Kaunas: The EU enterprise birth rate reached 10.4% in 2024, with 3.5 million new businesses, according to Eurostat figures released on 1 October 2026, and Lithuania led the field at 17.5%. The data show a single market that still creates more firms than it loses, even though eight countries saw the opposite.

The EU counted 34 million enterprises in 2024. Against 3.5 million births, Eurostat reports 3.1 million closures on preliminary figures. That gives an enterprise birth rate of 10.4% against a death rate of 9.2%, a net gain that keeps the business population growing. In 19 of the 27 member states, more enterprises opened than closed.

Behind Lithuania, the highest birth rates appeared in Portugal at 16.1%, Malta at 14.4% and France at 14.2%. The lowest rates came from Austria at 6.3%, Denmark at 7.2% and Germany at 7.8%. The spread shows how different national business cultures, registration rules and sector mixes can be, even inside one regulatory area.

Eight countries recorded more dissolutions than creations: Bulgaria, Denmark, Germany, Estonia, Ireland, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia. Estonia posted the highest preliminary death rate at 29.2%, followed by Ireland at 16.9% and Lithuania at 15.6%. Greece had the lowest death rate at 3.9%, with Malta at 4.4% and Austria at 5.3%. Lithuania appears in both lists, which suggests a market with heavy churn rather than simple expansion.

A high enterprise birth rate is not necessarily a weakness, even when it comes with heavy churn. Fast birth and death rates often signal that founders test ideas quickly and abandon those that fail. Still, a country with a high death rate and a low birth rate, like Estonia, where closures exceeded creations, deserves a closer look from policymakers who want durable employers rather than short-lived registrations.

The most interesting figures go beyond the enterprise birth rate and concern firms that scale. Eurostat identified 180,200 high-growth enterprises in 2024. The agency defines them as businesses with at least 10 employees at the start of a three-year period and average annual employment growth above 10%. They make up 10.0% of EU enterprises with at least 10 employees and provide work for 14.1 million people. A small group of companies therefore carries a large share of the jobs that a healthy enterprise birth rate eventually creates.

These numbers matter for the Commission’s competitiveness agenda. Brussels has argued that Europe needs more scale-ups and fewer barriers to growth, and the data back the first half of that claim: Europe starts businesses in volume but struggles to turn enough of them into large employers. Lower administrative costs, easier cross-border operation and better access to finance all feed into that conversion.

Eurostat’s release does not break the figures down by sector, so analysts must wait for further tables to learn which industries drive the births. For now, the headline is clear. The enterprise birth rate keeps new firms arriving at a pace that outstrips closures in most countries, and the policy challenge has shifted from starting firms to helping them grow.