The World's Top Migration Destinations Since 1960

Using data from the Migration Policy Institute, the chart above shows the top 20 Countries with the most international migrants from 1960 to 2024.

The United States remains the world’s largest migrant destination by an enormous margin at 52,375,000 in 2024.
Japan’s international migrant population grew from 693,000 in 1960 to 3,410,000 in 2024, making it among the world’s fastest-growing destinations for international migration.
South Korea’s Human Resources Development Service reports that Japan overtook the United States as the top destination for Korean overseas job seekers in 2024, with 2,257 Koreans securing jobs in Japan last year.

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Russia held nearly 12 million international migrants in 2000, which was the second-largest total in the world at the time.

By 2024, it had fallen to 7.6 million.

It is the only country in the top ten to record a significant absolute decline.

Sanctions, economic contraction, and the consequences of the 2022 invasion of Ukraine have made Russia a country migrants are leaving rather than arriving in.

India and Pakistan both had enormous migrant populations in 1960 (9.4 million and 6.4 million, respectively), primarily due to mass population movements following the partition in 1947.

Both have declined significantly since. India had 4.8 million in 2024, and Pakistan had 4.2 million. Both countries have transitioned from receivers to senders over the dataset’s timeframe.

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