Rent in the most expensive city on this page costs more than twice what it costs in the cheapest, and the cities that pay best are not the ones that charge least. This compares 25 German cities on what people earn and what housing costs, using the same official statistics for every one of them, so the numbers actually line up.
Net cold rent runs from €5.84 per square metre in Duisburg to €12.89 in Munich. But rent on its own decides nothing: measured against what residents actually have to spend, Bochum is the easiest of these cities to afford and Freiburg the hardest. Every figure below comes from the German Regionalstatistik, the 2022 census and the Breitbandatlas, not from user submissions.
25 German cities side by side
Ordered by population. Click a city for the full profile: housing market, broadband, local taxes, who lives there and how it compares with its own region.
| # | City | Rent /m² | 70 m² flat | Income / resident | Rent vs income | Median wage | Jobs / 1,000 | Unemployment |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Berlin | €7.67 | €537 | €26,209 | 24.6% | €4,150 | 457 | 10.3% |
| 2 | Hamburg | €9.16 | €641 | €29,620 | 26.0% | €4,350 | 582 | 8.3% |
| 3 | Munich | €12.89 | €902 | €38,190 | 28.4% | €5,100 | 649 | 5.4% |
| 4 | Hanover | €7.21 | €505 | €26,814 | 22.6% | €4,150 | 480 | 8.1% |
| 5 | Cologne | €9.39 | €657 | €28,764 | 27.4% | €4,450 | 617 | 9.1% |
| 6 | Düsseldorf | €9.24 | €647 | €32,446 | 23.9% | €4,700 | 744 | 8.0% |
| 7 | Stuttgart | €10.39 | €727 | €31,390 | 27.8% | €4,950 | 723 | 6.6% |
| 8 | Leipzig | €6.44 | €451 | €23,683 | 22.8% | €3,800 | 486 | 8.5% |
| 9 | Dortmund | €6.45 | €452 | €24,200 | 22.4% | €4,000 | 441 | 12.0% |
| 10 | Bremen | €7.75 | €542 | €26,870 | 24.2% | €3,900 | 516 | 11.0% |
| 11 | Aachen | €7.20 | €504 | €25,577 | 23.6% | €4,100 | 392 | 7.8% |
| 12 | Essen | €6.72 | €470 | €25,872 | 21.8% | €4,200 | 473 | 11.4% |
| 13 | Dresden | €6.92 | €484 | €25,679 | 22.6% | €3,950 | 498 | 7.0% |
| 14 | Nuremberg | €8.21 | €575 | €27,201 | 25.4% | €4,050 | 606 | 7.3% |
| 15 | Duisburg | €5.84 | €409 | €21,102 | 23.2% | €3,950 | 358 | 13.2% |
| 16 | Bochum | €6.25 | €438 | €24,836 | 21.1% | €4,150 | 421 | 9.1% |
| 17 | Bielefeld | €7.12 | €498 | €27,062 | 22.1% | €4,000 | 508 | 9.1% |
| 18 | Bonn | €9.09 | €636 | €29,079 | 26.3% | €4,550 | 604 | 7.4% |
| 19 | Mannheim | €8.39 | €587 | €26,853 | 26.2% | €4,400 | 634 | 7.9% |
| 20 | Karlsruhe | €8.46 | €592 | €28,467 | 25.0% | €4,550 | 662 | 5.1% |
| 21 | Münster | €8.71 | €610 | €29,156 | 25.1% | €4,250 | 634 | 5.3% |
| 22 | Augsburg | €8.48 | €594 | €25,528 | 27.9% | €4,000 | 507 | 6.7% |
| 23 | Freiburg | €9.74 | €682 | €27,158 | 30.1% | €4,300 | 597 | 5.6% |
| 24 | Mainz | €9.73 | €681 | €27,153 | 30.1% | €4,650 | 572 | 5.8% |
| 25 | Heidelberg | €10.02 | €701 | €30,764 | 27.4% | €4,950 | 654 | 5.1% |
Rent is the average net cold rent (Nettokaltmiete) from the 2022 census; the 70 m² column applies that rate to a typical flat. Income is disposable income per resident (2023), median wage is full-time gross per month (2024), jobs and unemployment are 2025.
Two things to hold in mind. Rent is the 2022 census average for tenants already in place, so a new lease costs more everywhere — it is a fair basis for comparing cities, not a quote. And disposable income is spread across every resident, children and pensioners included, so it is lower than a salary and should be read as a measure of local prosperity rather than of your own budget.
If you are optimising for one thing
Cheapest to rent
Average net cold rent per square metre, 2022 census.
Most rent for your money
A 70 m² flat for a year as a share of disposable income per resident — the closest thing here to an affordability ranking.
- Bochum — 21.1% of income
- Essen — 21.8% of income
- Bielefeld — 22.1% of income
- Dortmund — 22.4% of income
- Hanover — 22.6% of income
Highest wages
Median full-time gross pay per month, Bundesagentur für Arbeit 2024.
- Munich — €5,100 / month
- Stuttgart — €4,950 / month
- Heidelberg — €4,950 / month
- Düsseldorf — €4,700 / month
- Mainz — €4,650 / month
Strongest job markets
Jobs at local workplaces per 1,000 residents, commuters included. A high number means the city is a workplace for its whole region.
- Düsseldorf — 744 per 1,000
- Stuttgart — 723 per 1,000
- Karlsruhe — 662 per 1,000
- Heidelberg — 654 per 1,000
- Munich — 649 per 1,000
Lowest unemployment
Registered unemployment rate, 2025.
- Karlsruhe — 5.1%
- Heidelberg — 5.1%
- Münster — 5.3%
- Munich — 5.4%
- Freiburg — 5.6%
Best fibre coverage
Share of households that can get fibre to the building (FTTB/H), end of 2025.
- Bremen — 84% FTTB/H
- Hamburg — 80% FTTB/H
- Munich — 77% FTTB/H
- Hanover — 68% FTTB/H
- Cologne — 66% FTTB/H
Browse by state
A state page is the regional view — what the whole Bundesland looks like and which districts sit in it. A city page is one place in depth. Start with the state if you are choosing a region, with the city if you already know where the job is.
- Baden-Württemberg — Stuttgart, Mannheim, Karlsruhe, Freiburg, Heidelberg
- Bavaria — Munich, Nuremberg, Augsburg
- Lower Saxony — Hanover
- North Rhine-Westphalia — Cologne, Düsseldorf, Dortmund, Aachen, Essen, Duisburg, Bochum, Bielefeld, Bonn, Münster
- Rhineland-Palatinate — Mainz
- Saxony — Leipzig, Dresden
- City-states — Berlin, Hamburg, Bremen — where the city is the state, so there is one page rather than two.
Once you have picked a city
The practical set-up is the same wherever you land: a bank account, an internet line and a German number.
Source: Regionaldatenbank Deutschland (regionalstatistik.de), Statistische Ämter des Bundes und der Länder; supplementary data via Destatis GENESIS-Online. Housing, household, education and migration figures from the Zensus 2022. Broadband coverage from the Breitbandatlas (© MIG, BMDV). Recorded crime from the Polizeiliche Kriminalstatistik (BKA, 2025). Median full-time gross wages from the Bundesagentur für Arbeit (2024). · How we built this ›