When will Tanzania overtake Germany in population?

Tanzania is projected to overtake Germany in total population around 2032. At the crossover, both countries sit at roughly 83.3 million people. Today Germany is still larger, but the trend lines are converging and the order is set to flip within a generation.

The reason is a tale of two trajectories. Tanzania is on course to more than double over the century, moving from about 67.6 million in 2024 toward 262 million by 2100. Germany, by contrast, is projected to shrink, going from roughly 84.7 million to 70.9 million over the same period. Differences in fertility and age structure (Tanzania's median age near 17 versus Germany's near 45 today) explain much of the divergence.

Crossovers like this one are how the global population ranking is quietly rewritten. As faster-growing populations climb the table and slower-growing or shrinking ones slip down, the list of the world's largest countries in 2100 will look markedly different from today's. The 2032 crossing is one of the clearer signals of that shift.

As with all long-range projections, the exact year carries uncertainty. Under the UN's high and low fertility scenarios the crossover could arrive earlier or later, and the figures here follow the medium variant. Still, the direction of travel, Tanzania rising relative to Germany, is robust across the plausible range of outcomes.