The crude birth rate in China decreased by 0.8 live births per 1,000 inhabitants (-10.64 percent) in 2022 in comparison to the previous year. Therefore, 2022 marks the lowest rate during the observed period. The crude birth rate is the annual number of live births in a given population, expressed per 1,000 people. When looked at in unison with the crude death rate, the rate of natural increase can be determined.Find more statistics on other topics about China with key insights such as number of tuberculosis infections , total fertility rate, and death rate.

In 2022, the ratio of military expenditure to gross domestic product (GDP) in China remained nearly unchanged at around 1.6 percent. Yet 2022 saw the lowest ratio in China with 1.6 percent. These figures refer to the total amount of money spent on a country's military, as a share of its gross domestic product (GDP). These figures apply to current expenditure on a country's armed forces, including peacekeeping forces and defense ministries, among others.Find more key insights for the ratio of military expenditure to gross domestic product (GDP) in countries like South Korea and Japan.

China is home to the largest online community in the world. According to estimates, the Chinese internet population was around 1.04 billion in 2022 and would reach 1.18 billion by 2026. By comparison, the internet user-base of the United States was around 307 million in 2022. The country’s internet penetration rate is around 72 percent, indicating that almost one out of three Chinese are still offline.

Mobile-first kingdom

Affordable smartphones play an important role in China’s rising internet population. In 2022, almost all Chinese people accessed the internet through mobile phones. Messaging, watching videos, and listening to music are popular activities. In fact, Chinese people spent over three hours of their daily time online. This large and engaged mobile internet population has provided a wide range of opportunities to hi-tech companies in China, including online dating and matchmaking business.

What’s next?

As of June 2022, around 28 percent of online users were living in rural China. To provide more affordable and faster internet services, measures have been carried out in the country to reduce service rates and extend the 1,000-Megabyte broadband connection to over 300 cities. In 2019, the government announced to roll out 5G networks in Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, and other major cities. The technology advancement would likely enhance internet accessibility in rural areas, further increasing the country’s internet user base.

In 2022, there were around 1.02 billion social media users in China. Despite Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter being blocked in the country, local social networking sites such as WeChat and Weibo have been attracting millions of users, making China the world’s biggest social media market.

What is the role of social media in China? Around 74 percent of the Chinese population use internet. Social networking plays a huge role among netizens, especially the younger generation. Chinese social media, just like Western equivalents, not only serves as a way to communicate online, but also as one of the main sources of news and entertainment, e-payments, shopping advisors, and dating channels. In 2021, over 40 percent of surveyed social media users said they mostly appreciated that social networks help them to keep in touch with friends and family, but also share their life moments and thoughts.

What are the most popular social media platforms?

WeChat (Weixin in Chinese) is by far the most commonly seen social app in the country, used for anything from texting/calling to photo and video sharing, dating, financial services, game-playing, shopping, ride hailing, and so on. However, Chinese social media scene is quite diverse and dynamic, therefore, it is not just about WeChat. Instant messaging app Tencent QQ, microblogging site Weibo, video sharing app Youku Tudou, short-form video app Douyin (aka TikTok), photo editing and sharing app Meitu, restaurant recommendation and food ordering platform Meituan, Quora equivalent Zhihu, and dating app Momo are just a few among the most popular Chinese social media examples.

In 2024, the gross domestic product (GDP) of China amounted to around 18.7 trillion U.S. dollars. In comparison to the GDP of the other BRIC countries India, Russia and Brazil, China came first that year and second in the world GDP ranking. The stagnation of China's GDP in U.S. dollar terms in 2022 and 2023 was mainly due to the appreciation of the U.S. dollar. China's real GDP growth was 3.1 percent in 2022 and 5.4 percent in 2023. In 2024, per capita GDP in China reached around 13,300 U.S. dollars. Economic performance in China Gross domestic product (GDP) is a primary economic indicator. It measures the total value of all goods and services produced in an economy over a certain time period. China's economy used to grow quickly in the past, but the growth rate of China’s real GDP gradually slowed down in recent years, and year-on-year GDP growth is forecasted to range at only around four percent in the years after 2024. Since 2010, China has been the world’s second-largest economy, surpassing Japan.China’s emergence in the world’s economy has a lot to do with its status as the ‘world’s factory’. Since 2013, China is the largest export country in the world. Some argue that it is partly due to the undervalued Chinese currency. The Big Mac Index, a simplified and informal way to measure the purchasing power parity between different currencies, indicates that the Chinese currency yuan was roughly undervalued by 38 percent in 2024. GDP development Although the impressive economic development in China has led millions of people out of poverty, China is still not in the league of industrialized countries on the per capita basis. To name one example, the U.S. per capita economic output was more than six times as large as in China in 2024. Meanwhile, the Chinese society faces increased income disparities. The Gini coefficient of China, a widely used indicator of economic inequality, has been larger than 0.45 over the last decade, whereas 0.40 is the warning level for social unrest.

