Military profile
Romania Military Strength
Romania ranks #47 of 145 in the Global Firepower military strength ranking, with 67,000 active personnel. It spent $9.7 billion on its military in 2025 (2.3% of GDP).
Romania armed forces in numbers
Personnel
- Active military personnel
- 67,000#57 of 145
- Reserve military personnel
- 50,000#47 of 145
- Paramilitary forces
- 15,000#53 of 145
- Army personnel
- 43,000#70 of 145
- Air force personnel
- 10,700#56 of 145
- Navy personnel
- 7,150#52 of 145
Air power
- Total military aircraft
- 146#60 of 145
- Fighter aircraft
- 30#52 of 145
- Attack aircraft
- 0#65 of 145
- Military helicopters
- 61#54 of 145
- Attack helicopters
- 0#79 of 145
Land forces
- Tanks
- 413#38 of 145
- Self-propelled artillery
- 47#60 of 145
- Towed artillery
- 910#15 of 145
- Rocket artillery
- 207#23 of 145
Naval power
- Aircraft carriers
- 0#8 of 113
- Destroyers
- 0#15 of 113
- Frigates
- 3#40 of 113
- Corvettes
- 7#10 of 113
- Submarines
- 0#44 of 113
- Patrol vessels
- 3#96 of 113
- Mine warfare vessels
- 5#26 of 113
Finance
- Military spending
- $9.7 billion#33 of 156
- Military spending as % of GDP
- 2.3%#49 of 156
- Purchasing power parity (GDP, PPP)
- $556.1 billion#37 of 145
Equipment and personnel: Global Firepower 2023 military strength ranking (2023). Spending: World Bank / SIPRI military expenditure data (CC BY 4.0).
Romania military spending 2010–2025
Military spending of Romania grew by 366% between 2010 and 2025, from $2.1 billion to $9.7 billion (current US dollars), and stood at 2.3% of GDP in 2025.
Armed forces of Romania
Branches and forces
Romanian Armed Forces (Forțele Armate Române or Armata Română): Romanian Land Forces, Romanian Naval Forces, Romanian Air Force Ministry of Internal Affairs: Romanian Police, Romanian Gendarmerie, Romanian Border Police (2025)
Personnel
approximately 70,000 active Armed Forces (2025)
Service age and conscription
typically 18-35 years of age for voluntary service for men and women; compulsory service ended in 2007 (2025)
Equipment and suppliers
the military's inventory includes a considerable amount of Soviet-era and older domestically produced weapons systems, although in recent years Romania has launched an effort to acquire more modern and NATO-standard equipment from European countries and the US, including aircraft and armored vehicles (2025)
Deployments abroad
470 Bosnia Herzegovina (EUFOR); 200 Kosovo (KFOR/NATO); up to 120 Poland (NATO); Romania also has small numbers of military personnel deployed on other international missions under the EU, NATO, and UN (2025)
Good to know
the Romanian Armed Forces are responsible for territorial defense, fulfilling the country's commitments to European security, and contributing to multinational peacekeeping operations; the military has a variety of concerns, including Russian aggression against Ukraine, Russia's activities in the Black Sea and in Moldova, cyber attacks, hybrid threats, and terrorism; a key focus for the military is equipment modernization Romania joined NATO in 2004, and its membership forms a key pillar of the country’s defense policy; it hosts a NATO multinational divisional headquarters (Multinational Division Southeast) and a French-led ground force battlegroup as part of NATO's Enhanced Forward Presence initiative in the southeastern part of the Alliance, which came about in response to Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine; NATO allies have also sent detachments of fighters to augment the Romanian Air Force since 2014 because of aggressive Russian activity in the Black Sea region; the Romanian military trains with NATO and its member states and has participated in NATO- and EU-led multinational missions in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, and Poland; it also participates in UN peacekeeping missions (2025)
Military expenditure (% of GDP)
2025: 2.3% · 2024: 2.2% · 2023: 1.6% · 2022: 1.8% · 2021: 1.9%
Forces and service: CIA World Factbook (public domain).
Moldova
Bulgaria
Ukraine
Serbia
Hungary