Average Swiss donation drops to 2019 level but more people are giving

More Swiss households donated to charity in 2024, but the median gift size dropped by a quarter as economic pressures reshaped giving patterns, according to new survey data.

The 2025 Rapport Sur Les Dons Suisse or Spendenreport Schweiz shows 82% of households making a donation in 2024. This is a substantial increase from 72% in the year before, and more in line with figures in the low eighties recorded in previous reports.

However, the median donation fell to CHF300 (€321), the lowest figure since 2019, a year-on-year decrease of 25%. The report says that median donations from young families, who have been hit particularly hard by the economic climate, dropped by 50%.

Household giving rates grew from 74% to 82% in the country’s German-speaking majority, and from 66% to 79% among its French-speaking population. In its Italophone community, the smallest of Switzerland’s three major groups, giving rates dropped slightly, from 76% to 74%.

Donors’ preferred causes remained similar to in previous years. Survey respondents were most likely to cite domestic social and emergency (48%) and nature, the environment and animals (also 48%) as priorities, closely followed by children and young people (46%) and disability (45%).

Swissfundraising board member Ruth Wagner writes in the report:

“Overall, the sector’s reputation is good and stable. Some aspects such as transparency or innovation capacity are (still) judged somewhat more critically in 2024, and lack of confidence and questioning of charities’ effectiveness are increasingly cited as reasons for not donating.”

“In my opinion, two aspects are extremely important for market development and future success: the media mix is ​​becoming increasingly crucial, and donor loyalty needs to be rethought. It is precisely in digital channels, but also in broadcasting, that one can achieve relatively low-cost reach – and awareness is fundamentally important as background noise and a driving force, not just for conversion.”

Other articles in the Rapport Sur Les Dons include a look back at the AI usage guidance issued by Swissfundraising earlier in the year, and it also includes data from a recently-released report by the Zewo Foundation, based on data from a group of major Swiss charities.

Zewo’s report estimated that total giving in the country in 2024 was 2.25bn CHF, the same figure as in 2023. This total has now been in excess of 2bn CHF for five consecutive years.

Photo by Claudio Schwarz on Unsplash