Demographics of Iceland

Demographics of Iceland
Population pyramid of Iceland in 2020
Population	400,000 (2024 est.)
Growth rate	0.93% (2022 est.)
Birth rate	12.96 births/1,000 population
Death rate	6.56 deaths/1,000 population
Life expectancy	83.64 years
• male	81.41 years
• female	85.97 years
Fertility rate	1.95 children
Infant mortality rate	1.65 deaths/1,000 live births
Net migration rate	2.89 migrant(s)/1,000 population
Sex ratio
Total	1 male(s)/female (2022 est.)
At birth	1.05 male(s)/female
Nationality
Nationality	Icelandic

The demographics of Iceland include population density, education level, health of the populace, economic status, religious affiliations and other aspects of the population.

As of 2022, the Icelandic population was just over 376,000. About 86,000 residents (23.7%) were of foreign background.^[1]

About 99% of the nation's inhabitants live in urban areas (localities with populations greater than 200) and 64% live in the Capital Region.

The population of Iceland probably wavered between about 30,000 and 80,000 for most of the time since settlement. Official statistics begin in 1703, since which the population has grown from 50,358 to 376,248 (January 2022).^[2]

Most Icelandic people are descendants of Norwegian settlers, and of Gaels from Ireland and Scotland who were brought over as slaves during the settlement of Iceland in the ninth century AD. Recent DNA analysis suggests that about 66 percent of the male settler-era population was of Norse ancestry and that the female population was 60 percent Celtic.^[3][4] Iceland remained extremely homogenous from its settlement era until the twentieth century.

Large numbers of Icelanders began to emigrate from Iceland in the 1850s. It has been estimated that 17,000 Icelanders immigrated to North America in the period 1870–1914, and that 2,000 of them moved back to Iceland; this net loss, 15,000, was about 20% of the Icelandic population in 1887.^[5] According to historian Gunnar Karlsson, "migration from Iceland is unique in that most went to Canada, whereas from most or all other European countries the majority went to the United States. This was partly due to the late beginning of emigration from Iceland after the Canadian authorities had begun to promote emigration in cooperation with the Allan Line, which already had an agent in Iceland in 1873. Contrary to most European countries, this promotion campaign was successful in Iceland, because emigration was only just about to start from there and Icelandic emigrants had no relatives in the United States to help them take the first steps".^[5]

In the wake of the 2008 Icelandic financial crisis, many Icelanders went to work abroad.^[6]

Before the 1990s, there was little immigration to Iceland, and most of it was from other Scandinavian countries: about 1% of Icelanders in 1900 were of Danish heritage (born either in Denmark or to Danish parents).^[7] In the mid-1990s, 95% of Icelanders had parents of Icelandic origin, and 2% of Icelanders were first-generation immigrants (born abroad with both parents and all grandparents foreign-born).^[8][9]

Immigration to Iceland rose rapidly in the late twentieth century, encouraged by Iceland's accession to the European Economic Area in 1994, its entry into the Schengen Agreement in 2001, and the country's economic boom in the early twenty-first century. The largest ethnic minority is Poles, who are about a third of the immigrant population. In 2017, 10.6% of the people were first-generation immigrants.^[9]

Iceland is also developing relatively small populations of religious minorities, including Catholics (about 15,000 in 2020, 4.02% of Icelanders),^[10][11][12] Baháʼís (about 400 in 2010),^[13] Jews (about 250 in 2018),^[14] Buddhists (about 1,500 in 2021),^[15] and Muslims (about 1,300 in 2015).^[16][17]

Research on the experience of immigrants to Iceland is in its early days.^[18][19] There is some evidence that racism is not as acute in Iceland as in neighbouring countries.^[20][21][22] But, while it is popularly believed in Iceland that racism does not exist there,^[23] there is evidence that in some respects immigrant populations experience prejudice and inequalities.^[24] For example, Iceland has a higher dropout rate from upper secondary school among young immigrants than the EEA average.^[25]

Iceland does not formally collect data on the ethnicity or racial identification of its citizens, but does collect data of the origin and background group by birth.^[26]

