods; energy import and energy use; employee-worker relationship; development of real income as well as prices; private savings; income concentration; retail trade index; hectare yields and proportion of private agriculture.

2. Military: defense expenditures; export of weapons; strength of military forces; proportion of defense expenditures in gross national product; number of disturbances and protest demonstrations; armed attacks and persons killed; sanctions of the government; internal security forces.

3. Miscellaneous: content analysis of newspapers regarding reports about human rights, disarmament, economic as well as technical cooperation and conflicts after adoption of the final agreement of Helsinki and Belgrad.

As part of the project "Social Stratification in Eastern Europe after 1989," sample surveys were conducted in 1993 and 1994 in six countries: Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Russia, and Slovakia. Using a questionnaire common to all countries, national probability samples of approximately 5,000 members of the adult population were surveyed in five of the six countries in 1993; in Poland, due to the lack of local funds, the data collection was delayed until 1994 and the sample size was reduced to approximately 3,500. To permit analyses of special interest to urban geographers (the Dutch funding was provided by a study committee of the Dutch NSF consisting of sociologists and urban geographers), over-samples of the populations of Prague and Warsaw were surveyed, with the sample sizes sufficient to bring the sum of cases from the over-sample and the national sample in each country to approximately 1,500. (About 900 cases each are available for Budapest and Sofia, generated by the national sample design. Thus, a four city comparison of Eastern European capitals is feasible.) The design of the survey called for exactly comparable wording of questions, and variation in the response categories only where national variations in circumstances (e.g., different religious distributions) warranted it. Country teams were free to add local questions at the end of the questionnaire. To ensure such comparability, the questionnaire was translated into each local language and then back-translated into English; the back-translated versions were compared as a group by a multi-lingual team and discrepancies in wording corrected. Inevitably, despite our best intentions, minor variations crept into the questionnaire. These are identified at appropriate places in the Codebook. The local language questionnaires are shown in Appendix G (Vol. II). (Probability samples of about 1,000 members of the old elite and about 1,000 members of the new elite in each country except Slovakia were also surveyed, using a similar but not identical questionnaire. These surveys have a separate codebook, which may be found under the title "Social Stratification in Eastern Europe after 1989: Elite Survey".)

Number of inhabitants born in Eastern and Southern Europe (non-EU), Africa, Asia or South America divided by the total population of the municipality.

Aggregate data of economical, military, demographical, social and political indicators concerning 7 Eastern European communist countries. ( Theme 1: population and society ) population density / population growth 1970-1978 / infant mortality and life expectancy / degree of urbanization / amenities running water, central heating etc. / housing conditions / hospital beds and medical doctors / kindergarten / women in branches of economy / religion / divorce / education / technics and science / production of scientific books / social mobility. ( Theme 2: economy ) GNP / investments / import and export / employment and production in sectors of economy / incomes / meat consumption and calorie supply / trade with comecon/ capitalist and underdeveloped countries / trade deficit and debt to foreign countries / growth of import, export and incomes / labour productivity / required work-time for selected goods / capital intensity / nr. of telephones, tv-sets, cars, etc. / energy import and consumption / ratio employees and workers / development real incomes and prices / private savings / income concentration / retail trade index / hectare yields and portion of private agriculture. ( Theme 3: defense ) defense expenditures / arms export / armed forces / GNP of defense expenditures / riots and protest demonstration / armed attacks and persons killed / government sanctions / internal security forces. ( Theme 4: miscellaneous ) content analysis of newspapers concerning human rights/ disarmament/ economical and technical co-operation and conflicts after the final acts of Helsinki and Belgrade.

The Country-Level Population and Downscaled Projections Based on Special Report on Emissions Scenarios (SRES) A1, B1, and A2 Scenarios, 1990-2100, were adopted in 2000 from population projections realized at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) in 1996. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) SRES A1 and B1 scenarios both used the same IIASA "rapid" fertility transition projection, which assumes low fertility and low mortality rates. The SRES A2 scenario used a corresponding IIASA "slow" fertility transition projection (high fertility and high mortality rates). Both IIASA low and high projections are performed for 13 world regions including North Africa, Sub-Saharan Africa, China and Centrally Planned Asia, Pacific Asia, Pacific OECD, Central Asia, Middle East, South Asia, Eastern Europe, European part of the former Soviet Union, Western Europe, Latin America, and North America. This data set is produced and distributed by the Columbia University Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN).

