Official figures show that the euro zone economy grew by 2.6% last year, a big improvement on the 1.4% recorded in 2005.
But the figure from Eurostat was slightly down on last month's estimate of 2.7% growth. Despite the slight downward revision, the rate was the fastest since the peak of the technology boom in 2000.
The combined economy of the 25 countries in the EU expanded by 2.9% after chalking up growth of 1.7% in 2005.
Europe enjoyed an economic spurt at the end of last year thanks to a surge in Italy and Germany, which have been two of Europe's weakest economies in recent years.
Separate Eurostat figures showed that euro zone retailers saw their sales fall in January after the holiday spending spree in December.
The volume of retail trade in the euro zone fell 1% in January from December and eased 0.1% over the year. That marked a slowdown from December when retail sales grew 0.3% over one month and 2.2% over one year.
