Global Insurance Market: Premium Growth Outlook (Swiss Re sigma)

Swiss Re Institute's annual World Insurance sigma tracks life and non-life premiums worldwide. Its 2019 edition reported that global premiums exceeded USD 5 trillion for the first time [3].

Total global insurance premiums grew 3.9% in real terms in 2025, according to sigma 2/2026 [1]. The previous edition reported 5.2% real growth in 2024 [2].

In mid-2025, Swiss Re forecast real growth of 2% for 2025 and 2.3% for 2026 [2]. Actual 2025 growth of 3.9% beat that forecast, but the 2026 forecast has since been cut to 1.3% [1][2].

Swiss Re names three dynamics for 2026 [1]:

• Slower growth and stickier inflation reduce demand for cover and raise claims costs.
• Non-life insurance is entering a soft market, with cyclically weak pricing and high capacity.
• Data centres, power grids and factories enlarge the stock of insurable assets and create new demand.

Swiss Re describes the 2026 Middle East conflict as the fourth global supply shock since 2019, after COVID-19, the Russia-Ukraine war and the 2025 trade tariffs [1].

In sigma 2/2025, Swiss Re forecast global real GDP growth slowing to 2.3% in 2025 and 2.4% in 2026, from 2.8% in 2024 [2]. It named US goods tariffs as the main source of policy uncertainty [2].

Figures come from Swiss Re Institute's World Insurance sigma publications: sigma 2/2026 (published July 2026) [1], sigma 2/2025 [2] and the July 2019 press release on sigma 3/2019 [3]. Growth rates are real (inflation-adjusted) and cover total life and non-life premiums. Values labelled F are Swiss Re forecasts. The growth chart combines estimates from two editions; later editions may revise earlier years. Total premium volumes in USD for 2025 were not verified for this edition and are not reported.