Spain’s population reached a record 49.8 million in the second quarter of 2026, the country’s official stats body announced on Thursday, with more than 100,000 new residents added to the census in just three months.
Spain’s population continues to grow month by month in 2026, and it’s looking likely that the country will reach 50 million inhabitants by this year or the next.
Spain saw an increase of 104,178 inhabitants from April to June, a faster increase than in Q1 2026.
As of July 1st 2026, Spain’s population had reached a total of 49,801,559 inhabitants, the highest figure in the historical record, according to the National Statistics Institute’s (INE) Continuous Population Survey, released on Thursday August 6th.
In annual terms, the estimated population growth in Spain is already 444,205 people.
According to the INE, Spain’s population growth is due once again to the increase in people born abroad.
READ ALSO: What would Spain be like with fewer immigrants?
In fact, the number of people born in Spain -including to foreign parents – decreased by 20,367 compared to the previous quarter .
The stats show that Spain’s population born abroad now totals nearly 10.3 million people, around one in five residents in Spain, but this includes those who’ve acquired Spanish citizenship.
If you look at the foreign-born population without Spanish nationality, they currently number 7,437,543 people.
The number of foreigners living in Spain increased by 87,197 people during the second quarter.
The population with Spanish nationality grew by 16,981 people, due largely to the aforementioned naturalisations.
READ ALSO: Births rise in Spain for first time in over a decade
The main nationalities of new immigrants during that period were Colombian (with 34,000 arrivals in Spain) , Venezuelan (23,300), and Moroccan (21,100).
Interestingly, the most numerous nationalities of emigrants – those who left Spain – were also Colombian (with 11,500 departures), Moroccan (10,900), and Venezuelan (5,900).
If you’re wondering if Spain’s widely reported migrant amnesty has had an impact on the second quarter’s increase in population, the answer is most likely no.
Even though over a million undocumented people living in the country applied for residency earlier this year, INE already included most of these migrants in the census, as most were registered in the padrón town hall.
During this second quarter, the population has grown in all Spanish regions and cities.
The largest increases occurred in the Valencian Community (0.43 percent), the Balearic Islands (0.36 percent), and the Principality of Asturias (0.29 percent).
Aragón (0.28 percent), Castile-La Mancha (0.28 percent), and Catalonia (0.27 percent) also saw population growth rates above the average of 0.21 percent.
Spain surpassed the barrier of 35 million inhabitants in 1974, 40 million in 1997, and 45 million in 2007.
