Distribution of well-being: subjective well-being

Subjective well-being concerns how people rate their lives. It is about life satisfaction as a whole and about specific aspects of life. It is also about positive and negative feelings that people experience and the extent to which they feel their lives have purpose and meaning. Subjective well-being is strongly influenced by the extent to which people experience control over their lives. The differences between population groups are measured in terms of life satisfaction.

Subjective well-being – or the well-being of the population – is an important aspect of well-being, because it is closely interwoven with quality of life. Information on people’s well-being provides an understanding of how they rate their own lives in general, i.e. relatively independently of objective measures such as income level or position in the labour market.

• 18 to 35-year-olds, people with primary education or a VMBO qualification, and migrants are less likely than average to be satisfied with their lives.
• Adults aged 65 and over, those with higher professional education (HBO) or university education, and people of Dutch origin are more satisfied with life than the average.
• The total proportion of people who reported being satisfied with life was 2.4 percentage points lower in 2025 than in 2019. Among the youngest age group (18 to 25 years), the decline – at nearly 7 percentage points – was more significant than the average.

Life satisfaction

In 2025, 84.9 percent of adults in the Netherlands said they were satisfied with their lives, which was a decrease of 2.4 percentage points compared to 2019. Meanwhile, 12.2 percent were neither satisfied nor dissatisfied and a relatively small group of 3 percent said they were dissatisfied with their lives.

Among 18 to 24-year-olds, 79.5 percent said they were satisfied with their lives; among those aged 25 to 34, the figure was 81.1 percent. Moreover, 18 to 24-year-olds experienced a stronger than average decrease in satisfaction compared to 2019 (a drop of 6.6 percentage points). Adults aged 65 and over, on the other hand, are more likely than average to be satisfied with their lives. Among 65 to 74-year-olds, 90.9 percent said they were satisfied with their lives; among those aged 75 and over, the figure was 88.7 percent. Satisfaction among these groups has also developed more favourably than average compared to 2019. Compared to that year, there was no decline in the proportion of people who were satisfied with life.

People who completed primary education or prevocational secondary education (VMBO) are less likely than average to report life satisfaction, while those with a higher education degree (HBO or university) are more likely to be satisfied with their lives.

People born in the Netherlands to parents who were also born in the Netherlands experience above-average life satisfaction, at 86.8 percent. Migrants are less likely than average to be satisfied with life.