The present disclosure describes a method for occupancy class prediction, such as for occupancy class detection in a vehicle. In aspects, the method includes determining, for a plurality of points of time, measurement data related to an area and determining, for a plurality of points of time, occlusion values based on the measurement data. The method further includes selecting, for a present point of time, one of a plurality of modes for occupancy class prediction based on the occlusion values for at least one of the present point of time and a previous point of time and/or based on one of the plurality of modes for occupancy class prediction selected for the previous point of time. The method additionally includes determining, for the present point of time, one of a plurality of predetermined occupancy classes of the area based on the selected mode for the present point of time.