Seoul, February 25 – South Korea experienced the fastest growth in the number of babies born in 15 years in 2025, with the country's total fertility rate reaching 0.8 for the first time in four years, according to government data released on Wednesday.
A total of 254,500 babies were born last year, an increase of 6.8 percent, or 16,100, compared to 2024, according to provisional data from the Ministry of Statistics and Data. The ministry will announce the final statistics in August, according to Yonhap News Agency.
The 2025 figures represent the steepest year-on-year increase since 2010, and the second consecutive year of growth.
The total fertility rate, the average number of children a woman is expected to have over her lifetime, reached 0.8, an increase of 0.05 from the previous year, marking the first time it has exceeded the threshold in four years.
The ministry attributed the rebound in the number of newborns to an increase in marriages and the continued growth in the population of women in their early 30s, the prime childbearing age group, since 2021.
"The number of marriages increased for 21 consecutive months from April 2024 to last December as couples who had delayed their marriages due to the COVID-19 pandemic finally got married," explained Park Hyun-jeong, a ministry official.
Park also noted a notable shift in social perception regarding childbirth, with the ministry's latest biennial survey in 2024 showing an increase in the number of people with the intention to have children after marriage compared to two years earlier.
She also added that the proportion of people willing to give birth outside of marriage also increased.
In terms of the total fertility rate, Park projected that the figure would remain above the 0.8 level this year and further rise to 1 in 2031.
Data also showed that the number of deaths increased by 1.3 percent year-on-year to 363,400 in 2025, resulting in a natural population decline of 110,000.