Key facts
- In 2025, 9.1% of EU youth aged 18-24 were early school leavers.
- Romania, Germany, and Spain had the highest rates of early school leavers.
- Croatia recorded the lowest rate of early school leavers at 2.1%.
- The EU aims for fewer than 9% early school leavers by 2030.
- 46.2% of early school leavers were employed in 2025.
- Early leavers in rural areas are most common in Romania, Bulgaria, and Denmark.
In 2025, the proportion of young people aged 18 to 24 in the European Union who left education and training early stood at 9.1%, according to the latest Eurostat figures. This rate varied significantly across member states, with Croatia reporting the lowest percentage of early leavers at 2.1% and Romania the highest at 15.5%.
More young men than women tend to leave education and training early, although there has been a consistent downward trend for both sexes over the past decade. The EU has set a target to reduce the rate of early school leavers to below 9% by 2030, a goal that 17 member states have already achieved. Countries like Croatia, Greece, and Ireland recorded the lowest shares of early leavers, while Romania, Germany, and Spain reported the highest.
Geographical location within a country also plays a role, with urban areas showing the lowest proportion of early leavers (8%) compared to suburbs (10.1%) and rural areas (9.6%) in 2025. Romania, Bulgaria, and Denmark registered the highest shares of young people in rural areas who stopped studying after completing at most lower secondary education. Young people in Romania, Spain, and Germany who dropped out early were also more likely to live in towns or suburbs.
Early leavers from education and training often face challenges in the labor market. In 2025, 46.2% of all early leavers were employed, while 30.8% were unemployed but seeking work, and 23.1% were neither employed nor looking for work. A majority of EU countries reported that less than 50% of their early leavers were employed, with Lithuania (86.4%), Slovakia (77.9%), Bulgaria (76.7%), and Croatia (76.2%) having the highest shares of unemployed early leavers.