Abstract. The growth of Hilbert coefficients for powers of ideals are studied. For a graded ideal I in the polynomial ring S = K[x1, . . . , xn] and a finitely generated graded S-module, the Hilbert coefficients ei(M/I k M ) are polynomial functions. Given two families of graded ideals (I k ) k≥0 and (J k ) k≥0 with J k ⊂ I k for all k with the property that J k J ℓ ⊂ J k+ℓ and I k I ℓ ⊂ I k+ℓ for all k and ℓ, and such that the algebras A = L k≥0 J k and B = L k≥0 I k are finitely generated, we show the function k →0 (I k /J k ) is of quasipolynomial type, say given by the polynomials P0, . . . , Pg−1.we show that all the Pi have the same degree and the same leading coefficient. As one of the applications it is shown that lim k→∞ ℓ(Γm (S/I k ))/k n ∈ Q. We also study analogous statements in the local case.