Background Groups	Year
	1996[28]		2001[28]		2006[28]		2011[28]		2016[28]		2021[28]
	Number	%	Number	%	Number	%	Number	%	Number	%	Number	%
Icelanders	260,054	97.10%	270,106	95.32%	278,975	93.02%	286,606	89.99%	292,326	87.90%	300,369	81.44%
Icelanders of two Icelandic parents	251,057	93.74%	259,109	91.44%	265,711	88.60%	270,771	85.02%	274,115	82.43%	279,236	75.71%
Born abroad, Icelandic background	3,490	1.30%	4,214	1.48%	4,880	1.62%	5,449	1.71%	5,971	1.79%	6,634	1.79%
Born in Iceland, one parent born abroad	5,507	2.05%	6,783	2.39%	8,384	2.79%	10,386	3.26%	12,240	3.68%	14,499	3.93%
Foreign	7,755	2.90%	13,255	4.67%	20,916	6.97%	31,846	10%	40,203	12.09%	68,423	18.55%
Immigrants	5,357	2.00%	10,073	3.55%	16,690	5.56%	25,697	8.06%	31,819	9.56%	57,126	15.49%
Descendants of Immigrants	345	0.12%	543	0.19%	1,116	0.37%	2,586	0.81%	4,152	1.24%	6,117	1.65%
Born abroad, one Icelandic parent	2,053	0.76%	2,639	0.93%	3,110	1.03%	3,563	1.11%	4,232	1.27%	5,180	1.40%
Total	267,809	100%	283,361	100%	299,891	100%	318,452	100%	332,529	100%	368,792	100%

Foreign-born communities of over 300^[1]

Country	2010	2015	2020	2021	2022
Poland	10,088	10,967	20,515	20,558	20,927
Denmark	3,236	3,283	3,644	3,701	3,839
Lithuania	1,442	1,499	3,299	3,292	3,420
United States	1,849	2,019	2,516	2,680	2,888
Romania	205	400	1,995	2,117	2,505
Philippines	1,407	1,565	2,223	2,276	2,374
Germany	1,697	1,649	2,065	2,180	2,367
Sweden	1,846	1,920	2,173	2,245	2,352
Latvia	641	735	1,965	2,087	2,252
United Kingdom	1,095	1,307	1,836	1,960	1,976
Thailand	1,062	1,196	1,428	1,465	1,497
Norway	987	1,036	1,273	1,305	1,369
Spain	288	540	1,076	1,161	1,331
Portugal	607	576	1,131	1,034	1,113
France	444	538	913	966	1,080
Vietnam	479	613	885	988	1,073
Croatia	148	169	828	825	898
Czech Republic	152	246	851	792	841
Italy	218	260	556	607	758
China	481	582	709	729	749
Hungary	154	218	506	550	580
Bulgaria	135	240	550	551	557
Venezuela	36	39	229	391	557
Serbia	312	307	516	528	550
India	272	305	387	439	544
Russia	294	364	502	515	534
Slovakia	234	243	511	463	511
Ukraine	210	274	430	457	510
Syria	19	35	331	402	471
Netherlands	297	288	401	431	451
Iraq	48	57	279	400	424
Canada	231	277	328	331	352
Greece	25	45	228	260	342
Moldova	13	21	173	227	341
Bosnia and Herzegovina	144	150	277	272	305
Other	7,066	7,489	8,561	9,014	9,115
Total immigrant population	35,121	39,221	66,767	68,938	73,258

Due to a shortage of labor,^[29] immigration to Iceland will most likely increase in the future.^[30] Estimates show that the number of immigrants could be as high as 15% of the total population by 2030.^{[30][needs update]}

Most Icelandic surnames are based on patronymy, or the adoption of the father's first given name, followed by "son" or "daughter". For example, Magnús and Anna, children of a man named Pétur Jónsson, would have the full name Magnús Pétursson and Anna Pétursdóttir, respectively. Magnús's daughter Sigríður Ásta would be Sigríður Ásta Magnúsdóttir, and would remain so for the rest of her life regardless of marriage. An Icelandic patronymic is essentially only a designation of fatherhood, and is therefore redundant in Icelandic social life except to differentiate people of the same first name – the phone directory, for example, lists people by their given name first, patronymic second. Thus it has little in common with traditional surnames except for its position after the given name. It is legally possible in Iceland to rework the patronymic into a matronymic, replacing the father's name with the mother's. Use of the patronymic system is required by law, except for descendants of those who acquired family names before 1913 (about 10% of the population). One notable Icelander with an inherited family name is football star Eiður Smári Guðjohnsen.

According to University of Iceland economists Davíd F. Björnsson and Gylfi Zoega, "The policies of the colonial masters in Copenhagen delayed urbanisation. The Danish king maintained a monopoly in trade with Iceland from 1602 until 1855, which made the price of fish artificially low – the price of fish was higher in Britain – and artificially raised the price of agricultural products. Instead, Denmark bought the fish caught from Iceland at below world market prices. Although the trade monopoly ended in 1787, Icelanders could not trade freely with other countries until 1855. Following trade liberalisation, there was a substantial increase in fish exports to Britain, which led to an increase in the number of sailing ships used in fishing, introduced for the first time in 1780. The growth of the fishing industry then created demand for capital, and in 1885 Parliament created the first state bank (Landsbanki). In 1905 came the first motorised fishing vessel, which marked an important step in the development of a specialised fishing industry in Iceland. Iceland exported fresh fish to Britain and salted cod to southern Europe, with Portugal an important export market. Fishing replaced agriculture as the country’s main industry. These developments set the stage for the urbanisation that was to follow in the twentieth century."^[31]

