Which EU country has the happiest people?

In 2018, over 62% of people aged 16 and over in the European Union reported being happy all of the time (14%) or most of the time (48%) over the past four weeks, while 12% were rarely (8%) or never happy (2%).

The European Union (EU) statistical office (Eurostat) has published an international ranking of happiness for its member states. Respondents were asked to rank their frequency of being happy in the past four weeks on the following scale: ‘all of the time’, ‘most of the time’, ‘some of the time’, ‘a little of the time’ or ‘none of the time’.

Compared with 2013, the share of happy people in the EU increased by over 2 percentage points (then it was 60%).

Belgium, the Netherlands, Austria and Finland have the happiest people: over three quarters of people (76% in each country) claimed to feel happy all or most of the time over the last four weeks. The next happiest individuals are in Luxembourg (74% of people), Spain (72%) and Denmark (70%).

In contrast, the frequency of being happy is the lowest in Latvia (where 31% of people reported being happy all or most of the time) and Bulgaria (35%), followed by Croatia (42%), Lithuania (45%), Greece and Romania (both 46%).

Looking at the extremes, Spain recorded the highest share of people that were happy all of the time (29%), while a similar share of people in Latvia (28%) reported being happy rarely or never over the last four weeks.