The population of the Brussels-Capital Region has stopped growing for the first time in 30 years, rising by 39 people in 2025.
On January 1, 2026 the region had 1,255,834 inhabitants, according to Statbel, the Belgian statistical office, and the national register, as analysed by the Brussels Institute for Statistics and Analysis (IBSA) and reported on Wednesday by Bruzz and VRT.
That is 39 more than a year earlier, when 1,255,795 people were registered in the region, meaning unbroken growth since 1996 has ended.
IBSA said the figures amount to “a stagnation of the population in Brussels”.
Earlier forecasts had not expected the pause until 2026, followed by a slight annual fall until 2035. The institute has projected that Brussels will shed about 2,400 inhabitants between 2024 and 2034, falling back below 1.25 million.
A projection in February still assumed a gain of about 1,200 in 2025.
Births and international migration both came in lower than expected.
The natural balance is still positive. There were 5,103 more births than deaths, unlike Flanders and Wallonia, where deaths outnumber births.
What cancelled that gain was movement.
Arrivals from abroad fell by more than 11 per cent on 2024: 48,179 people moved in from another country and 34,191 left for one, a net growth of 13,988.
Against that, more people left for Flanders and Wallonia than arrived from them, a net loss of 18,553.
Belgium as a whole added 42,083 inhabitants in 2025, of whom 33,584 in Flanders and 8,460 in Wallonia.
Foreign nationals are fewer as well.
On January 1, 2026, 461,155 residents did not have Belgian nationality, 36.7 per cent of the population and about 5,900 fewer than a year earlier, the first such drop in 20 years.
Growth was confined to nine of the 19 communes, “far fewer than in recent decades”, IBSA said.
Anderlecht overtook Schaerbeek in population.
There are a few factors that might be behind the population stagnation.
In 2025, 23 per cent of Brussels residents were at risk of poverty, against 7 per cent in Flanders and 13 per cent in Wallonia, according to the Health and Wellbeing Observatory of Brussels-Capital.
Extreme poverty rose by more than a quarter in two years.
The region had 47,304 people on integration income, more than the whole of Flanders, and Bruss’Help counted 9,777 homeless or badly housed people in November 2024, up 25 per cent in two years.
Average private rents reached €1,376 a month in 2025, up 3.7 per cent, and every commune is now above €1,000.
A quarter of residents live in an unhealthy home and 30 per cent in an overcrowded one.
The social-housing waiting list stood at 62,234 households by February 2026, against about 42,000 units, and the regional housing company carries €197 million of debt to the Region.
The regional books are no healthier. The 2026 budget, approved by the Brussels Government on March 6 and voted through parliament later that month, sets spending at €7.61 billion against €6.62 billion of revenue, a deficit of €957 million.
Consolidated gross debt stands at €15.65 billion, triple the 2016 level, and Standard & Poor’s still rates the Region A with a negative outlook, pointing to an unexpected rise in borrowing and the risk that the Government misses its target of a balanced budget by 2029.
Federal police figures for 2025 showed cocaine offences and recorded murders rising, with the public prosecutor having to go into hiding. The same figures counted 96 shootings in the region over the year, eight of them fatal, against 92 and nine deaths in 2024 and about 48 in 2022.
Brussels is experiencing a relentless surge in severe violence, marked by a high number of shootings, prompting the public prosecutor to raise the alarm. https://t.co/mLUAhELKMm
— Brussels Signal (@brusselssignal) August 13, 2025
