Events in the year 1988 in Germany.

• President - Richard von Weizsäcker
• Chancellor – Helmut Kohl

• Head of State – Erich Honecker
• Head of Government – Willi Stoph

• 12 - 23 February - 38th Berlin International Film Festival
• 31 March - Germany in the Eurovision Song Contest 1988
• 28 August – Ramstein air show disaster
• 7 October - East German Republic Day Parade of 1988

• 18 January - Angelique Kerber, German tennis player^[1]
• 20 January - Benjamin Ulrich, German rugby player
• 29 February - Benedikt Höwedes, German football player
• 2 March - Simon Terodde, German football player
• 12 March - Sebastian Brendel, German sprint canoeist
• 14 March - Rico Freimuth, German athlete
• 12 April - Lisa Unruh, German archer^[2]
• 29 April - Julian Reus, German athlete
• 8 June - Lisa Brennauer, German cyclist
• 19 July - Kevin Großkreutz, German football player
• 3 September - Jérôme Boateng, German football player
• 9 September - Fiona Erdmann, German model
• 3 October - Max Giesinger, German singer
• 5 October - Bahar Kızıl, German singer-songwriter
• 15 October - Mesut Özil, football player
• 1 December - Nadia Hilker, German actress and model
• 16 December - Mats Hummels, German football player

• 20 January - Paul Esser, German actor (born 1913)
• 21 January - Werner Nachmann, President of Central Council of Jews in Germany (born 1925)
• 28 January - Klaus Fuchs, physicist and spy (born 1911)
• 9 March - Kurt Georg Kiesinger, German politician (born 1904)
• 9 May - Georg Moser, German bishop of Roman Catholic Church (born 1923)
• 27 May - Ernst Ruska, German physicist who won the Nobel Prize in Physics (born 1906)
• 20 July — Richard Holm, German operatic tenor (born 1912)
• 27 July - Brigitte Horney, German actress (born 1911)
• 5 September - Gert Fröbe, German actor (born 1913)
• 6 September - Axel von Ambesser, German actor and film director (born 1910)
• 3 October - Franz Josef Strauss, German politician (born 1915)
• 9 October - Felix Wankel, German engineer (born 1902)
• 14 October - Charles Augustus, Hereditary Grand Duke of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach (born 1912)
• 20 December — Anni Schaad, German jewelry maker (born 1911)

• 1988 in German television