Population in Brief 2023: Key Trends

29 SEP 2023

The Population in Brief (PIB) 2023 publication provides key updates on Singapore’s population. Here’s a snapshot of the key trends:

1.    Overall population

  • Overall, Singapore’s total population stood at 5.92 million as at June 2023, a 5.0% increase from June 2022. Taking into account the decline in total population in 2020 and 2021 amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, the average total population growth rate over the past five years was comparable to the preceding five-year period.

  • The Singapore Citizen (SC) population increased by 1.6% from 3.55 million in June 2022 to 3.61 million in June 2023. The Permanent Resident (PR) population increased by 3.7% from 0.52 million in June 2022 to 0.54 million in June 2023. With the easing of travel restrictions related to COVID-19, more citizens and PRs living overseas returned to Singapore, and this was the largest contributing factor to the increases in the citizen and PR populations. 

  • The Non-Resident (NR) population increased by 13.1% from 1.56 million in June 2022 to 1.77 million in June 2023. The increase was seen across all pass types, and the largest increase came from Work Permit Holders in the Construction, Marine Shipyard, and Process (CMP) sectors, as contractors hired more workers to catch up on projects that were delayed by COVID-19.

2. Citizen marriages

  • In 2022, there were 24,767 citizen marriages, a record high. The number of citizen marriages increased for the second consecutive year since 2020, when the number of marriages dropped due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the annual average number of citizen marriages in 2018 - 2022 (22,700) remained lower than that of 2013 - 2017 (23,600).

3. Citizen births

  • The resident total fertility rate (TFR) reached a historic low of 1.04 in 2022.There were 30,429 citizen births in 2022, 4.0% fewer than the 31,713 citizen births in 2021. The annual average number of births in 2018 - 2022 (31,800) was also lower than that in 2013-2017 (32,700).

PIB 2023 is available here.