Bulgaria

Country at a glance

Bulgaria is a southeastern europe member of the European Union, with its capital in Sofia. The country joined the European Communities in 2007 in the post-2004 Balkan enlargement (alongside Bulgaria and Romania). Economically, Bulgaria is a Balkan economy in the middle of its convergence path, with IT services, manufacturing and agriculture, and a planned euro adoption in 2025–2026. The country retains the BGN, with eurozone entry foreseen once the convergence criteria are met, and it is part of the Schengen area for cross-border movement. Bulgarian is the official language and the country is divided into 2 NUTS-1 statistical regions for the purposes of Eurostat reporting. On Eurostat's headline indicators, Bulgaria is currently 15th-most populous of the 27 member states with data on record; 19th by GDP at current prices; with one of the oldest median ages in the bloc (rank 2/27).

Key insights

How Bulgaria stands out across the EU-27 on flagship indicators — auto-generated from the latest Eurostat snapshot.

• 🔴At-risk-of-poverty 21.2% — 3rd highest in EU (EU avg 16.3%)
• 🟡2nd-oldest median age in EU-27 (47.3 years)
• 🟡Life expectancy 75.8 years — bottom 1 in EU
• 🟡GDP per capita €18k — bottom 1 in EU (EU avg €42k)
• 🟡R&D expenditure 0.8% of GDP — far below the EU 3% target
• 🟢Public debt 29.9% of GDP — well below the 60% Maastricht threshold

Bulgaria vs EU-27

Flagship indicators alongside the EU-27 average and Bulgaria's rank across covered member states.

Indicators by topic

Every Eurostat indicator we hold for Bulgaria, grouped by theme. Click through to the indicator profile for the cross-country timeline.

More data on Bulgaria

This profile covers Eurostat statistical indicators. The pages below extend the picture into other strands of EU public data — parliamentary representation, public procurement, EU-funded research, cohesion-fund spending, regional statistics.

• European Parliament

  MEPs elected from Bulgaria (current term, 2024–2029).

• Public tenders

  TED notices from Bulgaria buyers — public contracts above EU thresholds.

• EU research grants

  CORDIS-funded R&D projects coordinated from Bulgaria.

• Cohesion funds

  Kohesio-listed ERDF/ESF+/Cohesion Fund projects in Bulgaria.

Sources & methodology

Data on this page comes from Eurostat (403 indicators), fetched from the official dissemination API. Each indicator card links to the cross-country profile with the full year-by-year timeline. See methodology for caveats, revision policy and ranking definitions, or sources for the complete dataset list.

Last refreshed: 2026-05-18 · Source: Eurostat dissemination API