Sudanell, in the Segrià, will have seen fifteen babies born this year to as many families, according to its mayor, Eduard Oró, as reported by SEGRE. It is a record for a village that has passed 900 inhabitants for the first time in its history, according to the National Statistics Institute (INE). In Montgai, in the Noguera, eight babies will be born before the end of 2026, the highest number since 2001, according to 3CatInfo.

Oró explained that some of the babies were born between January and August, two more this summer, and one is about to arrive, according to SEGRE. Twelve births came before the August eclipse and two after, and another baby will arrive before the end of the year.

Sudanell, close to a thousand

The mayor stressed that the couples are all or almost all from the village, people with deep roots, although some come from elsewhere and moved there years ago. Being close to Lleida matters: many work in the city but live their lives in the village, he said, according to the same newspaper.

The 2024 register stood at 897 inhabitants, according to the local magazine Les 5 boqueres, cited by SEGRE. In 2025 there were 915, and in August this year there were 971 registered residents, «lo que supone un récord absoluto» (an all-time record), according to Oró. Growth has been slight but steady since the 840 residents of 2020.

Of those 971 registered residents, 550 are men and 421 women, with an average age of 46, according to figures reported by SEGRE. A total of 193 are foreign nationals, 19%. Oró said the couples from elsewhere who had children this year have lived in the village for years. It remains to be seen how the figure evolves in winter, when farm work slows down and many seasonal workers leave, according to the same newspaper.

The school and the nursery

The births ensure generational renewal and keep services such as the school and the nursery, which opened a year ago, according to SEGRE. The nursery now takes children aged one to two, but not those under one, who have to go to Albatàrrec because the Sudanell facility is not equipped for babies that young.

Montgai, happy with its babies

In Montgai, a village of 643 inhabitants in the Noguera, the sight of a group of women who have become mothers or soon will has become a common one in the street, according to 3CatInfo. According to the Idescat data cited by the broadcaster, no child was born in Montgai in 2017 and only two were born in the last three years.

«No va ser per a res buscat!» (it wasn’t planned at all!), laughs Sara Esteve, Gael’s mother. «La gent està molt contenta!» (people are very happy!), says Meri Grau, Kail’s mother. For a village more used to deaths than births, it is an exceptional event and the talk of the town, according to the same report.

The second-to-last to arrive will be Juna. Her mother, Judit Isart, still pregnant, explains that it was hard: they had decided to stop if it had not happened by 40, and in the end it did. Isart is from Lluçanès and settled in Montgai for love, although she had always said she would never leave her home for anyone, she told 3CatInfo with a laugh. She has no regrets, least of all now.

Raising children as a tribe

The mothers of Montgai experience pregnancy and motherhood together, according to 3CatInfo. Isart says they call each other to go for walks or have a coffee, and that it is lovely. Sara Esteve explains that if they have questions they can ask the one who has already had her baby about breastfeeding or sleepless nights. «No es pot demanar més!» (you can’t ask for more!), she sums up.

Beyond the sense of community, the births push back the shadow of depopulation, because they keep the school going and, they hope, other services. The bank opens once every two weeks and the doctor no longer comes every day; they will not get that back, but at least they will not go backwards, concludes Pilar Giné, the pharmacist who supports the mothers, according to the same broadcaster.

Biel, Hugo and Marc

Among the names given to newborns in Lleida, Biel stands out: the Catalan form of Gabriel, which means «fortaleza de Dios» (strength of God) or «God is my strength», according to El Confidencial. According to the 2025 Idescat data cited by that outlet, it was given to 23 babies in the area covered by the statistics, a rate of 7.15 per thousand live births, the same as Hugo and Marc. In 2023, 387 babies were given that name in Catalonia, where it was the second most popular boy’s name, behind only Jan, according to the same report. The name comes from Gabriel, the archangel who appears as a divine messenger in the Judeo-Christian tradition. According to the INE, 11,411 people in Spain bear it, with an average age of 10.8.

The province, 20% below ten years ago

The two villages are going against the trend. Across the Lleida districts, 3,191 babies were born in 2025, 0.5% more than in 2024, according to the INE’s monthly estimate reported by SEGRE. It is the second increase in two years, but births are still about 20% below 2015 levels.

Mothers are getting older. Women who gave birth aged 40 or over accounted for 9% of the total in 2025, with 290 births, compared with 7% in 2015, according to the same newspaper. Five women became mothers over the age of 50, more than double a decade earlier. Among mothers aged 15 to 19, by contrast, births fell 51.6% in ten years, to 46.

In the first eleven months of 2025, 2,944 babies were born in the province, 0.91% more than in the same period of the previous year and 19.6% fewer than ten years earlier, according to SEGRE. Of them, 1,513 were boys and 1,430 girls. Births to mothers aged 35 to 39 rose 9.5%.

More deaths than births

The INE estimates that 4,205 people died in the Lleida districts in 2025, 0.3% more than in 2024, according to SEGRE. Natural population change, the difference between births and deaths, was negative by 1,014 people. The age group with the most deaths was 90 and over, with 1,299, although this fell 3.8% from 2024. 2,136 men and 2,069 women died.

With data up to November, 63.3% of those who died in the province in 2025 were 80 or older, and 32.5% were over 90, according to SEGRE. In that period, 14 children under 15 died. In the first week of 2026, 94 people died in the province, two fewer than in the same period the previous year.

Across Spain, 321,164 children were born in 2025, 1% more than the previous year, according to the INE. It is a slight rise, still to be confirmed by final data, that breaks the downward trend of the past decade. Births to mothers aged 40 or over rose from 7.8% in 2015 to 10.4% in 2025.

Deaths in Spain rose 2.5% to 446,982, and natural population change was negative by 122,167 people, according to the same body. It was negative in every region except the Community of Madrid, which had a positive balance of 2,134 people. The biggest increases in births were in the Community of Madrid, 3.3%, and the Basque Country, 3%. The biggest falls were in Melilla, 10.1%; Ceuta, 6.6%; and the Balearic Islands, 2.6%.

In the first eleven months of 2025, 294,629 babies were born in Spain, 3,145 more than in the same period of 2024 but almost 47,500 fewer than in the same months of 2018, according to SEGRE. In November 2025, more babies were born in Spain to women over 40 than to women under 25, according to INE estimates reported by the same newspaper.

By age and sex, the largest relative fall in deaths in Spain was among males under four, down 12.9% on 2024, and the largest rise among males aged five to 29, up 6.6%, according to the INE.

What is not on record

None of the sources cited gives the number of births in 2026 for the province of Lleida as a whole, or whether other villages are seeing similar increases. The INE warns that its monthly estimates are provisional and may change.

Sources and verification

Information based on SEGRE, 15 October 2026; 3CatInfo, 6 October 2026; SEGRE, 19 February 2026; SEGRE, 22 January 2026; El Confidencial, 14 October 2026; and the INE press release of 18 February 2026. The 2025 figures are provisional INE estimates.