The United States hosted, by far, the highest number of immigrants in the world in 2024. That year, there were over ** million people born outside of the States residing in the country. Germany and Saudi Arabia followed behind at around **** and **** million, respectively. There are varying reasons for people to emigrate from their country of origin, from poverty and unemployment to war and persecution. American Migration People migrate to the United States for a variety of reasons, from job and educational opportunities to family reunification. Overall, in 2021, most people that became legal residents of the United States did so for family reunification purposes, totaling ******* people that year. An additional ******* people became legal residents through employment opportunities. In terms of naturalized citizenship, ******* people from Mexico became naturalized American citizens in 2021, followed by people from India, the Philippines, Cuba, and China. German Migration Behind the United States, Germany also has a significant migrant population. Migration to Germany increased during the mid-2010's, in light of the Syrian Civil War and refugee crisis, and during the 2020’s, in light of conflict in Afghanistan and Ukraine. Moreover, as German society continues to age, there are less workers in the labor market. In a low-migration scenario, Germany will have **** million skilled workers by 2040, compared to **** million by 2040 in a high-migration scenario. In both scenarios, this is still a decrease from **** skilled workers in 2020.

The United States had the ******* net migration levels of the G7 countries between 2000 and 2025. This is unsurprising as it is also the country with the highest population of the seven. Moreover, net migration to the United States decreased from 2016 onwards, following the beginning of the Trump administration. Germany's net migration peaked in 2015 and 2022 after a high number of refugees immigrated to the country, but has been decreasing since. In terms of net migration per 1,000 inhabitants, the U.S. had the highest ratio in 2025.

All of the inhabitants in the Holy See, the home of the leader of the Roman Catholic Church, were immigrants in 2020, meaning that they were born outside of the country. Perhaps more interesting are the Gulf States the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, and Kuwait, all with an immigrant population of over ** percent of their total populations, underlining the high importance of migrant workers to these countries' economies. In terms of numbers, the United States had the highest number of immigrants in 2020. Migration to Gulf Cooperation Council states The United Arab Emirates, Qatar, and Kuwait, all members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), have a significant amount of migrant labor. The United Arab Emirates and Qatar both rank high in quality-of-life rankings for immigrants. A significant number of migrant workers in the GCC originate from Asia, with the most originating from Bangladesh. As of 2022, nearly ***** thousand Bangladeshi citizens expatriated to work in GCC nations. The American melting pot The United States is known for having high levels of diversity and migration. Migration to the United States experienced peaks from the periods of 1990-1999 as well as 1900-1909. Currently, Latin Americans are the largest migrant group in the United States, followed by migrants from Asia. Out of each state, California has some of the highest naturalization rates. In 2021, ******* people in California naturalized as U.S. citizens, followed by Florida, New York, Texas, and New Jersey.

United States Immigrants Admitted: All Countries data was reported at 1,127,167.000 Person in 2017. This records a decrease from the previous number of 1,183,505.000 Person for 2016. United States Immigrants Admitted: All Countries data is updated yearly, averaging 451,510.000 Person from Sep 1900 (Median) to 2017, with 118 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 1,827,167.000 Person in 1991 and a record low of 23,068.000 Person in 1933. United States Immigrants Admitted: All Countries data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by US Department of Homeland Security. The data is categorized under Global Database’s United States – Table US.G087: Immigration.

The rating reflects the number of migrants in the country. It allows you to assess how attractive the country is for foreigners to live and work, as well as in terms of migration legislation.

Of the G7 countries, Canada had the highest crude net migration rate most of the years between 2000 and 2022. In 2023, the net migration ratio of the average population in Canada reached ** per 1,000 inhabitants. On the other hand, the rate in Japan was *** per 1,000 inhabitants. Migration numbers were unusually low in 2020 and 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Continuous Population Statistics: Immigration from abroad, by quarter and country of birth (top 3 countries). Quarterly. Provinces.

Sweden was the Nordic country that received the highest number of immigrants from 2001 to 2021. In 2021, nearly ****** people immigrated to Sweden, but was overtaken by Denmark in 2022. Sweden was also the country in the region with the highest net migration over the last years. Iceland, which also has the smallest population of the five, had the lowest number of immigrants. Migration to Sweden As the Nordic country with the highest number of migrants, nearly ** percent of survey respondents consider immigration an important issue for Swedish society, more than other European countries. In 2023, most immigrants to Sweden were Swedes returning to the country, followed by India, Poland, and Germany. The need for migration in Nordic nations Migrants often fill in gaps within labor markets that local populations cannot fill. In Nordic nations, these gaps are becoming more apparent as fertility rates decrease. Over the past decade, crude birth rates have decreased in all Nordic countries. Meanwhile, those aged 70 years and older are becoming larger portions of Nordic societies. Declining birth rates combined with aging societies mean that labor markets will be challenged to have enough workers.

This table contains 25 series, with data for years 1955 - 2013 (not all combinations necessarily have data for all years). This table contains data described by the following dimensions (Not all combinations are available): Geography (1 items: Canada ...) Last permanent residence (25 items: Total immigrants; France; Great Britain; Total Europe ...).

Debates about migration are often in the news. People quote numbers about how many people are entering and leaving different countries. Governments need to plan and manage public resources based on how their own populations are changing.

Informed discussions and effective policymaking rely on good migration data. But how much do we really know about migration, and where do estimates come from?

In this article, I look at how countries and international agencies define different forms of migration, how they estimate the number of people moving in and out of countries, and how accurate these estimates are.

Migrants without legal status make up a small portion of the overall immigrant population. Most high-income countries and some middle-income ones have a solid understanding of how many immigrants live there. Tracking the exact flows of people moving in and out is trickier, but governments can reliably monitor long-term trends to understand the bigger picture.

