Growing and emptying towns in Spain, France, Italy and Portugal

Which towns are growing, and which are emptying	Measured over	Change
The fastest-growing towns in Spain 7,667 municipalities rated	measured over 2015–2025	median -0.37 %/yr 51.8% declining
The fastest-growing towns in France 33,984 municipalities rated	measured over 2015–2020	median +0.00 %/yr 40.3% declining
The fastest-growing towns in Italy 7,852 municipalities rated	measured over 2019–2025	median -0.42 %/yr 57.2% declining
The fastest-growing towns in Portugal 305 municipalities rated	measured over 2013–2023	median -0.20 %/yr 43.9% declining

Which towns are growing, and which are emptying

Measured over

Change

The fastest-growing towns in Spain

7,667 municipalities rated

measured over 2015–2025

median -0.37 %/yr

51.8% declining

The fastest-growing towns in France

33,984 municipalities rated

measured over 2015–2020

median +0.00 %/yr

40.3% declining

The fastest-growing towns in Italy

7,852 municipalities rated

measured over 2019–2025

median -0.42 %/yr

57.2% declining

The fastest-growing towns in Portugal

305 municipalities rated

measured over 2013–2023

median -0.20 %/yr

43.9% declining

What this number is

Compound annual change in registered residents: the rate that, compounded over the window, gets from the first figure to the last. Annualised on purpose — the four statistics offices publish windows of 10, 5, 6 and 10 years under one label, so comparing their raw percentages would rank countries by how wide a window each happens to publish.

There is no Europe-wide ranking here, and that is deliberate. Each statistics office publishes a different window — Spain 2015–2025 from the annual Padrón, France 2015–2020, Italy 2019–2025, Portugal 2013–2023 — so a pooled table would order towns partly by whose office publishes the freshest and widest data. The per-country pages are the honest form of the same question.