Contributions to Denmark’s retirement savings scheme (aldersopsparing) reached a record DKK 15.4bn in 2025, up from DKK 6bn in 2018, according to Insurance and Pension (I&P) Denmark.

I&P Denmark said the increase showed that recent political changes to make the scheme simpler and more attractive were having an impact on saver behaviour, with growth in retirement savings outpacing other forms of pension contribution over the same period.

Under the scheme, pension customers do not receive a tax deduction when they make contributions, but withdrawals are not offset against the state pension supplement or other public benefits.

I&P Denmark pension manager, Lotte Katrine Ravn, argued that retirement savings are a "good example" of how the pension system can be designed smarter.

"When you remove set-off and make the rules easier to use, more people will benefit from the scheme," she said.

I&P Denmark noted that growth had accelerated particularly since 2022, following a series of political agreements that widened access to the scheme and reduced the risk of benefit offsets.

Changes included increasing contribution limits, extending the period during which higher contributions can be made before state pension age, and removing the risk of set-off when payments are made.

The reforms built on an agreement reached in 2017, which introduced differentiated contribution limits from 2018, allowing higher amounts to be paid in during the five years before retirement age.

Further agreements in 2022 removed offsets for occupational income in public pensions from January 2023 and improved the retirement savings scheme by increasing the lower contribution limit and extending the higher-limit period from five to seven years before state pension age.

The implementation timetable for some of these measures was subsequently brought forward to January 2023.

Ravn continued: “The interesting thing is that we can now see that the changes are working. Pension companies can use retirement savings more broadly in labour market pensions, and the composition of the payments is changing in the direction that the regulations suggest.”

I&P Denmark added that the figures indicated that both pension customers and providers had increasingly made use of the expanded retirement savings framework.

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