People overestimate how many immigrants live in their country

People tend to think there are more immigrants in their country than there really are.

In the United States, for example, the average person believes that 33% of people were not born there. However, official estimates from government agencies show that the figure is just 15% — less than half as many.

In Japan, people guess that 10% of the population are immigrants, but the accurate figure is around 2%. For every 5 immigrants people think exist, there is only one in reality.

As the chart shows, this mismatch is common everywhere. The data comes from the 2023 Ipsos Perils of Perception report.

(This Daily Data Insight was written by Simon van Teutem.)

See the data tab for information on the share of immigrants in each country's population.