Tennessee’s population is expected to reach 7.94 million by 2040, according to new projections from the Boyd Center for Business and Economic Research at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. By 2040, the state’s population of adults 65 and over is expected to increase by 25 percent compared to the 2022 census estimate (the most recent available), with a 36 percent spike among those aged 75-84 and a 72 percent surge in individuals aged 85 and above.
During the same period, a projected overall population increase of nearly 900,000 people will increase the number of Tennessee residents by 12.6 percent from the 2022 population of 7.05 million.
From 2020 to 2030, Tennessee is projected to experience an annual population growth rate of 0.82 percent. A period of steady but smaller population gains is expected to follow as the state’s projected rate of increase slows to 0.55 percent annually between 2030 and 2040. This slower pace of increase is expected to continue to 2070.
“At the state level, the amount of population growth during the 2020s will feel similar to the gains we saw last decade,” said Matt Harris, Boyd Distinguished Professor of Health Economics and co-author of the new projections. “But as the baby boom generation reaches the later stages of life, a rising number of deaths will begin to slow Tennessee’s population increases.”