Ireland records high share of female engineers and scientists

Monday 16 February 2026

Eurostat data show that the number of women working as engineers and scientists in the EU reached 7.9 million in 2024, representing 40.5% of the total workforce in these fields.

Ireland recorded a share of 47.3% female scientists and engineers, placing it among the member states with relatively high representation.

The highest shares in Latvia (50.9%) and Denmark (48.8%).The lowest representation of female scientists and engineers was in Finland (30.7%), followed by Hungary (31.7%).

Data show an increase from 3.4 million in 2008 to 5.2 million in 2014, reaching 7.9 million in 2024.

Across all economic activities, women represented 40.5% of the scientists and engineers’ workforce in 2024. This share was higher in the total knowledge-intensive services (45.1%) and in the services (45.0%) categories. In manufacturing, women represented 22.4% of scientists and engineers, while in other activities, that share was 23.6%.

Image source dataset: hrst_st_nsecsex2.

Among the EU countries, the proportion of female scientists and engineers varied widely in 2024, with the highest shares registered in Latvia (50.9%), Denmark (48.8%), Estonia (47.9%), Spain (47.6%), and Bulgaria and Ireland (both 47.3%). The lowest representation of female scientists and engineers was in Finland (30.7%), followed by Hungary (31.7%), Luxembourg (32.4%), Slovakia (33.6%) and Germany (34.6%).

At level 1 of the Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (NUTS 1), female scientists and engineers were in the majority in 11 EU regions:

Four regions of Spain: Canarias (58.8%), Centro (52.5%) and Noroeste (52.4%) and Sur (50.3%);
Two regions of Portugal: Região Autónoma dos Açores (57.3%) and Madeira (56.4%);
Makroregion Centralny (54.8%) and Makroregion Wschodni (54.0%) in Poland, Severna i yugoiztochna in Bulgaria (53.3%), Norra Sverige in Sweden (52.0%) and Latvia (50.9%).

At the other end of the scale, the smallest proportion of female scientists and engineers was recorded in the Hungarian region of Közép-Magyarország (30.0%), the Finnish region of Manner-Suomi (30.7%), Sud in Italy (31.1%) and in the German regions of Rheinland-Pfalz (31.3%), Baden-Württemberg (31.7%) and Hessen (32.3%).