Competition figures 2024/25

DB's annual competition report reveals how the transport markets in Germany and Europe have performed, describes key trends and highlights competition-related developments. Some key points from the report are summarised below:

• Continued strong demand in German passenger transport
  In 2024, total passenger transport performance in Germany increased by 2.1% across all modes of transport to around 1,069.7 billion passenger kilometres (2023: 1,047.6 billion passenger kilometres). For 2025, further growth of 1.5% is expected.
   
• Rail achieved the strongest market share gains
  Passenger rail transport performance rose by 5.4% in 2024. As a result, rail’s intermodal share in German passenger transport increased to 10.3% (2023: 9.9%). The main driver of this development was regional rail transport (+11.5% in passenger kilometres), with demand further boosted by the Deutschlandticket. Long-distance rail transport, by contrast, recorded a decline in performance (-1.8%), partly due to extensive construction work, adverse weather conditions, strikes and changes in travel behaviour (e.g. mobile working and Deutschlandticket effects). Public road transport increased its performance by 5.2%, expanding its market share to 6.0% (2023: 5.9%). Private motorised transport showed the lowest dynamic with a plus in transport performance of 1.5%; its market share fell to 83.2% (2023: 83.7%). Domestic air travel remained stable at a 0.5% market share, with performance at 5.1 billion passenger kilometres – still well below pre-pandemic levels (2019: 10.1 billion passenger kilometres).
   
• Weak economic development slowed down freight transport
  The economic environment for freight transport remained weak in 2024: GDP -0.2%, industrial production -4.6%, and trade in goods -2.6%. Accordingly, transport demand stagnated. Total freight transport performance across all modes reached around 674.0 billion tonne-kilometres and remained at the level of the previous year (2023: 673.9 billion tonne-kilometres). Given the continuing weak economic outlook (forecast for 2025: GDP +0.2%, trade in goods -0.4%, industrial production -0.7%), overall freight transport performance is expected to decline by around 1.0%.
   
• Road freight transport lost market share
  Developments in freight transport varied across modes in 2024. Road freight performance fell by 0.8% to 476.7 billion tonne-kilometres, resulting in a market share loss of 0.6 percentage points to 70.7%. Rail freight transport, on the other hand, grew slightly (+0.8% to 135.5 billion tonne-kilometres), gaining 0.2 percentage points in market share to 20.1%. This growth was driven by non-DB railway undertakings. After sharp declines in previous years, inland waterway transport returned to growth (+4.7% to 43.4 billion tonne-kilometres), increasing its market share by 0.2 percentage points to 6.4%.
   
• Non-DB railway undertakings increased their share of train path usage on the DB network
  In 2024, total train path operating performance on the DB network declined slightly to 1,103 million train-path kilometres (-1.3%). Contributing factors included weaker demand in rail freight transport and special effects such as strikes, adverse weather and construction-related restrictions. Nevertheless, non-DB railway undertakings expanded their train path operating performance by 2.5% to around 449 million train-path kilometres. Their share of total usage thus rose to 40.7% – exceeding 40% for the first time. Train path operating performance by DB Group railway undertakings fell by 3.8% to around 654 million train-path kilometres. In the first half of 2025, total train path operating performance on the network increased by 1.1% year-on-year to 554 million train-path kilometres, driven by growth in passenger rail transport.