Woman standing in a shop surrounded by snowboards

In 2020, among the 22 EU countries for which data are available, 4 registered an average household expenditure on sporting goods and services above 500 purchasing power standard (PPS). PPS is an artificial currency unit that eliminates price level differences between countries. 

On top of the list was Luxembourg (628 PPS), closely followed by the Netherlands (622), Austria (620) and Germany (526). 

At the other end of the scale, average household expenditure was inferior to 100 PPS in Bulgaria (24), Slovakia (66), Lithuania (87) and Poland (95).

Source dataset: sprt_pcs_hbs

Recreational and sporting services: biggest spending category

Among the various sporting goods and services, the category in which EU households spent the most in 2020 was recreational and sporting services. In almost all the EU countries with available data, the highest share of spending in the field was on recreational and sporting services. The only exception was Greece where the highest share was devoted to major durables for outdoor recreation (69.0%). 

Mean household spending on recreational and sporting services was the highest in Cyprus with a share of 93.7%, followed by Bulgaria and Croatia with 81.3% and 79.3%, respectively. The lowest shares were observed in Greece (19.2%), Denmark (43.7%) and Belgium (46.8%).

Expenditure on equipment for sport, camping and open-air recreation represented the second highest share of household budgets in 14 EU countries with available data. This share ranged from 3.7% in Cyprus to 42.3% in Slovakia. 

Besides Greece, where the household expenditure on major durables for outdoor recreation had the highest share, this category was the second largest item in household budgets for sporting goods in Belgium (36.7%), Denmark (33.7%), Luxembourg (29.2%), Lithuania (27.2%), Malta (19.3%), the Netherlands (18.1%) and France (16.5%). Hungary (0.4%) and Bulgaria (0.8%) recorded the lowest shares of household expenditure on major durables for outdoor recreation. 

Stacked bar chart: Mean household expenditure on sporting goods and services, by broad expenditure purpose, %, share of all household sporting expenditure, 2020

Source dataset:  sprt_pcs_hbs

For more information

Methodological notes

  • Data for this article were collected through the household budget survey (HBS), a national survey carried out by EU Member States collecting data primarily on households’ consumption expenditure on goods and services. Eurostat disseminates the HBS results every 5 years, most recently for 2020. The fieldwork for the 2020 HBS data collection took place between 2018 and 2022 in the Member States, except for Cyprus, Malta and France, where the data were collected between 2015 and 2017. For Finland, Ireland, Portugal and Sweden, the data for the 2020 HBS were not available by the time this article was published. For Romania, data for the categories on sporting goods and services were not available. The data collection and expenditure patterns of households in some Member States might have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic-related restrictions.
  • Sporting items are classified under the European Classification of Individual Consumption according to Purpose (COICOP) heading 09 ‘Recreation and culture’. The list of sporting-related goods and services identified in the classification is limited to the articles and services that are considered as sport or are related to sporting activities. From the HBS, the data for the following sport-related categories are available according to the 2013 ECOICOP (European Classification of Individual Consumption according to Purpose):
    • CP0921 - Major durables for outdoor recreation
    • CP09222 - Major durables for indoor recreation
    • CP0923 - Maintenance and repair of other major durables for recreation and culture
    • CP0932 - Equipment for sport, camping and open-air recreation
    • CP09321 - Equipment for sport
    • CP09322 - Equipment for camping and open-air recreation
    • CP09323 - Repair of equipment for sport, camping and open-air recreation
    • CP0941 - Recreational and sporting services
    • CP09411 - Recreational and sporting services – Attendance
    • CP09412 - Recreational and sporting services – Participation

If you have any queries, please visit our contact us page.