The purpose of these statistics is to provide data on how much of Sweden's R&D was financed by government funds and give an indication of the priorities of the government regarding the purpose of research. In total, the central government budget consisted of SEK 1 415 billion, and, according to calculations by Statistics Sweden (SCB), 46.5 billion, or 3.29 percent, of these were allocated for R&D, a decrease from 3.49 percent in the year prior. Consequently, the R&D share fell to its lowest level since 2009. Despite the reduced share of total government funds, R&D appropriations were SEK 319 million higher in 2024 compared to 2023 in fixed prices. As a share of GDP, the R&D appropriations were unchanged from 2023 at 0.73 percent, based on the latest preliminary numbers for GDP.

"We see that government budget allocations for R&D (GBARD) related to defence increased significantly in the 2024 budget and appear to remain a strong focus in the 2025 budget as well, according to our preliminary figures. Most of the increase concerns additional funding for the Swedish Defence Research Agency, FOI, and R&D funds for the Swedish Armed Forces" says Philip von Schéele, economist and statistician at Statistics Sweden.

Education and academic research - the largest expenditure area for R&D

The government budget was distributed across 27 expense areas which all represented one part of the economy. Among these areas, Education and academic research was the largest in terms of the GBARD with SEK 30.8 billion, an increase of about 1 billion from 2023, and as a result, the largest increase within any one expense area. The expense area accounted for 66 percent of the GBARD, equally as in 2023. In absolute terms, the second largest appropriation at SEK 4.4 billion was for Industry and trade, which includes the general R&D allocation for Vinnova, one of the large governmental research funding bodies. Climate, environment and nature took third place with the largest R&D appropriations within the expense area being for The Industrial Leap (Industriklivet) and the research funding body Formas. The placements as second and third largest expense areas within the GBARD remained unchanged compared to 2023.

In relative terms however, the largest changes for R&D could be found in the expense areas of Defence and contingency measures, 21 percent, International cooperation, 13 percent and Justice, 7 percent, compared to 2023. The largest reduction was in the area of Regional development at 49 percent, which can largely be attributed to changes made to the appropriations related to the European Development Fund. This also accounted for the largest negative change in absolute terms at SEK 123 million.

Large increase in Defence as an R&D objective

A different way of dividing the GBARD is to consider the appropriations' socioeconomic objectives. The division is based on the Nomenclature for the Analysis and Comparison of Scientific Programmes and Budgets (NABS 2007), developed by OECD. Similarly, as when considering areas of expense, the socioeconomic objective of General advancement of knowledge: R&D financed from General University Funds (GUF) represented the largest item, with 43 percent of the GBARD in 2024, unchanged from 2023. The second largest socioeconomic objective, with 25 percent of the appropriations, was General advancement of knowledge: R&D financed from other sources than GUF.  

Aside from these general advancement objectives, the largest socioeconomic objectives were Health, 7 percent, Energy, 6 percent, and Transport, telecommunication and other infrastructures, 4.5 percent. In terms of changes from the previous year, the objective of Defence saw the largest increase, with 17 percent higher appropriations for R&D, compared to 2023. The increased appropriation for Defence was also the largest change in absolute terms, not considering the general advancement of knowledge objectives, at SEK 241 million. As a result, Defence accounted for 3.5 percent of the GBARD in 2024.

Natural sciences remain the largest research area within the GUF

The largest socioeconomic objective, General advancement of knowledge: R&D financed from GUF, can be further divided into subcategories based on the Fields of Research and Development (FORD) classification. The largest share of these appropriations went to the Natural Sciences, which accounted for 27 percent, followed by Medical Sciences at 23 percent. Together, these fields of R&D accounted for just over half of the GUF. The third largest area was Social Sciences at 18 percent. The distribution between the research areas has remained unchanged since 2023. Agricultural Sciences accounted for the smallest share of the GUFs with roughly 6 percent. The five largest institutions for higher education, as measured by GUFs for R&D, accounted for just over half of the appropriations.

Large increase in transnationally coordinated R&D since the corona pandemic

Since 2022 the amount of public funds for transnationally coordinated R&D has increased sharply. Transnational R&D covers R&D performed across borders, usually in cooperation between enterprises, universities, research institutions or other international organisations. In 2024 the total amount allocated for this was SEK 4 billion, almost 9 percent of the GBARD, and about 2 percentage points higher than in 2023. Appropriations for transnationally coordinated R&D rose 20 percent, or SEK 794 million, compared to 2023 in fixed prices. The increase followed an even larger increase from 2022 to 2023 of 32 percent in fixed prices. In total, the appropriations were 82 percent higher 2024 compared to 2022. The increase was primarily driven by the category of Bilateral or multilateral public R&D programmes which, among other things, included funds from the Swedish National Space Agency to the European Space Agency (ESA). 

Facts

Preliminary statistics on government budget allocations for R&D for the reference year 2024 were published on 21 March 2024 and were based on the provisional appropriations in the central government budget. During spring 2025, the preliminary statistics were updated with more recent data. The final statistics also take into account all supplementary budgets decided during the year.

The statistics are based on funding levels and so-called R&D coefficients, which indicate the share of each budget item allocated to research and development (R&D). These coefficients are derived from the surveys Research and development in the government sector and Research and development in the higher education sector. For the original preliminary statistics, coefficients based on 2021 data were used, while both the updated preliminary statistics and the final statistics use coefficients based on 2023 data.

Data on transnationally coordinated research is collected through a survey aimed at governmental research funding bodies. The statistics follow the guidelines set out by the OECD in the Frascati Manual, Guidelines for Collecting and Reporting Data on Research and Experimental Development, Frascati Manual (OECD, 2015) and are produced in accordance with the Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) No 2020/1197. The data is submitted to Eurostat.