In the quarter ending in December, Brazil recorded an unemployment rate of 5.1 percent – the lowest ever recorded by the Continuous PNAD (national household sample survey).

Looking at the consolidated data for 2025, the annual unemployment rate stood at 5.6 percent, also the smallest in history. The number of employed people reached 103 million.

Notícias relacionadas:

• Brazil has higher incomes, lower poverty, less inequality since 1995.
• Unemployment in Brazil falls to 5.6%, lowest since 2012.

Last year also saw a record in the average monthly income of Brazilian workers, which reached BRL 3,560, up 5.7 percent (or BRL 192) compared to 2024.

The number of formally employed workers in the year was also the highest ever recorded – 38.9 million people, up 1 million from the previous year.

The data were released Friday (Jan. 30) by Brazil’s statistics bureau IBGE.

The survey

The IBGE survey assesses Brazil’s labor market behavior for people aged 14 and over and takes into account all forms of employment – whether formal or informal, temporary or self-employed, for instance.

According to the institute’s criteria, only people who actively sought employment 30 days prior to the survey are considered unemployed. A total of 211 thousand households are visited across all states plus the Federal District.

The highest unemployment rate ever recorded in the time series, which began in 2012, was 14.9 percent, reached in two periods: in the rolling quarters ending in September 2020 and in March 2021 – both during the COVID-19 pandemic.