Demographics of Berlin

Berliners at the Tiergarten

In December 2013, the city-state of Berlin had a population of 3,517,424 registered inhabitants (+47, 800) in an area of 891.82 square kilometers (344.33 sq mi). The city's population density was 3,944 inhabitants per km². Berlin is Germany's largest city and the second most populous city in the European Union, as calculated by city-proper population.

Berlin's urban area stretches beyond the city limits, comprising about 3.7 million people in 2001. The Berlin-Brandenburg metropolitan area is home to about 4.3 million in an area of 5,370 km² (2,070 sq mi). In 2004, The Larger Urban Zone was home to around 5 million people in an area of 17,385 km².

National and international migrations into the city have a long history. In December 2013, 538,729 residents (15.3 percent of the population) were of foreign nationality from 190 countries.

History

The city responded to the 1685 revocation of the Edict of Nantes in France with the Edict of Potsdam, which guaranteed religious freedom and tax-free status to French Huguenot refugees for ten years. The 1920 Greater Berlin Act incorporated many suburbs and surrounding cities, forming most of the region comprising modern Berlin. The act increased the area of Berlin from 66 km² (25 sq mi) to 883 km² (341 sq mi) and its population from 1.9 million to 4 million.

Asylum policies in West Berlin triggered waves of immigration during the 1960s and 1970s. Berlin is home to about 250,000 Turks (especially in Kreuzberg, Neukölln and Wedding, a locality in the borough of Mitte), the largest Turkish community outside Turkey.

During the 1990s, the Aussiedlergesetze enabled immigration to Germany of residents of the former Soviet Union. Ethnic Germans from countries from the former Soviet Union make up the largest portion of the Russian-speaking community. Immigration continues from a number of Western countries, particularly by young people from other parts of the EU. Berlin has seen an increase in the number of African immigrants during the last two decades.

Chart showing Berlin's population fluctuations since 1880. The spike in population in 1920 is a result of the Greater Berlin Act.

Year Population 1250 1,200 1307 7,000 1400 8,500 1576 12,000 1600 9,000 1631 8,100 1648 6,000 1685 17,500 1709 57,000 1750 113,289 1775 136,137 1800 172,132 1825 219,968 December 3, 1840 ¹ 322,626 December 3, 1846 ¹ 408,500 December 3, 1849 ¹ 418,733

Year Population December 3, 1852 ¹ 426,600 December 3, 1855 ¹ 442,500 December 3, 1858 ¹ 463,600 December 3, 1861 ¹ 524,900 December 3, 1864 ¹ 632,700 December 3, 1867 ¹ 702,400 December 1, 1871 ¹ 826,341 December 1, 1875 ¹ 969,050 December 1, 1880 ¹ 1,122,330 December 1, 1885 ¹ 1,315,287 December 1, 1890 ¹ 1,578,794 December 2, 1895 ¹ 1,678,924 December 1, 1900 ¹ 1,888,848 December 1, 1905 ¹ 2,042,402 December 1, 1910 ¹ 2,071,257 December 1, 1916 ¹ 1,712,679

Year Population December 5, 1917 ¹ 1,681,916 October 8, 1919 ¹ 1,902,509 June 16, 1925 ¹ 4,024,286 June 16, 1933 ¹ 4,242,501 May 17, 1939 ¹ 4,338,756 August 12, 1945 ¹ 2,807,405 October 29, 1946 ¹ 3,170,832 December 31, 1950 3,336,026 December 31, 1960 3,274,016 December 31, 1970 3,208,719 December 31, 1980 3,048,759 December 31, 1990 3,433,695 December 31, 2000 3,382,169 September 30, 2005 3,394,000 December 31, 2010 3,460,725 December 31, 2013 3,517,424

Population by borough

Map of Berlin's twelve boroughs and their 96 localities.

People in Kreuzberg

Borough	Population 30 September 2010	Area in km²	Largest Non-German ethnic groups
Mitte	332,100	39.47	Turks, Arabs, Kurds, many Asians, Africans and Western Europeans.
Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg	268,831	20.16	Turks, Arabs, African, Kurds, Chinese
Pankow	368,956	103.01	Poles, Italians, French, Americans, Vietnamese, British
Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf	320,014	64.72	Turks, Africans, Russians, Arabs, others.
Spandau	225,420	91.91	Turks, Africans, Russians, Arabs, others.
Steglitz-Zehlendorf	293,989	102.50	Poles, Turks, Croats, Serbs, Koreans
Tempelhof-Schöneberg	335,060	53.09	Turks, Croats, Serbs, Koreans, Africans
Neukölln	310,283	44.93	Arabs, Turks, Kurds, Russians, Africans, Poles
Treptow-Köpenick	241,335	168.42	Russians, Poles, Ukrainians, Vietnamese
Marzahn-Hellersdorf	248,264	61.74	Russians, Vietnamese, several other Eastern Europeans.
Lichtenberg	259,881	52.29	Vietnamese, Russians, Ukrainians, Poles, Chinese
Reinickendorf	240,454	89.46	Turks, Poles, Serbs, Croats, Arabs, Italians
Total Berlin	3,450,889	891.82	Turks, Arabs, Russians, Vietnamese, Poles, Africans

