Military profile
Switzerland Military Strength
Switzerland ranks #44 of 145 in the Global Firepower military strength ranking, with 24,000 active personnel. It spent $7.6 billion on its military in 2025 (0.8% of GDP).
Switzerland armed forces in numbers
Personnel
- Active military personnel
- 24,000#91 of 145
- Reserve military personnel
- 120,000#32 of 145
- Paramilitary forces
- 0#113 of 145
- Army personnel
- 22,000#92 of 145
- Air force personnel
- 20,000#32 of 145
- Navy personnel
- 0#113 of 145
Air power
- Total military aircraft
- 148#57 of 145
- Fighter aircraft
- 43#45 of 145
- Attack aircraft
- 0#65 of 145
- Military helicopters
- 41#69 of 145
- Attack helicopters
- 0#79 of 145
Land forces
- Tanks
- 380#41 of 145
- Self-propelled artillery
- 0#96 of 145
- Towed artillery
- 0#107 of 145
- Rocket artillery
- 0#98 of 145
Finance
- Military spending
- $7.6 billion#37 of 156
- Military spending as % of GDP
- 0.8%#132 of 156
- Purchasing power parity (GDP, PPP)
- $590.2 billion#35 of 145
Equipment and personnel: Global Firepower 2023 military strength ranking (2023). Spending: World Bank / SIPRI military expenditure data (CC BY 4.0).
Switzerland military spending 2010–2025
Military spending of Switzerland grew by 84% between 2010 and 2025, from $4.1 billion to $7.6 billion (current US dollars), and stood at 0.8% of GDP in 2025.
Armed forces of Switzerland
Branches and forces
Swiss Armed Forces (aka Swiss Army or Schweizer Armee); Army (aka Land Forces), Swiss Air Force (2025)
Personnel
approximately 145,000 Swiss Armed Forces (2024)
Service age and conscription
every Swiss man 18-30 is obligated to serve in the military or the alternative civilian service; women can serve on a voluntary basis; required military service is 245 days, including 18-21 weeks of basic training generally between the ages of 19-25, followed by six three-week recalls for refresher training over the following nine years; the system offers opportunities for conscripts to train as non-commissioned and commissioned officers in the militia with longer service commitments (2026)
Equipment and suppliers
the military's inventory includes a mix of domestically produced and imported European and US weapons systems; the Swiss defense industry produces a range of military land vehicles (2025)
Deployments abroad
200 Kosovo (NATO/KFOR) (2025)
Good to know
the Swiss military is responsible for territorial defense, limited support to international disaster response and peacekeeping, and providing support to civil authorities when their resources are not sufficient to ward off threats to internal security or provide sufficient relief during disasters; Switzerland has long maintained a policy of military neutrality but does periodically participate in EU, NATO, Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), and UN military and peacekeeping operations; however, Swiss units will only participate in operations under the mandate of the UN or OSCE; Switzerland joined NATO's Partnership for Peace program in 1996; it has contributed to the NATO-led force in Kosovo (KFOR) since 1999 (2025)
Military expenditure (% of GDP)
2024: 0.7% · 2023: 0.7% · 2022: 0.7% · 2021: 0.7% · 2020: 0.7%
Forces and service: CIA World Factbook (public domain).
Italy
France
Germany
Austria