How Much of Europe is Made Up of Immigrants?

Key Takeaways

• 70% of Liechtenstein (or 28,000 people) are immigrants, of which 49% (19,000) were not born in the EU, per latest data from January, 2024.
• (For context, Liechtenstein is also not in the EU).
• On the other hand, Germany has the most number of immigrants in Europe, (16.9 million), or about 20% of the population. Of them 13% (10.5 million) were not born in the EU.

📝 Who is Included in Immigrant Data?

EU member states rely on administrative data to report migrants, such as registers for population, foreigners, residence, work permits, health insurance, or taxes.

Thus, this data will not include immigrants who entered illegally or who reside in a way not captured by a government agency.

Furthermore, every country except for these four listed—Poland, Slovakia, Sweden, and Liechtenstein—includes Ukrainians under temporary residence permits in their immigration statistics.

Immigrants have to reside in the country for more than 12 months to be counted.

🤔 Where is the UK?

Since Brexit, Eurostat stopped collecting and publishing relevant UK data. 

Per the last census (2020-21), about 16% of the UK is foreign-born.