Germans - Geographic Distribution

Geographic Distribution

Ethnic Germans form an important minority group in several countries in central and eastern Europe—(Poland, Hungary, Romania, Russia) as well as in Namibia (German Namibian), Brazil (German-Brazilian) (approx. 3% of the population), Argentina (German-Argentine) (~ 7,5% of the population) and Chile (German-Chilean) (approx. 3,5% of the population).

Some groups may be classified as Ethnic Germans despite no longer having German as their mother tongue or belonging to a distinct German culture. Until the 1990s, two million Ethnic Germans lived throughout the former Soviet Union, particularly in Russia and Kazakhstan.

In the United States 1990 census, 57 million people were fully or partly of German ancestry, forming the largest single ethnic group in the country. States with the highest percentage of Americans of German descent are in the northern Midwest (especially Wisconsin, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan) and the Mid-Atlantic state, Pennsylvania. But Germanic immigrant enclaves existed in many other states (e.g., the German Texans and the Denver, Colorado area) and to a lesser extent, the Pacific Northwest (i.e. Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington state).

Notable Ethnic German minorities also exist in other Anglosphere countries such as Canada (approx. 10% of the population) and Australia (approx. 4% of the population). As in the United States, most people of German descent in Canada and Australia have almost completely assimilated, culturally and linguistically, into the English-speaking mainstream.

Distribution of German citizens and people claiming German ancestry (important: those figures are not truly correct and could be only higher, because of wrongly formulated questions in censuses in various countries (for example in Poland) and other different factors, f.e. related to participant in a census):

Country German ancestry German citizens Comments
Germany 66,420,000 75,000,000 see Demographics of Germany
United States 50,000,000 see German American
Brazil 5,000,000 see German Brazilian
Canada 3,200,000 see Canadians of German ethnicity
Argentina 3,100,000 50,000 see German Argentine
South Africa 1,200,000 see Afrikaner. Although studies show that between 30–40% of Afrikaners have German ancestry, due to intermarriage this figure is likely to be much higher.
CIS 1,000,000 600,000 see Germans in Russia, Germans of Kazakhstan, Volga Germans, Caucasus Germans
France 1,000,000 predominant ethnic group of Alsace and Moselle; 970,000 with German dialects as mother tongue
Australia 812,000 incl. 106,524 German-born. See German Australian
Chile 500,000 - 600,000 see German-Chilean
Italy 500,000
Netherlands 179,000
United Kingdom 262,000 92,000 see German migration to the United Kingdom
Spain 255,000 German immigrants
Switzerland 266,000 see German immigration to Switzerland
Poland 153,000 German minority in Poland. The minority is concentrated mainly in Silesia (particularly in Opole Voivodeship).
Peru 180,000 see German Peruvian
Hungary 120,344 see Germans of Hungary
Austria 124,710
Israel 100,000
Venezuela 70,000 see German Venezuelan
Romania 60,000 see Germans of Romania
Uruguay 46,000 6,000
Czech Republic 40,000 see Germans in the Czech Republic
Bolivia 40,000 German speaking Mennonites. See Ethnic Germans in Bolivia
Belgium 38,366 excludes German-speaking ethnic Belgians
Norway 37,000
Ecuador 33,000
Namibia 30,000 German Namibian
Dominican Republic 25,000
Denmark 15,000–20,000 see North Schleswig Germans
Greece 15,498
Ireland 11,797
Slovakia 5000–10,000
Philippines 6,400 see German settlement in the Philippines
Serbia 3,900 see Germans of Serbia
Croatia 2,900 see Germans of Croatia
Turkmenistan 2,700
Tajikistan 2,700
Jamaica 160 Germans in Jamaica

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