Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI has died aged 95, Vatican News has announced.
The pope died at 12:30 pm Kenyan time in his residence at the Vatican's Mater Ecclesiae Monastery.
A statement from Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said: "With pain I inform that Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI died today at 9:34 [12:30 pm Kenyan time] in the Mater Ecclesia Monastery in the Vatican. Further information will be released as soon as possible."
Bruni said the body of Pope Emeritus will be in Saint Peter's Basilica on Monday morning, January 2.
On Wednesday, December 28, Pope Francis publicly shared the news about his predecessor's worsening health and asked people to pray for him.
Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI will be remembered as the first pope in 600 years to resign.
This has posed a burial protocol challenge as another pope is still in office but a church authority has categorically stated that Benedict XVI is a former pope but not the incumbent.
According to the BBC, The Vatican said the body of the Pope Emeritus will be placed in St Peter's Basilica from 2 January for "the greeting of the faithful".
Plans for Pope Benedict's funeral will be announced in the next few hours, the Vatican said.
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On Wednesday, Pope Francis appealed to his final audience of the year at the Vatican to "pray a special prayer for Pope Emeritus Benedict", whom he said was very ill, the BBC reports.
Benedict was born in Germany and named Joseph Ratzinger. He became the Pope in 2005 at the age of 78 to be one of the oldest pontiffs ever elected.
Born Joseph Ratzinger in Germany, Benedict was 78 when in 2005 he became one of the oldest popes ever elected.
"For much of his papacy, the Catholic Church faced allegations, legal claims and official reports into decades of child abuse by priests.
Earlier this year the former Pope acknowledged that errors had been made in the handling of abuse cases while he was archbishop of Munich between 1977 and 1982," the BBC reports.