Survey on income and living conditions is an annual survey regularly implemented by Statistical Office from 2013. The data collected with this survey represent the basis for calculating indicators of poverty and social exclusion for Montenegro. The indicators are based on the concept of relative poverty, which takes into account the disposable income of household, the number of household members (household size), and the distribution of income within the population. EU-SILC survey is, at the EU level, a required source for monitoring statistics on income, poverty, and social exclusion, in order to ensure comparable data both for every country, and at the EU level as total.

The indicators of poverty and social exclusion published in this release were calculated on the basis of data obtained from the survey conducted in 2025.

The reference period to which the data relates is different and depends on the type of data that are collected, so the reference period for income data is the previous calendar year, i.e. 2024. and for the material deprivation data is the moment of the survey, i.e. 2025.

The data for 2025, as well as for 2024, are preliminary. The final data will be published after validation by Eurostat.

According to the results of the 2025 Survey on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC), the at-risk-of-poverty rate stood at 20.9%, which represents an increase of 0.9 percentage points compared with the previous year. At the same time, the at-risk-of-poverty threshold increased compared with 2024. For a single-person household, the annual at-risk-of-poverty threshold rose from 3 973 to 4 868 euro, i.e. by 22.5%, while for a household consisting of two adults and two children under the age of 14, the threshold increased from 8 344 to 10 222 euro.

The at-risk-of-poverty or social exclusion (AROPE) rate in 2025 was 28.3%, which represents a decrease of 0.9 percentage points compared to 2024, when it was 29.2%. In the same time, the rate of severe material and social deprivation decreased from 11.0% in 2024, to 9.6% in 2025.
The groups that continue to face the highest risk of poverty are the unemployed, households with one adult and at least one dependent child, households with three or more dependent children, as well as residents of the Northern Region.