Contents
- Sports club membership statistics: Germany’s national totals
- Sports club membership statistics by German state
- Sports club membership statistics by German federation
- Japanese adult sports club membership statistics over time
- Japanese sports club membership statistics by gender and age
- Japanese club types and interest among nonmembers
- Reading these sports club membership statistics
- Sources
Sports club membership statistics: Germany’s national totals
Germany’s organized-sport inventory counted 30,082,466 sport-club memberships as of 1 January 2026, according to the German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB). This is a count of memberships reported through the DOSB system, not a count of unique people: one person may hold more than one membership. The total therefore describes the scale of recorded affiliations, rather than the number or share of Germans who participate in sport.
The DOSB table divides the total into organizational groups. State sport federations accounted for 26,399,942 memberships. Olympic sport federations reported 25,147,971, while non-Olympic sport federations reported 2,277,781. Federations with special tasks reported another 1,294,069. These categories show the breadth of the umbrella’s reporting structure; their counts should be understood as memberships within the stated federation groupings.
Source: DOSB, Bestandserhebung 2026, inventory date and “Gesamtzahl der Mitgliedschaften,” page 3.
Sports club membership statistics by German state
The state sport federation counts varied substantially among the reported states. Bavaria recorded 4,881,190 memberships and Baden-Württemberg 4,373,259 in the DOSB’s 2026 inventory. Lower Saxony reported 2,710,397, Hesse 2,296,906, and Rhineland-Palatinate 1,477,931.
| State | Memberships reported in 2026 |
|---|---|
| Bavaria | 4,881,190 |
| Baden-Württemberg | 4,373,259 |
| Lower Saxony | 2,710,397 |
| Hesse | 2,296,906 |
| Rhineland-Palatinate | 1,477,931 |
These are state-federation membership totals, not participation rates. Without corresponding population denominators in these reported figures, the counts alone cannot establish which state has the highest share of residents in sports clubs. They also do not show how many individuals are counted in more than one club or sport.
Source: DOSB, Bestandserhebung 2026, “Landessportbünde,” page 6; inventory dated 1 January 2026.
Sports club membership statistics by German federation
Among DOSB peak sport federations, football and gymnastics recorded the largest counts among the figures reported here. The German Football Association (Deutscher Fußball-Bund) reported 8,277,918 memberships in the 2026 inventory, and the German Gymnastics Federation (Deutscher Turner-Bund) reported 5,280,902.
Other large federation totals included 1,583,726 for the German Alpine Club, 1,553,580 for the German Tennis Federation, and 1,357,240 for the German Shooting Federation. These counts indicate the scale of memberships attributed to each federation in the DOSB ranking. They do not measure active participation, frequency of play, or the number of distinct people involved. Comparisons also describe federation reporting categories, not equivalent estimates of the size of every sport’s informal or non-affiliated participation.
Source: DOSB, Bestandserhebung 2026, “Rangliste 2026 aller Spitzenverbände (nach Mitgliedschaften),” page 16.
Japanese adult sports club membership statistics over time
Japan’s Sports Safety and Sports Foundation (SSF) reports adult enrollment through its National Sports-Life Survey. In the 2022 survey, 16.6% of adults said they were enrolled in a sport club, team, or group at the time of the survey. This is a survey percentage for adults, not an administrative count of registered memberships.
The SSF’s historical series shows a changing rate. It began at 19.7% in 1992, declined to 16.9% in 1994, then rose to 22.0% in 2000. Later reported readings were 18.4% in 2006 and 20.0% in 2014. The more recent sequence was 18.1% in 2016, 18.5% in 2018, 17.3% in 2020, and 16.6% in 2022.
| Survey year | Adult sport-club enrollment |
|---|---|
| 1992 | 19.7% |
| 1994 | 16.9% |
| 2000 | 22.0% |
| 2006 | 18.4% |
| 2014 | 20.0% |
| 2016 | 18.1% |
| 2018 | 18.5% |
| 2020 | 17.3% |
| 2022 | 16.6% |
The series moves up and down rather than following a steady rise or fall. The latest two observations in the supplied series show a decrease from 17.3% in 2020 to 16.6% in 2022, while the 2022 reading is also below the 1992 starting figure. These comparisons describe the survey’s reported rates; they do not identify why the rates changed.
