Military profile
Tanzania Military Strength
Tanzania ranks #101 of 145 in the Global Firepower military strength ranking, with 26,000 active personnel. It spent $1.0 billion on its military in 2025 (1.2% of GDP).
Tanzania armed forces in numbers
Personnel
- Active military personnel
- 26,000#85 of 145
- Reserve military personnel
- 40,000#51 of 145
- Paramilitary forces
- 1,000#106 of 145
- Army personnel
- 15,500#101 of 145
- Air force personnel
- 800#115 of 145
- Navy personnel
- 550#96 of 145
Air power
- Total military aircraft
- 40#98 of 145
- Fighter aircraft
- 14#70 of 145
- Attack aircraft
- 0#65 of 145
- Military helicopters
- 12#109 of 145
- Attack helicopters
- 0#79 of 145
Land forces
- Tanks
- 42#97 of 145
- Self-propelled artillery
- 0#96 of 145
- Towed artillery
- 0#107 of 145
- Rocket artillery
- 0#98 of 145
Naval power
- Aircraft carriers
- 0#8 of 113
- Destroyers
- 0#15 of 113
- Frigates
- 0#56 of 113
- Corvettes
- 0#47 of 113
- Submarines
- 0#44 of 113
- Patrol vessels
- 10#74 of 113
- Mine warfare vessels
- 0#53 of 113
Finance
- Military spending
- $1.0 billion#83 of 156
- Military spending as % of GDP
- 1.2%#105 of 156
- Purchasing power parity (GDP, PPP)
- $152.8 billion#74 of 145
Equipment and personnel: Global Firepower 2023 military strength ranking (2023). Spending: World Bank / SIPRI military expenditure data (CC BY 4.0).
Tanzania military spending 2010–2025
Military spending of Tanzania grew by 264% between 2010 and 2025, from $283 million to $1.0 billion (current US dollars), and stood at 1.2% of GDP in 2025.
Armed forces of Tanzania
Branches and forces
Tanzania People's Defense Forces (TPDF or Jeshi la Wananchi la Tanzania, JWTZ): Land Forces, Naval Forces, Air Force, Nation Building Army (Jeshi la Kujenga Taifa, JKT), Reserve Forces Ministry of Home Affairs: Tanzania Police Force (Jeshi la Polisi Tanzania) (2025)
Personnel
approximately 25,000 active Defense Forces (2025)
Service age and conscription
generally 18-25 years of age for voluntary military service for men and women, but may go up to 35 years of age depending on education levels and for medical specialists; no conscription (2026)
Equipment and suppliers
the TPDF's inventory includes mostly British, Chinese, and Russian/Soviet-era armaments (2025)
Deployments abroad
520 Central African Republic (MINUSCA); more than 1,000 Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO and Southern African Development Community regional force); 125 Lebanon (UNIFIL); approximately 300 Mozambique (under bi-lateral agreement to assist with combatting an insurgency) (2025)
Good to know
the chief concerns of the Tanzania Defense Forces (TDPF) are maritime piracy and smuggling, border security, terrorism, animal poaching, and spillover from instability in neighboring countries, particularly Mozambique and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC); it participates in multinational training exercises, regional peacekeeping deployments, and has ties with a variety of foreign militaries, including those of China, India, and the US; it has contributed troops to the UN's Force Intervention Brigade in the DRC; the TPDF also participated in the former Southern African Development Community intervention force in Mozambique, which assisted the Mozambique military in combating fighters affiliated with the Islamic State of Iraq and ash-Sham (ISIS); the regional force withdrew in 2024, but the TPDF continues to maintain troops in Mozambique as part of a separate bilateral security agreement; since 2020, the TPDF has reinforced the border with Mozambique following several cross-border attacks by ISIS fighters (2025)
Military expenditure (% of GDP)
2024: 1.3% · 2023: 1.2% · 2022: 1.2% · 2021: 1.1% · 2020: 1.2%
Forces and service: CIA World Factbook (public domain).
Mozambique
Kenya
Burundi
Malawi
DR Congo
Uganda
Zambia
Rwanda