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How has the share of women in physics evolved across Europe, and where do we see progress, stagnation, or setbacks?
The following interactive visualizations track the percentage of women enrolled in Physics Bachelor's, Master's, and PhD programmes across different European regions from 2015 to 2024, based on Eurostatdata elaborated by atom*innen.
Explore how participation changes over time, and follow the academic pipeline from Bachelor studies to doctoral level.
We've grouped the data in two ways: by geographic category, and by innovation performance.
Country groupings follow the United Nations Geoscheme (M49 classification, United Nations Statistics Division, 2021). Within each UN M49 sub-region, only EU member states are included; non-EU countries were excluded from this view.
The shaded grey bands indicate the sample standard deviation around the group average. All averages are unweighted.
Data extracted from Eurostat, elaborated by atom*innen.
Women enrolled in Physics Bachelor programmes (2015–2024; all years of study) in EU member states grouped by geographic sub-region
Averages of Female Enrollment (2015-2024, all years of study) in Physics bachelor's programmes by European sub-region — EU member states
Countries are grouped according to the United Nations Geoscheme (M49 classification, United Nations Statistics Division, 2021), which divides Europe into four geographic sub-regions: Eastern, Northern, Southern, and Western Europe. This classification reflects geographic proximity rather than economic performance, EU membership status, or any policy framework.
The group average and the sample standard deviation are calculated across the countries included in each chart.
Data extracted from Eurostat, elaborated by atom*innen.
Women enrolled in Physics Bachelor programmes (2015–2024; all years of study) in all European countries grouped by geographic sub-region
Averages of Female Enrollment (2015-2024, all years of study) in Physics bachelor's programmes by European sub-region — all European countries
EU Countries are grouped according to their innovation performance as classified by the European Innovation Scoreboard (EIS) 2024. The EIS is a European Commission tool for monitoring research and innovation performance across EU member states. As a composite index aggregating 32 indicators — covering areas such as research investment, human resources, digitalisation, and intellectual assets — it provides a comparative assessment of national innovation systems.
Countries are assigned to their 2024 EIS category: Innovation Leaders (>125% of EU average), Strong Innovators (100–125%), Moderate Innovators (70–100%), Emerging Innovators (<70%). Note that country categories have shifted over 2015–2024, as the EIS index only started in 2018.
Countries were excluded if the total number of students enrolled in physics fell below 50 in any year of the observation period (e.g. Luxembourg and Malta). Hungary (76.5) and Croatia (81.6) were excluded as their EIS scores fall within a narrow margin of the Emerging/Moderate category boundary (78.8) and therefore cannot be assigned a stable category membership across the observation period. Croatia additionally transitioned from the Emerging to the Moderate Innovator category in 2023.
Data extracted from Eurostat, elaborated by atom*innen.