The invention relates to a connecting element (10, 20, 30, 50) for producing a component connection (70) of two components (72, 74; 92) lying against each other by means of the connecting element (10, 20, 30, 50), which is welded to the lower layer (74)—the base layer—by friction, wherein the connecting element (10, 20, 30, 50) has a shaft (18), which has a shaft segment (14) and a head (12) having a flat surface (20) lying on the top side of the head for transmitting the axial force, wherein a drive cutout (22, 32) is introduced into the flat surface (20) in order to transmit a torque. The invention is characterized in that a continuous diameter increase starting at an ascent level (A) on the shaft segment (18) to the bottom side of the head results, wherein the distance from the ascent level (A) to a head bottom-side level (K), which has the greatest distance from the shaft end, is less than half the difference between the head outside diameter and the shaft diameter at the ascent level (DA−DS)/2 (D2) and greater than a quarter of the difference between the head outside diameter and the shaft diameter at the ascent level (DA−DS)/4 (D1).