Life expectancy by gender in France 2004-2023

On average, women live almost six years more than men in France. In 2023, female life expectancy at birth in France reached 85.7 years compared to 80 years for males. In 2021 life expectancy in France, regardless of gender, was of 82.32 years. Thus, France is one of the countries in the world with the highest life expectancy.

Women outlive men

According to the source there are differences in life expectancy between men and women in France. In 2004, female life expectancy in France was of 83.9, compared to 76.7 years for males. Since then, life expectancy for both genders has been evolving in a similar way. When life expectancy decreased slightly in 2015, it has affected both men and women. Similarly, when life expectancy increased. But one aspect remained the same: male life expectancy keeps being lower than female life expectancy. This difference has been seen not only in France. In Europe, females are expected to live longer than men in every region. While women in France have longer life expectancy, they are also expected to have a higher number of healthy life years. In 2013, a study from Eurostat showed that French women had a number of expected healthy years of 64.4, compared to 63 years for men.

An aging population

Like other Western countries, France has an aging population. French citizens aged 65 years and older are now more than French aged from 0 to 14 years old. The median age of the population in the country is increasing since the nineties, while the share of seniors reached almost 18 percent of the population in 2013.