The population of Ukraine was estimated in 2001 at 48,760,474, giving the country a population density of 81 persons per sq km (209 per sq mi). The most notable recent demographic trend has been a decline in population—with an estimated loss of nearly 1.2 million between 1990 and 1997—due to death rates exceeding birth rates. Leading factors in the country’s low fertility and high mortality rates are environmental pollution.

During the Soviet period, Russian was the required language of government administration and public life. In 1991 Ukrainian once again became the official language, though in the Crimea, where there is a Russian-speaking majority, Russian is the official language. In addition, primary and secondary schools using Russian as the language of instruction still prevail in the Donets Basin and other areas with large Russian minorities. Ukrainian—belonging to the East Slavic language family that also includes Russian and Belarusian—uses a form of the Cyrillic alphabet. It is closely related to Russian, and the two languages are mutually intelligible. Significant minorities speak Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Bulgarian, or Hungarian.