According to preliminary figures, the growth of real gross domestic product (GDP) in China amounted to 5.0 percent in 2024. For 2025, the IMF expects a GDP growth rate of around 3.95 percent. Real GDP growth The current gross domestic product is an important indicator of the economic strength of a country. It refers to the total market value of all goods and services that are produced within a country per year. When analyzing year-on-year changes, the current GDP is adjusted for inflation, thus making it constant. Real GDP growth is regarded as a key indicator for economic growth as it incorporates constant GDP figures. As of 2024, China was among the leading countries with the largest gross domestic product worldwide, second only to the United States which had a GDP volume of almost 29.2 trillion U.S. dollars. The Chinese GDP has shown remarkable growth over the past years. Upon closer examination of the distribution of GDP across economic sectors, a gradual shift from an economy heavily based on industrial production towards an economy focused on services becomes visible, with the service industry outpacing the manufacturing sector in terms of GDP contribution. Key indicator balance of trade Another important indicator for economic assessment is the balance of trade, which measures the relationship between imports and exports of a nation. As an economy heavily reliant on manufacturing and industrial production, China has reached a trade surplus over the last decade, with a total trade balance of around 992 billion U.S. dollars in 2024.

In 2024, China reported adding 16 million new users to its massive 1.1 billion internet population. The first half-year data in 2024 revealed that nearly half of the new internet users were between 10 and 18 years old, while a third were older adults aged above 50 years. The largest online community In 2023, China accounted for about one-fifth of the 5.5 billion internet users worldwide. However, compared to its total population, China’s internet penetration rate is lower than in other Asian countries. Penetration rates in both South Korea and Japan were extensively higher. The market potentials Internet usage in China is further characterized by a large regional discrepancy. In rural regions, the internet access rate is much lower than the national level. On the other side, the Chinese market became a mobile-first nation. Since 2014, more Chinese people have accessed the internet via mobile device than computers. The number of mobile internet users in China increased steadily over the previous decade.

The graph shows the population growth in China from 2000 to 2024. In 2024, the Chinese population decreased by about 0.1 percent or 1.39 million to around 1.408 billion people. Declining population growth in China Due to strict birth control measures by the Chinese government as well as changing family and work situations of the Chinese people, population growth has subsided over the past decades. Although the gradual abolition of the one-child policy from 2014 on led to temporarily higher birth figures, growth rates further decreased in recent years. As of 2024, leading countries in population growth could almost exclusively be found on the African continent and the Arabian Peninsula. Nevertheless, as of mid 2024, Asia ranked first by a wide margin among the continents in terms of absolute population. Future development of Chinese population The Chinese population reached a maximum of 1,412.6 million people in 2021 but decreased by 850,000 in 2022 and another 2.08 million in 2023. Until 2022, China had still ranked the world’s most populous country, but it was overtaken by India in 2023. Apart from the population decrease, a clear growth trend in Chinese cities is visible. By 2024, around 67 percent of Chinese people lived in urban areas, compared to merely 36 percent in 2000.

As of 2024, about 78.6 percent of the Chinese population had used the internet. The penetration rate denotes the share of the population that has access to a certain communication medium. Internet coverage in China For comparison, the global average internet penetration rate had resided at about 67.9 percent as of February 2025. The internet penetration in China had also been above the average rate in the Asia-Pacific countries. However, neighbor countries such as Japan and South Korea have displayed substantially higher internet penetration rates than China. It is worth noting that the internet usage in the country has faced a large regional disparity. Some of the remote western regions had shown penetration rates of below 45 percent. Chinese online population Over the past decade, the number of Chinese internet users has grown at a remarkable pace. By December 2024, the total amount of internet users in the world's second most populous country had amounted to approximately 1,108 million, up from 772 million at the end of 2017. Apart from extended access to broadband internet connections, mobile internet took up a large share in internet user growth. The share of users accessing the internet via mobile device had significantly exceeded that of those via desktop in the country. About 99.9 percent of Chinese internet users accessed the web via mobile phone.

