Monthly monitoring of entry clearance visa applications
Published 30 April 2024
Next update due: June 2024
On 4 December 2023, the Home Office announced future changes to visa rules intended to reduce immigration and published further details on 21 December.
These changes have now come into force, following 2 sets of Immigration Rules changes released on 19 February 2024 and 14 March 2024 as follows:
- the baseline general salary to be sponsored for a ‘Skilled Worker’ visa has increased from £26,200 to £38,700, while the ‘going rate’ minimum salary specific to each job has also gone up significantly
- a list of jobs for which it is possible to sponsor someone for a ‘Skilled Worker’ visa at a reduced minimum salary has been made shorter and renamed the Immigration Salary List
- the minimum income normally required to sponsor someone for a spouse/partner visa has risen from £18,600 to £29,000
- social care workers arriving from overseas are no longer allowed to bring dependants (that is, partners and children) on their visa
The ‘Graduate’ visa, a 2-year unsponsored work permit for overseas graduates of British universities, will also be reviewed by the Migration Advisory Committee.
For more information please see: Changes to legal migration rules for family and work visas in 2024 - House of Commons Library (parliament.uk).
The provisional data below provides an indication of the number of people who have an intention to enter the UK for work and study reasons. Finalised statistics on the numbers of visas will be published quarterly in the Immigration system statistics release.
Policy changes are one of a number of factors that may have impacted visa application volumes. This release provides the latest statistics but does not comment on the drivers of the trend. A comprehensive overview of visa trends can be found in the Summary of latest statistics published in the quarterly Immigration system statistics release.
Figure 1: Monthly applications for ‘Skilled Worker’ and ‘Skilled Worker: Health and Care’ visas, January 2022 to March 2024
Figure 2: Monthly applications for ‘Sponsored study’ visas, January 2022 to March 2024
It will be necessary to await the peak in student applications for the next academic year (which usually comes in August/September) before we can see the full effect of recent policy changes and any other impacts.
Table 1: Monthly applications for ‘Skilled Worker’, ‘Skilled Worker: Health and Care’ and ‘Sponsored study’ visas, from January 2022 to March 2024
Skilled Worker | Skilled Worker - Health and Care |
Sponsored study |
|||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Main applicants |
Dependants | Main applicants |
Dependants | Main applicants |
Dependants | ||
2022 | Jan | 4,100 | 2,700 | 3,700 | 4,000 | 31,100 | 11,000 |
Feb | 4,600 | 3,100 | 4,100 | 4,400 | 9,600 | 6,800 | |
Mar | 5,300 | 3,600 | 5,300 | 5,200 | 6,200 | 6,000 | |
Apr | 4,800 | 3,500 | 5,000 | 5,200 | 9,100 | 5,200 | |
May | 5,700 | 4,100 | 5,600 | 6,000 | 14,100 | 5,300 | |
Jun | 6,700 | 4,800 | 7,100 | 7,300 | 31,500 | 8,000 | |
Jul | 6,600 | 4,800 | 7,300 | 7,500 | 85,000 | 14,800 | |
Aug | 6,900 | 4,700 | 8,100 | 8,700 | 144,200 | 23,600 | |
Sep | 6,100 | 4,100 | 7,900 | 8,700 | 76,600 | 18,300 | |
Oct | 5,800 | 3,900 | 8,000 | 8,300 | 11,300 | 10,200 | |
Nov | 6,100 | 4,200 | 9,700 | 10,100 | 24,700 | 14,800 | |
Dec | 5,600 | 3,900 | 9,900 | 10,600 | 46,200 | 19,800 | |
2023 | Jan | 5,300 | 3,800 | 11,300 | 12,900 | 26,900 | 17,500 |
Feb | 5,100 | 4,000 | 13,100 | 14,600 | 5,200 | 7,500 | |
Mar | 5,600 | 4,500 | 14,300 | 16,700 | 7,800 | 7,900 | |
Apr | 4,700 | 3,900 | 12,200 | 15,100 | 9,500 | 6,000 | |
May | 5,900 | 4,800 | 14,600 | 19,300 | 16,900 | 7,800 | |
Jun | 6,200 | 5,000 | 14,600 | 19,300 | 38,900 | 9,100 | |
Jul | 6,500 | 4,900 | 16,200 | 21,600 | 81,900 | 12,300 | |
Aug | 6,900 | 4,900 | 18,300 | 23,300 | 147,100 | 25,100 | |
Sep | 5,500 | 4,100 | 12,900 | 18,400 | 83,500 | 22,500 | |
Oct | 6,400 | 4,900 | 14,400 | 22,700 | 10,400 | 12,000 | |
Nov | 6,100 | 4,300 | 9,800 | 19,400 | 14,800 | 9,700 | |
Dec | 6,100 | 5,500 | 6,400 | 21,300 | 30,600 | 8,000 | |
2024 | Jan | 6,900 | 8,100 | 4,700 | 19,800 | 25,500 | 3,400 |
Feb | 6,100 | 6,900 | 3,100 | 16,300 | 3,700 | 1,700 | |
Mar | 6,100 | 4,800 | 2,400 | 13,200 | 4,800 | 1,600 |
Notes:
- Figures are provisional management information from live operational systems drawn on the date of reporting and are subject to change.
- All figures are rounded to the nearest 100, and individual figures may not add up to totals due to rounding.
- These statistics will be updated on a monthly basis until the end of 2024. After which we will review the user need for monthly updates. The quarterly Immigration system statistics provide detailed information on visa applications and outcomes.