China Population

China's population began to shrink around 2022, an inflection point that arrived earlier than the government had planned for. Decades of the one-child policy, in force from 1980 to 2015, drove fertility far below replacement and left a narrow base of young people now entering adulthood. The consequences are a rapidly ageing society, a shrinking workforce and a skewed sex ratio, and recent moves to allow three children have done little to lift the birth rate.

China is home to about 1.41 billion people in 2026, the 2nd largest population of any country. In Eastern Asia, where it lies, that future is driven by fertility, longevity and the movement of people across its borders. It packs in roughly 147 people per square kilometre.

The peak is already behind China: its population maxed out at about 1.43 billion near 2021 and is contracting. By 2050 the UN expects around 1.27 billion people, and by 2100 about 639 million. It passed the 1 billion mark around 1982.

Fertility is exceptionally low, near 1.01 births per woman, far beneath the roughly 2.1 needed to hold a population steady.

The median age is set to climb from about 40 today to roughly 61 by 2100, even as life expectancy improves from about 78 years. An older population gradually reshapes the labour force, pension systems and healthcare demand.

All of this is a projection, not a prediction. The further out it runs the wider the plausible range becomes, which is why China's charts show a low-to-high band around the central line.