A 2017 study looking at individuals going to the capital area for higher education found that "Only about one in three University of Iceland students from regions beyond commuting distance return after graduation, while about half remain in the capital area and others mostly emigrate."^[32] Iceland's 10 most populous urban areas:

Largest cities or towns in Iceland statice.is
	Rank	Name	Region	Pop.
Reykjavík Kópavogur	1	Reykjavík	Capital Region	128,793	Hafnarfjörður Reykjanesbær
	2	Kópavogur	Capital Region	36,975
	3	Hafnarfjörður	Capital Region	29,799
	4	Reykjanesbær	Southern Peninsula	18,920
	5	Akureyri	Northeastern Region	18,925
	6	Garðabær	Capital Region	16,299
	7	Mosfellsbær	Capital Region	11,463
	8	Árborg	Southern Region	9,485
	9	Akranes	Western Region	7,411
	10	Fjarðabyggð	Eastern Region	5,070

In 2016, 71.6% of the population belonged to the state church (the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Iceland), approximately 5% in free churches, 3.7% to the Roman Catholic Church, approximately 1% to the Ásatrúarfélagið (a legally recognized revival of the pre-Christian religion of Iceland), approximately 1% to Zuism, 8% in unrecognized or unspecified religious groups, and 9% do not belong to any religious group.^[33]

All living Icelanders, as well as all foreign citizens with permanent residence in Iceland, have a personal identification number (kennitala) identifying them in the National Registry. This number is composed of 10 digits, whereof the first six are made up of the individual's birth date in the format DDMMYY. The next two digits are chosen at random when the kennitala is allocated, the 9th digit is a check digit, and the last digit indicates the period of one hundred years in which the individual was born (for instance, '9' for the period 1900–1999). An example would be 120192-3389. While similar, all-inclusive personal registries exist in other countries, the use of the national registry is unusually extensive in Iceland. It is worth noting that the completeness of the National Registry eliminates any need for census to be performed.

Data according to Statistics Iceland, which collects the official statistics for Iceland.^[34][35][36]

Graphs are unavailable due to technical issues. There is more info on Phabricator and on MediaWiki.org.

Graphs are unavailable due to technical issues. There is more info on Phabricator and on MediaWiki.org.

^[37]

Graphs are unavailable due to technical issues. There is more info on Phabricator and on MediaWiki.org.

^[38]

Period	Live births	Deaths	Natural increase
January - September 2023	3,260	1,910	+1,350
January - September 2024	3,230	1,970	+1,260
Difference	-30 (-0.92%)	+60 (+3.14%)	-90

Source: UN World Population Prospects^[41]

The following demographic statistics are from the CIA World Factbook, unless otherwise indicated.^[42]

Age structure

0–14 years: 19.8% (male 36,692/female 35,239)
15–64 years: 63.2% (male 116,210/female 113,810)
65 years and over: 17.1% (male 29,366/female 32,719) (2024 est.)

Sex ratio

at birth: 1.05 males: 1 female
under 15 years: 1.04 males: 1 female

15–64 years: 1.02 males: 1 female
65 years and over: 0.9 males: 1 female
total population: 1 male: 1 female (2024 est.)

Maternal mortality rate

3 deaths/100,000 live births (2020 est.)

Infant mortality rate

1.6 deaths/1,000 live births (2024 est.)

Life expectancy at birth

total population: 84 years
male: 81.8 years
female: 86.3 years (2024 est.)

Health expenditures

9.6% of GDP (2020)

Physicians density

4.14 physicians/1,000 population (2019)

Obesity – adult prevalence rate

21.9% (2016)

Education expenditures

7.7% of GDP (2020 est.)

Mother's mean age at first birth

28.7 (2020 est.)

Nationality

noun: Icelander(s)
adjective: Icelandic

Ethnic groups

78.7% Icelandic, 5.8% Polish, 1% Danish, 1% Ukrainian, 13.5% other (2024 est.)

Religions

Evangelical Lutheran Church of Iceland (official) 58.6%, Roman Catholic 3.8%, Independent Congregation of Reykjavik 2.6%, Independent Congregation of Hafnarfjordur 1.9%, Pagan Worship 1.5%, Icelandic Ethical Humanist Association 1.4%, other or unspecified 18.7%, none 7.7% (2024 est.)

Languages

Icelandic (English and a second Nordic language, Danish by default, are also a part of the Icelandic compulsory education).

• "Hagstofa Íslands" [Statistics Iceland]. statice.is – the national statistical institute of Iceland
• "ICELAND". The World Factbook. 20 June 2023.
• A 2012 report by the Ministry of Welfare on migration to and from Iceland 1961–2011.