Is New Zealand in a recession?
No. New Zealand did not have two consecutive quarters of falling real GDP in the latest figures: 0.9% in Mar 2026 qtr and 0.2% in Jun 2026 qtr. This uses the technical recession definition (Stats NZ).
Updated
Quarterly GDP, seasonally adjusted: real GDP (production measure), its quarterly percentage change, real GDP per person, and nominal GDP.
Quarterly figures are revised, sometimes substantially. The % change series is a rate; a 'technical recession' is commonly described as two consecutive quarters of falling real GDP.
Output, household income and population describe different parts of the economy. Dividing a total by population gives a per person figure, while adjusting dollars for inflation helps compare their buying power across years.
Read the period beside each number before comparing it with another figure. A monthly observation, a quarterly result and a financial year cover different spans of time. The latest release can also revise earlier observations. The chart and downloads keep the published periods so you can check which figures are being compared. A change in economic growth describes what happened during that period; it does not by itself explain why it happened or identify the effect of a government policy. Definitions and coverage matter as much as the size of a change.
Real GDP, % change from previous quarter was −0.6% in Jun 2025 qtr, a year earlier.
The earliest observation on the same basis was 2.2% in Sep 1986 qtr.
Economic growth: definitions
Quarterly GDP, seasonally adjusted: real GDP (production measure), its quarterly percentage change, real GDP per person, and nominal GDP.
- Quarterly figures are revised, sometimes substantially.
- The % change series is a rate; a 'technical recession' is commonly described as two consecutive quarters of falling real GDP.
Show the figures
| Period | Real GDP, % change from previous quarter (%) |
|---|---|
| Jun 2026 qtr | 0.2% |
| Mar 2026 qtr | 0.9% |
| Dec 2025 qtr | 0.5% |
| Sep 2025 qtr | 0.9% |
| Jun 2025 qtr | −0.6% |
| Mar 2025 qtr | 0.8% |
| Dec 2024 qtr | 0.1% |
| Sep 2024 qtr | −1.2% |
| Jun 2024 qtr | −0.5% |
| Mar 2024 qtr | 0.0% |
| Dec 2023 qtr | 0.5% |
| Sep 2023 qtr | 0.1% |
| Jun 2023 qtr | 0.9% |
| Mar 2023 qtr | −0.1% |
| Dec 2022 qtr | 0.3% |
| Sep 2022 qtr | 1.9% |
| Jun 2022 qtr | 1.0% |
| Mar 2022 qtr | −0.1% |
| Dec 2021 qtr | 4.1% |
| Sep 2021 qtr | −4.3% |
Quarters, labelled by their final month. Source: Stats NZ Tatauranga Aotearoa. Lines break at basis changes and missing periods.
Economic growth: questions for your AI
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The attached CSV is Gross domestic product (quarterly), from Stats NZ Tatauranga Aotearoa. Answer: Is New Zealand in a recession? Name the unit and period. Use only directly supported observations. Definitions: Quarterly GDP, seasonally adjusted: real GDP (production measure), its quarterly percentage change, real GDP per person, and nominal GDP. Limits: Quarterly figures are revised, sometimes substantially. The % change series is a rate; a 'technical recession' is commonly described as two consecutive quarters of falling real GDP.
More questions about economic growth
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Economic growth: sources
The source publication, licence and snapshot used to build this page.
- Organisation
- Stats NZ Tatauranga Aotearoa, Gross domestic product (quarterly release)
- Licence
- Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0). This work is based on Stats NZ's data which are licensed by Stats NZ for reuse under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence.
- Reuse limits
- Photos, graphics and logos are excluded. Stats NZ logos and government emblems must not be used.
- Snapshot
- data/raw/statsnz-gdp/2026-10-10_1de84b2fc30b.csv
- SHA256
- 1de84b2fc30bde1ca48bb7209cc01e2b261c13aef9c536aaac43d8519d1b95fc
- Retrieved
- 10 October 2026