South Korea's population might plummet to 15% of its current level over the next 100 years due to an ongoing demographic decline, according to a South Korean think tank.
Mike Heuer | July 2, 2025
A police officer monitors crowds in the Hongdae nightlife area of Seoul, South Korea (October 2023). According to a new report, South Korea's population might plummet to 15% of its current level over the next 100 years due to an ongoing demographic decline. File Photo by Thomas Maresca/UPI UPI
July 2 (UPI) -- South Korea's population might plummet to 15% of its current level over the next 100 years due to an ongoing demographic decline, according to a South Korean think tank.
South Korea's population of 51.68 million could decline to as low as 7.53 million by 2125, the Korean Peninsula Population Institute for the Future announced on Wednesday, The Korea Herald reported.
KPPIF officials assessed immigration trends and birth and mortality rates to project the nation's population change over the next 100 years.
The study projected a 2125 population of between 7.53 million and 15.73 million, with a median of 11.15 million, in South Korea.
It predicts an increasing rate of population decline of 30% over the next 50 years, followed by more than a 50% decline from 2076 to 2125.
Declining birth rates and fewer people born each generation will cause South Korea's population decline to accelerate if it is not reversed, according to the KPPIF.
South Korea's total fertility rate refers to the average number of children women are expected to have and is the world's lowest at 0.75 per woman in 2024, The Korea Times reported.
Last year's fertility rate represented a slight increase from 0.72 in 2023.
"As the pace of pace of population decline accelerates, by the year 2100, Korea's population will have fallen to less than half of its current size," officials with Statistics Korea said.
Analysts for Statistics Korea have forecast three possible fertility rates in South Korea through 2072.
The lowest is 0.82, which would represent a slight increase from South Korea's current fertility rate and result in a population of 14.66 million by 2100.
A moderate fertility rate of 1.08 gives the nation a population projection of 17.87 million by 2100, while the highest projection of 1.34 would result in a population of 21.65 million.
Another sign of South Korea's declining population is a projected increase in the proportion of elderly people who are age 65 and over compared to those who are between ages 15 and 64.
South Korea is projected to have 100 working-aged individuals for every 140 seniors by 2100.