[Source: SSF, “5-I. Sport Club Memberships for Adults (Sport Clubs) — White Paper on Sport in Japan 2023”, “Membership Trends.”]
Japanese sports club membership statistics by gender and age
In the 2022 Japanese adult survey, current enrollment was 16.9% among men and 16.2% among women. A separate measure of lifetime experience showed that 57.5% of men and 61.4% of women had never enrolled in any sports club by the time of the survey. The current-enrollment figures are close, while the never-enrolled figures describe a different time span and should not be treated as their complements.
Enrollment varied more noticeably by age. The SSF reported the highest membership rate for adults aged 18–19, at 29.3%. Rates then ranged from 23.8% among those aged 70 and over and 19.1% among ages 60–69 to lower levels in several working-age groups. Adults aged 30–39 had the lowest reported rate, 9.9%, and the highest reported non-membership rate, 65.5%.
| Age group | Enrolled in a sport club in 2022 |
|---|---|
| 18–19 | 29.3% |
| 20–29 | 15.3% |
| 30–39 | 9.9% |
| 40–49 | 13.4% |
| 50–59 | 15.4% |
| 60–69 | 19.1% |
| 70 and over | 23.8% |
The age pattern is not a simple progression in which enrollment falls continuously with age: the survey’s reported rate rises again among older adults, reaching 23.8% for people aged 70 and over. The 18–19 group also stands out, but it is a narrow age band. These are percentages within the survey’s age groups, not membership counts.
[Source: SSF, “5-I. Sport Club Memberships for Adults (Sport Clubs) — White Paper on Sport in Japan 2023”, “Membership Trends.”]
Japanese club types and interest among nonmembers
The SSF’s 2022 account also distinguishes reported club types. Local community clubs were identified as the most popular type, at 30.8% in the report’s club-type measure. The subgroup figures give further context: local community club proportions were 32.8% among women and 28.9% among men. Among adults aged 60–69, the reported local community club proportion was 39.8%, and among those 70 and over, it was 39.2%.
Private sport and fitness clubs showed a different age and gender pattern in the reported comparisons. The proportion was 34.0% among women and 15.0% among men. By age, the figures were 32.1% for ages 50–59 and 32.3% for ages 60–69; the report says these exceeded the proportions for other age groups. Workplace clubs, meanwhile, had reported proportions of 21.1% among adults aged 20–29 and 23.3% among those aged 30–39.
These figures refer to the survey’s club-type measure and should not be added together as if they were mutually exclusive shares of all adults. They describe reported membership by club type within the survey, rather than national administrative totals.
Among Japanese adults who were not currently enrolled in any sport club, 15.2% said in 2022 that they would like to become a member. That was down from 19.5% in 2016 and 13.9% in 2020. In 2022, stated interest among nonmembers was 16.7% for women and 13.8% for men. This is expressed interest within the nonmember group, not a forecast of future enrollment.
[Source: SSF, “5-I. Sport Club Memberships for Adults (Sport Clubs) — White Paper on Sport in Japan 2023”, “Membership Trends” and “Membership Status by Types of Sport Clubs.”]
Reading these sports club membership statistics
The German and Japanese figures offer complementary but different views. Germany’s DOSB inventory counts reported organizational memberships on a fixed date, while Japan’s SSF survey estimates the share of adults reporting current enrollment and provides demographic and club-type breakdowns. Membership counts cannot be directly compared with survey percentages, and the two countries’ measures do not establish which has greater participation overall.
Within their own scopes, the sources reveal useful contrasts: Germany’s federation system reports tens of millions of memberships, distributed unevenly across states and sports; Japan’s adult survey shows that enrollment rates vary by year, age, gender, and club type. Keeping those units and populations distinct makes the statistics more informative.