As of 2024, China reported having 14 million new mobile internet users, totaling 1.1 billion people having access to the internet via mobile devices. A mobile-first country Mobile internet refers to accessing the internet via any mobile device connected to a wireless network. China’s registered internet users account for one-fifth of the world’s total, and its mobile internet users almost doubled in the last decade. According to the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC), the share of Chinese users accessing the internet via mobile phone has already surpassed those via PC since 2014. Smartphone usage in China The rapid growth in smartphone and tablet user numbers has boosted mobile internet use in China. The projections indicate that over 80 percent of the Chinese population would possess a smartphone by 2026. Chinese users spent on average over seven hours each day on mobile internet. Short video apps and instant messaging were the most commonly visited services, accounting for 47 percent of the user time.

According to latest figures, the Chinese population decreased by 1.39 million to around 1.408 billion people in 2024. After decades of rapid growth, China arrived at the turning point of its demographic development in 2022, which was earlier than expected. The annual population decrease is estimated to remain at moderate levels until around 2030 but to accelerate thereafter. Population development in China China had for a long time been the country with the largest population worldwide, but according to UN estimates, it has been overtaken by India in 2023. As the population in India is still growing, the country is very likely to remain being home of the largest population on earth in the near future. Due to several mechanisms put into place by the Chinese government as well as changing circumstances in the working and social environment of the Chinese people, population growth has subsided over the past decades, displaying an annual population growth rate of -0.1 percent in 2024. Nevertheless, compared to the world population in total, China held a share of about 17 percent of the overall global population in 2024. China's aging population In terms of demographic developments, the birth control efforts of the Chinese government had considerable effects on the demographic pyramid in China. Upon closer examination of the age distribution, a clear trend of an aging population becomes visible. In order to curb the negative effects of an aging population, the Chinese government abolished the one-child policy in 2015, which had been in effect since 1979, and introduced a three-child policy in May 2021. However, many Chinese parents nowadays are reluctant to have a second or third child, as is the case in most of the developed countries in the world. The number of births in China varied in the years following the abolishment of the one-child policy, but did not increase considerably. Among the reasons most prominent for parents not having more children are the rising living costs and costs for child care, growing work pressure, a growing trend towards self-realization and individualism, and changing social behaviors.

The number of smartphone users in China was forecast to increase between 2024 and 2029 by in total 357.5 million users (+41.6 percent). This overall increase does not happen continuously, notably not in 2029. The smartphone user base is estimated to amount to 1.2 billion users in 2029. Notably, the number of smartphone users of was continuously increasing over the past years.Smartphone users here are limited to internet users of any age using a smartphone. The shown figures have been derived from survey data that has been processed to estimate missing demographics.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).

The graph shows per capita gross domestic product (GDP) in China until 2024, with forecasts until 2030. In 2024, per capita GDP reached around 13,300 U.S. dollars in China. That year, the overall GDP of China had amounted to 18.7 trillion U.S. dollars. Per capita GDP in China Gross domestic product is a commonly-used economic indicator for measuring the state of a country's economy. GDP is the total market value of goods and services produced in a country within a given period of time, usually a year. Per capita GDP is defined as the GDP divided by the total number of people in the country. This indicator is generally used to compare the economic prosperity of countries with varying population sizes.In 2010, China overtook Japan and became the world’s second-largest economy. As of 2024, it was the largest exporter and the second largest importer in the world. However, one reason behind its economic strength lies within its population size. China has to distribute its wealth among 1.4 billion people. By 2023, China's per capita GDP was only about one fourth as large as that of main industrialized countries. When compared to other emerging markets, China ranked second among BRIC countries in terms of GDP per capita. Future development According to projections by the IMF, per capita GDP in China will escalate from around 13,300 U.S. dollars in 2024 to 18,600 U.S. dollars in 2030. Major reasons for this are comparatively high economic growth rates combined with negative population growth. China's economic structure is also undergoing changes. A major trend lies in the shift from an industry-based to a service-based economy.

