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Juveniles among people in prison

What share of the people held in prison are juveniles, in each European country?

37 of 37 shown in the list

% of prisoners who are juveniles

  1. Cyprus4.20% 2024
  2. Netherlands4.00% 2024
  3. Portugal2.90% 2024
  4. Italy2.60% 2024
  5. Kosovo2.60% 2020
  6. Ireland2.30% 2024
  7. Poland2.30% 2024
  8. Serbia1.70% 2024
  9. Austria1.40% 2024
  10. Spain1.40% 2024
  11. Croatia1.20% 2024
  12. Sweden1.00% 2024
  13. Türkiye1.00% 2024
  14. France0.90% 2024
  15. Latvia0.90% 2024
  16. Romania0.90% 2024
  17. Bosnia and Herzegovina0.80% 2024
  18. Slovenia0.80% 2024
  19. Greece0.70% 2024
  20. Hungary0.60% 2024
  21. North Macedonia0.60% 2024
  22. Switzerland0.60% 2024
  23. Czechia0.50% 2024
  24. Finland0.50% 2024
  25. Luxembourg0.50% 2024

Source: Eurostat, Prisoners by age and sex (crim_pris_age). Data for 2020 to 2024. What it counts, how to cite it and the data

At a glance

  • 37 countries or territories have a figure.
  • The highest is Cyprus at 4.20% (2024) and the lowest is Belgium at 0.00% (2024).
  • The middle value (the median) is 0.70%.

What it counts

Prisoners recorded as juveniles divided by all prisoners on the reference day, in the latest year each country reports (since 2019).

What it leaves out, and how far to trust a comparison

Countries set the age of juvenile status differently (usually under 18), and many hold young people in separate youth institutions that may not be counted as prisons. The figures are small, so a handful of cases moves a country a long way. Eurostat marks Kosovo with an asterisk: this designation is without prejudice to positions on status, and is in line with UNSCR 1244/1999 and the ICJ opinion on the Kosovo declaration of independence.

Source

Eurostat: Prisoners by age and sex (crim_pris_age). Source licence: CC BY 4.0. Data retrieved 2026-10-23 to 2026-10-25.

Cite this chart

Free to use in teaching, articles, reports and slides, with credit. Our compilation is licensed CC BY 4.0; the source publishes the underlying data under its own licence, shown below.

Reference (APA style)

TheLawToKnow. (2026). Juveniles among people in prison [Chart]. Law in Charts. https://tools.thelawtoknow.com/law-in-charts/juveniles-among-prisoners. Data: Eurostat, Prisoners by age and sex (crim_pris_age), https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/databrowser/view/crim_pris_age/default/table (data retrieved 2026-10-23 to 2026-10-25).

Short credit for slides and websites

Chart: TheLawToKnow, Law in Charts (https://tools.thelawtoknow.com/law-in-charts/juveniles-among-prisoners). Data: Eurostat.

BibTeX

@misc{juvenilesamongprisoners2026,
  author = {{TheLawToKnow}},
  title = {Juveniles among people in prison},
  year = {2026},
  howpublished = {Law in Charts},
  url = {https://tools.thelawtoknow.com/law-in-charts/juveniles-among-prisoners},
  note = {Data: Eurostat, Prisoners by age and sex (crim_pris_age), https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/databrowser/view/crim_pris_age/default/table. Retrieved 2026-10-23 to 2026-10-25.}
}

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