The use of community sanctions and measures that allow individuals to remain in the community — also known as alternatives to imprisonment — continues to grow overall in Europe, although at a moderate pace, according to the latest Council of Europe annual penal statistics on persons under the supervision of probation agencies (2025 SPACE II survey), published today.
Probation grows as prisons hit capacity
Between January 2024 and January 2025, the total number of probationers increased by 2.7% in the 32 probation services that reported the total number of individuals under probation for both years.
At the same time, almost half of European prison systems report overcrowding or have their prisons nearly at full capacity, according to the Council of Europe’s 2025 annual penal statistics on prison populations (SPACE I), released in May.
The SPACE II survey contains data across 48 probation services in the 46 Council of Europe member states on individuals subject to community sanctions or measures, including alternatives to deprivation of liberty such as electronic monitoring, community service, home arrest, treatments, semi-liberty and conditional release.
Alternatives to imprisonment remain a Council of Europe objective
The Council of Europe – through its Committee of Ministers and other bodies, including the Committee for the prevention of torture — has long supported the use of alternatives to imprisonment, as they can effectively help integrate offenders into society and improve the operation of prisons. The Council of Europe’s, European rules on community sanctions and measures encourage governments to ensure their use in a proportionate and just way, taking into account the offences and the profile of the offender.
While prison systems consistently count individual inmates in their statistics, and most probation agencies also count individuals (regardless of how many measures they are subject to), some probation agencies use different counting methods and may count cases, files, or orders. The latter may concern more than one individual; conversely, in these agencies the same individual may be counted more than once (for example, if they are subject to more than one order).
Probation rates: huge variance
On 31 January 2025, a total of 1,433,011 probationers were under the supervision of the 36 probation agencies that reported data on the number of persons under their supervision, which corresponds to a median European probation population rate of 154 probationers per 100,000 inhabitants.
Probation rates vary dramatically across European countries, reflecting diverse criminal justice approaches and practices. In January 2025, the highest probation population rates were found in Poland (652 probationers per 100,000 inhabitants), Türkiye (495), Georgia (468), Armenia (430), Albania (387), Republic of Moldova (320), England and Wales (United Kingdom) (276), Latvia (267) and Italy (232), in countries counting individuals.
Four of the five agencies that registered the lowest probation rates are located in the Balkan region, where probation services have been established more recently. The lowest were found in Montenegro (16), Greece (21), North Macedonia (31), Switzerland (44), Serbia (47), Bulgaria (48), Finland (72), Iceland (86) and Croatia (89).
As regards 24 probation systems that also or only count measures, the highest probation rates were reported in Poland (726 per 100,000 inhabitants), Belgium (628), Georgia (518), Armenia (479), Republic of Moldova (384) and Romania (338). The lowest rates were found in North Macedonia (31), Norway (38), Spain (state administration) (39) and Croatia (89).
Considering countries with over half a million inhabitants which provided data for both 31 January 2024 and 31 January 2025 regardless of their counting unit (people, cases or orders), 18 jurisdictions experienced increases in their probation population rates, with nine reporting significant increases: Armenia (+65%), North Macedonia (+63%), Croatia (+14%), Serbia (+12%), Sweden (+9%), Catalonia (Spain) (+9%), Türkiye (+8%), Azerbaijan (+7%) and Ireland (+5%).
In seven probation services, the number of people subject to supervision fell significantly: Montenegro (-33%), Georgia (-22%), Albania (-21%), Scotland (United Kingdom (-19%), Estonia (-18%), Cyprus (-15%) and Lithuania (-8.7%).
No magic formula to estimate appropriate probation rate
According to Professor Marcelo Aebi, head of the SPACE research team at the University of Lausanne, “there is no ‘magic formula’ to estimate an appropriate rate of probationers for a jurisdiction. Alternatives to imprisonment aim to favour the social inclusion of offenders by keeping them in the community. Consequently, the probation rate cannot be interpreted without comparing it to the prison population rate.”
Among jurisdictions with at least half a million inhabitants using the person as the counting unit, the highest ratios of probationers per 100 inmates were observed in Armenia (492), Poland (344) and the Netherlands (313). In contrast, Montenegro (7.8 per 100 inmates), Greece (19) and North Macedonia (21) displayed the lowest ratios, likely due to the short history of their probation services.
In January 2025, in 28 of the 36 probation agencies and prison services covered — roughly 78% — the probation population rate was higher than the prison population rate. The exceptions were Montenegro, Greece, North Macedonia, Switzerland, Serbia, Bulgaria, Croatia, and Azerbaijan, where the rate of inmates per 100,000 inhabitants was higher than the corresponding rate of probationers.
Women accounted for 10.7% of the total probation numbers, compared with 5.4% of the prison population. This difference may reflect both different patterns of offending among men and women and differences in sentencing and release decisions, with women being proportionally more represented in community supervision than in prison. Foreign nationals represented one in every 10 probationers in countries that measure probation populations in individuals, a lower share than the 17% observed in prison across these jurisdictions, possibly reflecting, among other factors, residence requirements for probation eligibility.
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Conducted every year for the Council of Europe by the University of Lausanne, the SPACE survey provides an overview of the use of custodial (SPACE I) and community sanctions and measures - also known as alternatives to imprisonment - (SPACE II) in the Council of Europe member states.
Unless otherwise indicated, the data are expressed as median values, which are more reliable than average figures because they are less sensitive to extreme values.
Key Findings of the “Probation and prisons in Europe 2025 report”
