For the past year the three governing parties-CDU, CSU and SPD-experienced declining membership. The CDU’s earlier upward trend ceased in 2025, while the long‑running declines for the CSU and SPD continued.
On December 31, 2025 the CDU counted 356,769 members, according to the “Tagesspiegel” (Tuesday issue) citing CDU district figures. This represents a 2 % drop from the 364,202 members recorded at the end of 2024, and a fall from 363,101 at the end of 2023.
The CSU reported roughly 122,000 members on the same date. The party shared this number with the newspaper, noting that it had 125,153 members at the end of 2024, amounting to an approximate 3 % loss.
The SPD’s total membership on December 31, 2025 was 348,451, as reported by the “Tagesspiegel” using SPD district data. A year earlier the party had 357,116 members, indicating a decline of more than 2 % in 2025.
In February 2024 the federal election took place. In the subsequent months, by May 2024 Friedrich Merz of the CDU was elected chancellor of a black‑red coalition. In 2024 the CDU overtook the SPD as the party with the most members, a position it still held at the end of 2025.