Inflation in the euro area: country by country, September 2026
Euro-area inflation was 3.8% in September 2026, driven by energy prices +18.8% higher than a year earlier. This report shows where inflation is highest, what is driving it and how it compares with the United States, using the ECB's harmonised data for the euro area and eleven of its largest economies.
Edition of 10 October 2026 · data up to September 2026 · General Assets Research Group
Key findings
- 01
Euro-area inflation was 3.8% in September 2026, up from 2.2% a year earlier and 1.8 percentage points above the ECB's 2% target. It was 3.2% in August 2026.
- 02
9 of the 11 countries covered had inflation above 3% and all 11 above 2%. The highest rate was in Greece (5.1%), the lowest in Finland (2.6%): a gap of 2.5 percentage points.
- 03
Energy drives the headline figure: energy prices were +18.8% on a year earlier (a year before: −0.4%). Core inflation, which leaves out energy, food, alcohol and tobacco, was 2.5% (2.4% a year earlier).
- 04
Services inflation was 3.2%, food, alcohol and tobacco 1.4%, non-energy industrial goods 1.1%.
- 05
In the United States, consumer prices were 3.4% higher than a year earlier in August 2026 (CPI); euro-area HICP inflation in the same month was 3.2%. The two indices are built differently and are not strictly comparable.
- 06
9 of the 11 countries have higher inflation than a year ago. The euro-area rate peaked at 10.6% in October 2022.
Country by country
HICP annual rate of change in September 2026, compared with a year earlier (marker). The ECB's target refers to the euro-area figure only.
Latest month, ranked
September 2026; ◇ = September 2025
How far apart the countries are
Highest minus lowest rate among the 11 countries, percentage points
Thirteen months at a glance
Each cell is a country's annual inflation rate in that month. Darker gold = higher; blue = below 2%.
Source: ECB Data Portal, HICP dataflow (COICOP 2018).
What is driving it
The euro-area index and its main components since 2019.
Components
Annual rate, euro area
Euro area and United States
HICP (euro area) and CPI (United States), annual rate
What we watch next
- 16 October 2026 — Euro area HICP, final, September 2026.
- 29 October 2026 — ECB Governing Council monetary policy meeting.
- 30 October 2026 — Euro area GDP, preliminary flash estimate, third quarter of 2026.
- 4 November 2026 — Euro area HICP flash estimate, October 2026.
- Whether core inflation (2.5% in September 2026) moves towards the ECB's 2% target or away from it: the ECB says it looks through temporary energy effects only as long as they do not feed into wages and core prices.
- The spread between countries (2.5 percentage points now): a single interest rate has to serve all of them.
- Questions for investors: what does inflation at this level do to the real (after-inflation) return of cash, bonds and your fund holdings? Do you hold anything whose costs or income are fixed in nominal terms?
These are the dates and figures our research team follows, not predictions of what they will show and not advice on what to do. General Assets Research Group gives no investment recommendations.
Method
Annual rates of change of the Harmonised Index of Consumer Prices (HICP), as published by the ECB in the HICP dataflow, which uses the COICOP 2018 classification since 2026. Country figures are national HICPs, not national CPIs. The country gap and the counts are computed by us. US CPI annual rates are computed from the index level (CPIAUCSL) published by FRED. Data up to September 2026 (euro area) and August 2026 (United States).
Sources
- ECB Data Portal, HICP dataflow — data.ecb.europa.eu
- Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, FRED, series CPIAUCSL — fred.stlouisfed.org
- ECB, monetary policy strategy (2% symmetric target) — ecb.europa.eu
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