In 2023, the share of urban population in China increased by one percentage points (+1.57 percent) compared to 2022. While the growth is slowing down, with 64.57 percent, the share is at its peak in the observed period. Notably, the share continuously increased over the last years.The urban population refers to the share of the total population living in urban centers. Each country has their own definition of what constitutes an urban center (based on population size, area, or space between dwellings, among others), therefore international comparisons may be inconsistent.Find more key insights for the share of urban population in countries like South Korea and Mongolia.

In 2024, there were around 719 million male inhabitants and 689 million female inhabitants living in China, amounting to around 1.41 billion people in total. China's total population decreased for the first time in decades in 2022, and population decline is expected to accelerate in the upcoming years. Birth control in China From the beginning of the 1970s on, having many children was no longer encouraged in mainland China. The one-child policy was then introduced in 1979 to control the total size of the Chinese population. According to the one-child policy, a married couple was only allowed to have one child. With the time, modifications were added to the policy, for example parents living in rural areas were allowed to have a second child if the first was a daughter, and most ethnic minorities were excepted from the policy. Population ageing The birth control led to a decreasing birth rate in China and a more skewed gender ratio of new births due to boy preference. Since the negative economic and social effects of an aging population were more and more felt in China, the one-child policy was considered an obstacle for the country’s further economic development. Since 2014, the one-child policy has been gradually relaxed and fully eliminated at the end of 2015. However, many young Chinese people are not willing to have more children due to high costs of raising a child, especially in urban areas.

In 2022, the penetration rate of social media reached around 70.1 percent of the population in China. Despite global social media giants like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube being blocked by the “Great Firewall”, Chinese homegrown equivalents such as WeChat, Weibo, and Youku Tudou have captured millions of users in the country.

How active are Chinese social media users? In 2023, the number of social network users was projected to reach 1.06 billion. Social media plays a huge role among Chinese internet users. During the third quarter of 2021, Chinese netizens spent circa 315 minutes on average per day on the internet. Sites such as WeChat and Sina Weibo each held a bulk of the share of internet users in China.

What is the role of social media in China?

For the end user, social networking sites allow for the establishment and reinforcing of social relationships by sharing photos, videos, posts and statuses. Microblogging has become an indispensable tool to share news across China with over a hundred million words and photos each posted daily. On the business end, social media also presents an attractive avenue for advertising with estimated ad spending surpassing 100 billion yuan in 2022.

In December 2024, about 17 percent of internet users in China were under 20 years old, whereas those aged above 50 years accounted for 24 percent. The country has a huge mobile user base, driving the growth of the mobile app sector.

As of December 2024, about 48.9 percent of internet users in China were female. This closely aligned with the gender ratio of the overall resident population.

The graph shows the number of employed people in China from 2014 to 2024. In 2024, the workforce in China amounted to around 734.4 million people. This marked an annual decrease of six million and is in line with a general downward trend since 2014. Workforce in China China’s total population has been declining since 2022 and dropped by 1.4 million annually to around 1.408 billion as of the end of 2024. This development is also reflected in the number of people in working age which has been shrinking since 2014. The labor force of China, which refers to the population aged 16 and over and capable of working, has been declining since 2016 and ranged at around 772.2 million in 2023. Out of the total number of employed people in 2023, about 470.3 million people were employed in urban areas, while 270.1 million people were working in rural areas. Distribution of the workforce The share of the workforce employed in the primary sector declined significantly from 36.7 percent in 2010 to 22.8 percent in 2023, only interrupted in 2022 by effects related to the COVID-19 pandemic. While the percentage of people employed in the primary sector decreased, the tertiary sector gained importance. As of 2023, about 29.1 percent of Chinese workers were employed in secondary and 48.1 percent in tertiary industries. The share of the workforce employed in the secondary sector increased until 2012 but decreased thereafter due to China's shift towards a service driven economy.

China's digital economy has been growing rapidly in recent years. In 2023, the economy reached a size of nearly 54 trillion yuan, registering a nominal year-on-year growth of 10.3 percent, much higher than the country's nominal GDP growth at 7.4 percent. The digital economy accounted for around 43 percent of China's GDP.