More than 5.4 million people lived in absolute poverty in Italy in 2025, i.e. 9.3% of the population, according to statistics published on October 15, 2026 by the Italian National Institute of Statistics (ISTAT). More than 2.1 million households are affected. Despite a generally stable situation compared with 2024, children, large families and households including foreign nationals remain particularly exposed. Employment does not provide sufficient protection for everyone.
Key Figures
5.4 million
of people live in absolute poverty in Italy, i.e. 9.3% of the population.
1.136 million
of children under 18 are affected, i.e. 12.5% of minors.
26.7%
of households with at least one foreign national live in absolute poverty, compared with 5.9% of households composed solely of Italians.
Source: ISTAT — 2025 data, published October 15, 2026.
What does it mean to be poor in Italy?
Absolute poverty, as measured by ISTAT, concerns not only people who are unemployed or homeless.
It designates households whose consumption expenditures are insufficient to cover a set of essential needs, notably food, housing, clothing, and other indispensable goods and services.
The poverty threshold varies according to family composition, the ages of its members and the place of residence. There is therefore no single amount applicable to all Italians.
ISTAT also distinguishes relative poverty, which measures a household’s situation relative to the consumption level of society.
In 2025, nearly 8.7 million people were in relative poverty, i.e. 14.8% of the population. The two indicators respond to different methods and their counts should not be added together.
Persistent poverty despite a small decline in rates
Absolute poverty affected 9.3% of the population in 2025, down from 9.8% in 2024.
For households, the rate fell from 8.4% to 8.0%.
ISTAT nevertheless considers that absolute poverty remained statistically stable at the national level. The observed variations do not allow concluding a significant overall improvement.
The intensity of poverty remains a concern as well.
On average, the spending of poor households is 18.5% below the corresponding poverty threshold. This gap reaches 21.6% in families with minor children.
In other words, the difficulty lies not only in the number of poor people, but also in the insufficiency of their resources to cover essential needs.
The South remains more affected, but nearly half of the poor households live in the North
Territorial disparities remain significant.
Mezzogiorno, covering the South of Italy and the islands, records the highest rate of household absolute poverty at 9.6%, down from 10.5% in 2024.
The Northwest registers a rate of 7.7%, the Northeast 7.4% and the Center 6.3%.
| Region | Poor households | Rate |
|---|---|---|
| South and Islands | 813,000 | 9.6% |
| Northwest | 568,000 | 7.7% |
| Northeast | 386,000 | 7.4% |
| Center | 338,000 | 6.3% |
The situation becomes more nuanced when looking at the national distribution of poor households.
Despite regional rates being lower than those in the South, 45.3% of Italy’s absolutely poor households live in the North, compared with 38.6% in the Mezzogiorno and 16.1% in the Center.
Poverty is therefore not solely a phenomenon concentrated in southern regions. It also affects the country’s major economic and industrial hubs.
More than one million children below the poverty line
With 1.136 million minors affected, absolute poverty touches 12.5% of Italian children and adolescents.
The rate reaches 12.1% among ages 18 to 34, compared with 8.9% for 35-64 and 6.1% among those 65 and older.
Family composition heightens the gaps.
Among households with at least five members, 19.2% live in absolute poverty. The rate reaches 16.9% for couples with three or more children and 11.5% among single-parent families.
ISTAT notes, however, an encouraging sign for children aged 7 to 13: their poverty rate fell from 14.9% in 2024 to 12.1% in 2025.
The situation remains particularly difficult in poor families with minors, where the average gap between consumption expenditures and the poverty threshold reaches 21.6%.
Working is not always enough to escape poverty
One of the important lessons of the report concerns households where the reference person is employed.
Absolute poverty affects 8.5% of families whose reference person is a wage earner.
The rate rises to 14.3% when the reference person is a worker or holds a similar job. It reaches 20.7% in households where the reference person is seeking employment.
Qualifications also play an important role.
Poverty affects 4.4% of households where the reference person has at least a high school diploma, compared with 11.9% when they have not completed the first cycle of secondary education.
Thus, employment and the level of education remain associated with better economic protection, without guaranteeing on their own that a household has sufficient resources.
Foreign families much more exposed
The gaps by nationality are particularly pronounced.
Poverty affects 5.9% of households composed exclusively of Italian nationals.
The rate reaches 26.7% among those with at least one foreign member and 29.4% in families composed solely of foreign nationals.
These categories overlap: households composed exclusively of foreigners are included in the overall set of households containing at least one foreign national.
According to institutional Italian information published on October 19, more than 1.5 million foreign nationals personally live in absolute poverty, i.e. 29.8% of the resident foreign population, compared with 7.3% among Italian nationals.
Rates calculated for individuals must be distinguished from those for households.
These gaps reveal fundamentally different economic and social situations. They are not sufficient, however, to identify a single cause, as employment conditions, family composition and housing costs can all intervene simultaneously.
What about Tunisians living in Italy?
The ISTAT results also concern Tunisian families with relatives settled in Italy.
Tunisian nationals are part of the foreign population studied, but the general communiqué does not provide a poverty rate specific to their community.
It would therefore be incorrect to apply directly the 29.8% rate observed for all foreign nationals to Tunisians.
Reports dedicated to the Tunisian community, published by the Italian authorities, allow for a more precise study of its situation in terms of employment, economic integration and living conditions.
For the affected families, the economic situation in Italy can also weigh on the capacity to save and on financial transfers to relatives remaining in Tunisia. No numerical effect on these transfers can be inferred from ISTAT’s poverty data alone.
The report finally draws a portrait of poverty deeply rooted in a developed country, where difficulties are not limited to unemployment or to historically disadvantaged regions.
More than one million poor children, wage-earning households struggling to cover their essential needs, and strong inequalities by nationality: behind the stability of national statistics, precarity remains a daily reality for millions of residents in Italy.