As of October 2024, the highest share of the population unconnected to the internet among European regions was in Eastern Europe, approximately 30 percent. Southern Europe followed, with around 14.8 percent of its population being unconnected. The least share of the unconnected population was in Northern Europe. The region had the worldwide highest internet penetration rate as of the latest measured period.

A total of 192 populations of Quercus cerris from the eastern Mediterranean Basin (Italy, Balkan peninsula, Anatolia) were genotyped with six polymorphic chloroplast microsatellites, and the genetic diversity and differentiation of the populations were evaluated. DNA samples are kept in collection at -20° C and available for research use only.

The Jewish population of Europe decreased dramatically during the 20th century, as millions of Jews were killed during the Holocaust of the Second World War, while millions of others emigrated to escape persecution (notably to Israel and the U.S.). Some estimates suggest that the total number of Jews in Europe in 1933 was approximately 9.5 million people, with the majority of these living in Eastern Europe. Jews were a minority in most countries, however they still made up a significant portion of the population in countries such as Hungary, Poland and Romania. Following the war however, the Jewish populations in these countries dropped drastically, and by the end of the century they made up just 0.1 percent or less in several countries.

Opinion data from Hungary, Bulgaria and Latvia (including the Russian-speaking minority).

This survey focuses on relations with and attitudes towards Russia in three East European countries with a record of close ties with Russia – Latvia, Hungary, and Bulgaria. The survey was carried out against the backdrop of Russia´s annexation of Crimea and Eastern Ukraine. It may be the very first survey to tap East European reactions to Russia’s drastic attempt to redraw the map of post-war Eastern Europe. The 2015 Post-Crimea Survey asks many of the key questions in the Baltic Barometer questions about identity, democracy, and the European Union (Baltic Barometer 2014).

Over the observed period, the employment-to-population ratio among men in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) was projected to be the lowest in 2026, at over 63 percent. The ratio among women was recorded at around 50 percent in 2024.

History of East-Central Europe has been intertwined with the history of Turks in the past. A significant part of this region of Europe has been fallen under Ottoman control during the 150 years of Ottoman occupation in the 16–17th centuries. The presence of the Ottoman Empire affected this area not only culturally but also demographically. The Romani people, the largest ethnic minority of the East-Central European area, share an even more eventful past with Turkish people from the time of their migration throughout Eurasia and they were a notable ethnic group in East-Central Europe in the Ottoman era already. The relationship of Turks with East-Central European ethnic groups and with regional Roma ethnicity was investigated based on genome-wide autosomal single nucleotide polymorphism data. Population structure analysis, ancestry estimation, various formal tests of admixture and DNA segment analyses were carried out in order to shed light to the conclusion of these events on a genome-wide basis. Analyses show that the Ottoman occupation of Europe left detectable impact in the affected East-Central European area and shaped the ancestry of the Romani people as well. We estimate that the investigated European populations have an average identity-by-descent share of 0.61 with Turks, which is notable, compared to other European populations living in West and North Europe far from the affected area, and compared to the share of Sardinians, living isolated from these events. Admixture of Roma and Turks during the Ottoman rule show also high extent.

This research, designed by the World Bank, and supported by the Department for International Development (DFID), aims to highlight the unprecedented transformation of the urban systems in the ECA region in the last decades, and to look at this shifts from the demographic, economic, and spatial prospectives. Cities in ECA database comprises data from 5,549 cities in 15 countries of the Eastern Europe and Central Asia region, as defined by the World Bank Group, and from the United Kingdom and Germany. Database information for each city is in three dimensions: demographic, spatial, and economic. The starting point to construct the Cities in ECA database was to obtain from each of the countries the list of official cities and these cities' population data. Population data collected for cities falls on or around three years: 1989, 1999, and 2010 (or the latest year available). The official list of "cities" was geo-referenced and overlaid with globally-available spatial data to produce city-level indicators capturing spatial characteristics (e.g., urban footprint) and proxies for economic activity. City-level spatial characteristics, including urban footprints (or extents) for the years 1996, 2000, and 2010 and their temporal evolution, were obtained from the Global Nighttime Lights (NTL) dataset. City-level proxies for economic activity were also estimated based on the NTL dataset. Nighttime Lights (NLS) data is produced by the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) Optical Line Scanner (OLS) database and maintained by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).