Approval ratings mostly unchanged for King Willem-Alexander, Máxima & Amalia

The public approval scores for Dutch King Willem-Alexander, Queen Máxima and Princess Amalia was almost exactly the same compared to a year ago. Though the king's rating ticked up slightly, the public has the highest level of confidence in the queen's performance.

Results of the survey, conducted by Ipsos, showed that the king's approval improved slightly from 6.5 to 6.6, where 10 is the maximum score. Máxima's approval rating remained at 7.3. Princess Amalia, their oldest child and the heir to the throne, saw her score remain unchanged at 7.0, according tot he survey of over a thousand people commissioned by NOS.

Willem-Alexander's approval rating plunged from 7.7 in 2020 after a series of scandals during the coronavirus pandemic. Though the king and queen were vocal supporters of the country's measures to contend with the pandemic, they frequently violated those guidelines, including traveling to Greece shortly after asking everyone to shelter in their homes.

Confidence in Willem-Alexander's performance fell further over the past year, from 46 down to 44 percent. Some 76 percent said they had confidence in the king in 2020. That dropped to 57 percent the following year, and plunged another 10 points in 2022.

The country's feelings towards the monarchy appears to mainly be dragged down by public opinion of Willem-Alexander. Roughly 56 percent of Dutch people are either confident, or very confident in Máxima's abilities.

Support for the monarchy also fell by about 20 percentage points during the pandemic from about 75 percent in 2020. It has not recovered, holding at about 57 percent, with 25 percent outright opposed to a monarchy.