Who is considered an international migrant? In the United Nations statistics, an international migrant is defined as “a person who moves to a country other than that of his or her usual residence for at least a year, so that the country of destination effectively becomes his or her new country of usual residence”.1

For example, an Argentinian person who spends nine months studying in the United States wouldn’t count as a long-term immigrant in the US. But an Argentinian person who moves to the US for two years would. Even if someone gains citizenship in their new country, they are still considered an immigrant in migration statistics.

The same applies in reverse for emigrants: someone leaving their home country for more than a year is considered a long-term emigrant for the country they’ve left. This does not change if they acquire citizenship in another country. Some national governments may have definitions that differ from the UN recommendations.

What about illegal migration? “Illegal migration” refers to the movement of people outside the legal rules for entering or leaving a country. There isn’t a single agreed-upon definition, but it generally involves people who breach immigration laws. Some refer to this as irregular or unauthorized migration.

There are three types of migrants who don’t have a legal immigration status. First, those who cross borders without the right legal permissions. Second, those who enter a country legally but stay after their visa or permission expires. Third, some migrants have legal permission to stay but work in violation of employment restrictions — for example, students who work more hours than their visa allows.

Tracking illegal migration is difficult. In regions with free movement, like the European Union, it’s particularly challenging. For example, someone could move from Germany to France, live there without registering, and go uncounted in official migration records.2 The rise of remote work has made it easier for people to live in different countries without registering as employees or taxpayers.

Correlation between the Immigrant ranking sorted by the proportion of immigrants living in each country and the Cultural Similarity ranking for each country, sorted by the most similar countries in terms of cultural similarity.

Armenia recorded the highest crude rate of net migration among the countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). Over the course of 2023, the ratio of the difference between immigrants into and emigrants from the country reached 25 per 1,000 population.

Inspiration

Inspired by another Kaggle user who did a similar project with Indian emigrants (https://www.kaggle.com/rajacsp/indian-migration-history)

Content

Data sourced from World Bank database at https://datacatalog.worldbank.org/dataset/global-bilateral-migration-database. In addition to selecting the decades from 1960-2000, I added a "Total" column and a least squares regression rate column. The original CSV (SG_IMMIGRANTS.csv) is a bit messy and contains a lot of blanks because ... well Singapore is a small country.

For the two limited "melted" versions, I used pandas pd.melt() to restructure the different decades into a new column "Year" with it's corresponding "Total". Only a select few countries with substantial number of total immigrants are included (Bangladesh, China, Indonesia, Pakistan, Thailand, Philippines, India, Malaysia, Vietnam, United Kingdom). Here, the ratio refers to either the ratio of gender to decade's total or the ratio of that decade's total to the country's all-time cumulative total . e.g. Male 1960 CHN Ratio =0.510563203 means males made up 51% of the total Chinese immigrants to SG in 1960 e.g. Total 1960 MYS Ratio = 0.081202409 means 1960 contributed only 8% of the total Malaysian immigrants to SG

Hope this is clear, leave a comment if anything needs clarification!

Thoughts/to-do:

Future version with global database csv, SG emigrants csv For select top origin/destination countries, show a positive-negative bar plot, coloured according to immigration/emigration multiple

Continuous Population Statistics: Emigration abroad, by quarter and country of birth (top 10 countries). Quarterly. National.

Migration in Europe in 2024 marks a return to normality after the extreme disruptions experienced in 2022. While in 2022 ******* saw the largest negative net migration balance, with almost * million of its citizens fleeing the eastern European country in the aftermath of Russia's invasion, in 2024 it is in fact the country with the largest positive net migration balance. Over **** million Ukrainians have returned to their home country from abroad, leading Poland, Romania, and Hungary to have large net migration deficits, as they were key recipient countries for Ukrainians in 2022. The other countries which experienced large positive net migration balances in 2023 are all in Western Europe, as the UK, the Netherlands, France, Italy, and Spain all remain popular destinations for migrants.

Graph and download economic data for Net migration for High Income Countries (SMPOPNETMHIC) from 1962 to 2017 about migration, Net, 5-year, and income.

Eurostat's annual collections of statistics on international migration flows are structured as follows:

• NOWCAST: Annual collection of provisional monthly data on live births and deaths covering at least 6 months of the reference year (Article 4.3 of https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg_impl/2014/205/oj/eng" target="_self">Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) No 205/2014) and provisional monthly data on migrants covering at least 6 months of the reference year on a voluntary basis.
• DEMOBAL (Demographic balance): Annual collection of provisional data on population, total live births and total deaths at national level (Article 4.1 of Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) No 205/2014) and provisional data on total migrants at national level on a voluntary basis.
• POPSTAT (population statistics): The most in-depth annual national and regional data collection on demography and migration, for population, births, deaths, immigrants, emigrants, marriages and divorces by a large number of breakdowns. (Article 3 of Regulation (EU) No 1260/2013 and Article 3 of Regulation (EC) No 862/2007).

The aim is to collect annual mandatory and voluntary data from the national statistical institutes. Mandatory data are those defined by the legislation listed under ‘6.1. Institutional mandate — legal acts and other agreements’.

The quality of the demographic data collected on a voluntary basis depends on the availability and quality of information provided by the national statistical institutes.

For more information on mandatory/voluntary data collection, see 6.1. Institutional mandate — legal acts and other agreements.

The following data on migrants are collected under unified demographic data collection:

• Immigrants by age, sex and:
  • Country of citizenship;
  • Country of birth;
  • Country of previous residence.
• Immigrants by country of citizenship and country of birth.
• Emigrants by age, sex and:
  • Country of citizenship;
  • Country of birth;
  • Country of next residence.

Migration Statistic: Immigration flow from abroad by year, country of origin and nationality (Spanish/foreign). Annual. National.