Coinciding with International Youth Day, the Barcelona City Council has highlighted the impact of its municipal services aimed at adolescents and young people. During the 2025-2026 academic year, support has continued to be strengthened in key areas such as education, emotional well-being, career guidance, and access to city resources.
The commissioner for Child, Adolescent, Youth, and LGTBI Policies, Javier Rodríguez, underscored "the importance of reinforcing emotional support as another branch of development for the adolescents and young people of our city." Rodríguez also noted that "more and more young people are using the services aimed at youth, with a special emphasis on mental health services, which change lives".
One of the main advancements has been the launch of EstarB, the new municipal emotional well-being service for adolescents, young people, and families, which began in October 2025. This service has created a single entry point for emotional support, strengthened coordination with the Mental Health Network, expanded psychological attention to all weekday afternoons, extended coverage up to age 25, and consolidated a network of 21 service points.
From October 2025 to June 2026, EstarB recorded 16,165 attendances for adolescents and young people (12,148 group and 4,017 individual), 2,154 attendances for families, and 447 for professionals. The average age of users is 17.7 years, with 63.4% being girls, 31.1% boys, and 5.5% non-binary individuals. The service has increased monthly consultations by nearly 150 compared to previous facilities.
The Joves de Barcelona network, offering information, guidance, and advice to individuals aged 12 to 35, registered 210,128 uses during the 2025-2026 academic year, a 5.4% increase from the previous year. The primary reasons for consultation were education, health, and employment. 1,506 specialized individual advisory sessions and 6,566 group activities with 130,172 participants were conducted.
The city is home to 525,915 young people aged 12 to 35, representing 30.4% of the total population. The districts with the highest concentration of young people are Eixample, Sant Martí, and Sants-Montjuïc. Adolescents aged 12 to 17 number 87,957 (5.1% of the population), with Sant Martí being the district with the largest volume.
