According to preliminary results released by the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis), transportation figures in Germany for 2025 show growth across various forms of local public transport.
In rail transport, 2.8 billion passengers traveled by local rail services, marking an increase of roughly 2 percent compared to the previous year. Furthermore, the total distance covered by all passengers using rail services reached 66 billion passenger kilometers, representing a 3 percent increase year-over-year.
The localized bus sector also saw an increase in passengers, reaching 5.5 billion, which is a 2 percent rise. The carried distance in bus transport remained largely stable at 39 billion passenger kilometers. Tram use showed no change from the previous year, with 3.9 billion passengers covering 17 billion passenger kilometers.
When comparing 2025 to 2015, passenger numbers in local rail transport are currently 10 percent higher. The rise in ridership was strongest between 2015 and 2019, after which growth slowed to just 1 percent between 2019 and 2025. Moreover, the average trip length in local rail transport was 23 kilometers in 2025, up from 21 kilometers a decade earlier. Over this ten-year period, the service’s total carried distance grew by 21 percent.
In the bus sector, nearly 5.5 billion passengers were transported. This figure is comparable to the pre-pandemic year of 2019 and is 1 percent higher than the 2015 figure. The average bus journey duration remained stable, around 7 kilometers in 2025, matching the length of journeys a decade ago.
Tram traffic is experiencing a slight dip in ridership; passenger numbers are 5 percent lower than they were in the pre-pandemic year of 2019, though they are 1 percent higher than the 2015 value. The average distance covered by tram passengers remained consistent at about 4 kilometers.