Population by nationality

See also: Turks in Berlin, Arabs in Berlin, and Vietnamese community of Berlin

Significant foreign born populations
Country of Birth	Population (2012)
Turkey	101,061
Poland	46,945
Italy	19,771
Serbia	18,544
Russia	17,596
Bulgaria	15,933
France	15,253
United States	14,395
Vietnam	13,959
United Kingdom	11,480
Spain	11,473
Greece	10,953
Bosnia and Herzegovina	10,680
Austria	10,058
Croatia	10,025
Romania	8,843
Ukraine	8,791
Lebanon	7,094
China	6,084
Thailand	4,975
Macedonia	4,960
Netherlands	4,911
Iran	4,192
Sweden	3,519
Portugal	3,405
Hungary	3,317
Israel	3,302
Brazil	3,231
South Korea	3,195
Latvia	3,152
Japan	2,987
Denmark	2,979
Republic of Kosovo	2,957
India	2,739
Syria	2,471

As of December 2013 there were approximately 1,000,000 people (about 30 percent of the population) with an immigrant background living in Berlin, with significant differences in their distribution. The immigrant community is diverse, with Middle Easterners (including Turks and Arabs), smaller numbers of East Asians, Sub-Saharan Africans and other European immigrants , Eastern Europeans forming the largest groups. About 70,000 Afro-Germans live in Berlin.

There are more than 25 non-indigenous communities with a population of at least 10,000 people, including Turkish, Polish, Russian, Croatian, Palestinian, Serbian, Italian, Bosnian, Vietnamese, American, Romanian, Bulgarian, Chinese, Austrian, Ghanaian, Ukrainian, French, British, Spanish, Israeli, Thai, Iranian, Egyptian and Syrian communities.

Ethnic groups in 2011	% of population
European:	82.0
Ethnic German	71.0
Polish	3.0
former Soviet Union (primarily Russians)	3.0
former Yugoslavia	2.0
European Other (primarily Southern Europeans)	3.0
Middle Eastern:	9.0
Turkish	5.5
Arab	2.0
Iranian	0.5
other	2.0
Asian:	3.0
Southeast Asian	1.5
East Asian	1.0
South Asian	0.5
Afro-German or Black African	2.0
Mixed or unspecified background	2.0
Other groups (primarily the Americas)	2.0
Total population	3,496,082

These lists are based on official statistics regarding the foreign background of Berlin residents, rather than ethnicity; therefore, there may be a lower percentage of ethnic Germans. Fifty percent of children and teenagers have an immigrant background; in Neukölln, the percentage is higher (nearly 80 percent).

Berlin is estimated to have from 100,000 to 250,000 illegal immigrants. Since the accession of Romania and Bulgaria to the European Union there has been a Romani influx, and social-welfare offices are working to integrate them (and other migrants) with German-language and job-skills courses.

On 31 December 2010 the largest groups by foreign nationality were citizens from Turkey (104,556), Poland (40,988), Serbia (19,230), Italy (15,842), Russia (15,332), United States (12,733), France (13,262), Vietnam (13,199), Croatia (10,104), Bosnia and Herzegovina (10,198), UK (10,191), Greece (9,301), Austria (9,246), Ukraine (8,324), Lebanon (7,078), Spain (7,670), Bulgaria (9,988), the People's Republic of China (5,632), Thailand (5,037). There is also a large Arabic community, mostly from Lebanon, Palestine and Iraq. Additionally, Berlin has one of the largest Vietnamese communities outside Vietnam, with about 80,000 people of Vietnamese origin.

Country of origin	Population
Turkey	250,000-300,000 (see: Turks in Berlin)
Russia (including Russian-Germans)	est.200,000
Poland	est.200,000- 240.000
Arab World	est.70,000 (see: Arabs in Berlin)
Vietnam	est. 20,000-40,000 (with Residence permission or German citizenship/without Residence permission)
Ghana	est. 20,000 (estimations vary from 15,000-25,000). Actually there are about 1,800 Ghanaian citizens residing in Berlin, however, there are many Germans of Ghanaian and other West-African origin or with one parent being German and the other being from Ghana.
China, Croatia, Serbia, United States, Italy, Bosnia, Iran, Greece	almost or at least 20,000

Languages

The most-commonly-spoken foreign languages in Berlin are Turkish, Russian, Arabic, Polish, Kurdish, Vietnamese, English, Serbian, Croatian, Greek and other Asian languages. Turkish, Arabic, Kurdish, Serbian and Croatian are heard more often in the western part, due to the large Middle Eastern and former-Yugoslavian communities; Vietnamese, Russian and Polish have more native speakers in eastern Berlin.

Berlin dialect

Main article: Berlinerisch dialect

See also

• List of metropolitan areas by population
• Larger Urban Zones in the European Union
• Largest urban areas of the European Union

External links

• Berlin-Brandenburg Statistical Office (Amt für Statistik Berlin-Brandenburg)
• Schwenk, Herbert, Berliner Stadtentwicklung von A bis Z: Kleines Handbuch zum Werden und Wachsen der deutschen Hauptstadt, 2nd edition. Berlin: Luisenstädtischer Bildungsverein, 1998.