Non-EU citizens resident in the Union
- Eurostat dataset
- migr_pop1ctz
- Reference period
- 2025
- Unit of measure
- persons
Key estimates
- EU aggregate (2025): 30 600 204 persons.
- Highest value: Germany at 8 024 309 persons; lowest: Liechtenstein at 7 050 persons.
- Cross-country mean 1 041 862 persons, standard deviation 1 827 189, coefficient of variation 175.4% across 31 reporting countries.
- Aggregate change 2015→2025: +51.7% on a constant panel of 9 countries.
Where do non-EU citizens live in the Union? Eurostat dataset migr_pop1ctz reports non-EU citizens resident in the Union for 31 reporting countries, with 2025 as the most recent period carrying broad coverage. The European aggregate stands at 30 600 204 persons. Citizenship-based stocks, unlike country-of-birth measures, change with naturalisation policy as well as migration.
The five highest values in 2025 are recorded by Germany (8 024 309), Spain (5 149 235), France (4 847 178), Italy (3 996 856), Türkiye (1 278 995), all expressed in persons. At the opposite end of the distribution sit Liechtenstein (7 050), Iceland (19 801), Slovakia (25 736), Luxembourg (76 142), Bulgaria (115 754). The ratio between the highest and the lowest observation is 1138.20, while the median country reports 300 096 persons against a mean of 1 041 862 persons.
Dispersion is wide: the standard deviation across countries is 1 827 189 persons, giving a coefficient of variation of 175.4%. The mean sits above the median, which indicates that the distribution is pulled by the upper tail rather than being symmetric. Any European average quoted for this indicator therefore describes a synthetic country that few Member States resemble.
Between 2015 and 2025 the summed value across the 9 countries reporting in both periods moved by +51.7%. The largest relative increases are observed in Lithuania (+753.3%), Hungary (+157.9%), Finland (+135.9%); the largest decreases, or the smallest increases, in Italy (+15.4%), Estonia (+17.8%), Norway (+42.7%). Because the panel is held constant, this change is not an artefact of countries entering or leaving the sample.
This indicator has no normatively preferred direction; its analytical value lies in the structure of the distribution and in how national positions move relative to each other over time. The estimates above are reproducible: the dataset identifier, filter dimensions and reference period are stated in the methodological note, and the series can be re-downloaded from the Eurostat dissemination API at any time.
Methodological note
Source: Eurostat, dataset migr_pop1ctz ('Population on 1 January by age group, sex and citizenship'), extracted from the Eurostat dissemination API (JSON-stat 2.0) on the dataset update of 2026-07-09. Filter dimensions: sex=T; age=TOTAL; unit=NR; citizen=NEU27_2020_FOR. Unit of measure: persons. Reference period: 2025. Geographic perimeter: national reporting units with two-character geo codes (31 countries with a non-missing observation); European and euro-area aggregates are excluded from the cross-country statistics and reported separately. Descriptive statistics (mean, median, population standard deviation, coefficient of variation) are computed unweighted over reporting countries. Change over time is computed on a constant panel: only countries with a non-missing observation in both the base and the reference period enter the calculation, which removes composition effects but may differ from the officially published aggregate. No imputation, seasonal adjustment or re-scaling has been applied beyond what Eurostat performs at source. Flagged provisional and estimated observations are retained as published.
Source data
The underlying series can be inspected and re-downloaded from the Eurostat data browser.