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Developments in migration statistics

Updated 27 February 2025

The Home Office publishes a range of statistics on different aspects of the immigration system in its Migration statistics collection. Home Office statisticians ensure that the migration statistics are kept under review, and make continual improvements to enhance both the statistics themselves and users’ understanding of them.

This publication outlines changes made to migration statistics in 2024 and planned developments in the future. We welcome feedback on these plans.

1. Improving Home Office Migration statistics

1.1 Changes to range of publications

Official statistics published by the Home Office are kept under review in line with the code of practice for statistics, taking into account a number of factors, including user needs, the resources required to compile the statistics, as well as the quality and availability of data. These reviews allow us to balance the production of our regular statistics whilst developing new statistics for future release.

Several changes to the statistics were announced alongside the Immigration system statistics publication. These changes include some statistics being discontinued and changes to frequency. More details on such changes can be found in the About this release section of the publication.

In 2024, the EU Settlement Scheme and Irregular migration quarterly publications were integrated into the Immigration system statistics report. This change aids users in finding migration statistics and provides more coherent reporting of the department’s immigration system data.

A new Monthly entry clearance visa applications publication was introduced in April 2024. This provides more frequent statistics on the number of people with an intention to enter the UK for work and study reasons, following policy changes affecting these routes at the beginning of the year.

Additional ad hoc publications of statistics were released in 2024, including updated immigration returns and arrests data and an analysis of the graduate route. These statistics releases support the Office for Statistical Regulation’s principle of Intelligent Transparency. A list of ad hoc publications can be found on the Home Office migration statistics collection.

The Home Office published a statistical report titled ‘Analysis of migrants use of the Graduate route’, which evaluates those entering the Graduate route, what they do after their leave expires, and early insights into the earnings and employment of Graduate visa holders. This report was released concurrently with the Migration Advisory Committee (MAC) rapid review of the Graduate route.

1.2 Managed Migration

The Home Office published data on sponsored work entry clearance visas by occupation for codes under the ONS’s Standard Occupational Classification “SOC 2010” framework. This has been updated to include codes under the “SOC 2020” framework, along with modelled estimates produced for the period between 2021 Q1 (January to March) and 2024 Q3 (July to September), allowing for comparisons across the data series. More information can be found in section 3.4 ‘Work’ of the Immigration system statistics user guide.

The Home Office now publish data on sponsored study entry clearance visas by course level, allowing users to see the level of study undertaken (for example, masters-level courses) by those applying for and granted Student visas.

Extensions data displaying the previous category of leave type was reintroduced, following a change of methodology used to produce the data. This data was published up to 2020, after which, due to changes in the caseworking systems the publication of the data was paused. It will now be updated annually in May each year.

Statistics on Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA) applications and outcomes, which allow eligible non-visa nationals to visit the UK, have been expanded to include new nationalities that have been enrolled onto the scheme. A detailed ETA dataset has also been included which enables users to analyse the data in more detail.

New data on passenger arrivals, by nationality and mode of arrival (air, rail, sea) were introduced in the Immigration system statistics, replacing the existing passenger arrivals statistics that reported on total arrivals to the UK, only.

The EU Settlement Scheme (EUSS) summary tables include more information on key areas, such as monthly trends, derivative rights applications, and repeat applicant breakdowns.

1.3 Irregular migration, Asylum and Enforcement

In the irregular migration publication, data on small boat arrivals was expanded to include the numbers of enforced and voluntary returns of small boat arrivals.

Asylum decision data was expanded to include administrative outcomes. Administrative outcomes are not substantive decisions (grants, refusals) but describe additional casework undertaken in the Asylum system. The data has been included in the asylum decision tables to enable outcomes to be presented in a clearer, more transparent, way; provide a more accurate reflection of the activity within the asylum system; and to align with how outcomes are counted in the Migration Transparency Data collection.

The asylum chapter has been split into three sections; inflow into the system (applications), outflow (decisions), and the caseload (cases currently in the system). The new chapters provide succinct summaries of trends in areas of notable political and policy interest.

Since October 2024, several ad hoc notes provide an overview of the number of people who have been returned from the UK since early July 2024, as well as data on illegal working activity. This data supplements the quarterly summary in the Immigration system statistics report to provide the public with clear and timely statistics for an area of high public interest.

A new structure was introduced for the ‘How many people are detained or returned?’ chapter. The new chapters clearly distinguish the detained and returned population. Additionally, the chapters are shorter, clearly titled and help users find the information they need more quickly and easily.

1.4 Migrant Journey publication

The Migrant Journey report provides a longitudinal analysis of changes in migrants leave. The 2024 report included new analysis, most notably following the journey of asylum seekers from the point they applied for asylum (rather than when they were granted status).

2. IT systems development work

The UK’s immigration system and the routes migrants can take to the UK are subject to change. New routes are reflected in Home Office caseworking and reporting systems. Any changes, including new routes or schemes, will be clearly signposted in relevant statistical publications.

Home Office IT systems are undergoing significant transformation, including the introduction of new case working systems to replace legacy immigration casework systems from which administrative data used in the migration statistics are derived. This case working system transformation, along with the supporting data infrastructure changes that must follow, will continue during 2025. We expect to maintain the core functions of the systems over this period, including the development and publication of new migration statistics.

3. Data sharing and working with the Office for National Statistics and other parts of Government

The Home Office is committed to supporting the Office for National Statistics (ONS) cross-government programme of work on developing population and migration statistics. This includes working together, alongside our partners from the Government Statistical Service in other departments, to ensure that the statistical information on migration in the public domain is coherent and helps to inform both policy development and the public debate. In addition to sharing expertise, the Home Office enables ONS analysts to access a range of immigration and borders data. Recent work has supported ONS in developing their methods for improving estimates of EU nationals. Access to Advance Passenger Information (API) has also been provided to support developments of methods for estimating migration of British nationals.

In collaboration with the ONS as part of the Refugee Integration Outcomes (RIO) project, Home Office refugee data has been shared and linked with data from NHS, DWP, and HMRC, with more linkages planned. The resulting dataset provides information to help researchers understand more about the outcomes of refugees in the UK. This information will inform policy development to ensure the successful integration of this vulnerable population into their communities for the benefit of all.

Home Office analysts worked with HMRC to develop insights on migrant earnings and employment, by linking Home Office visa records to HMRC earnings data. This collaboration led to new insights being published in the Analysis of migrants use of the Graduate route which complement the Migration Advisory Committee’s (MAC’s) rapid review of the Graduate route, published on 14 May 2024.

ONS’ analysis of Home Office Borders and Immigration data continues to be a key aspect of their migration statistics development programme. The Home Office provides both data and advice to support ONS analysts in their understanding of immigration and help shape the development of new ONS migration statistics.

In November 2024, the ONS published their latest long-term international migration estimates drawing on Home Office administrative data to inform their estimates of non-EU migration.

We continue to work closely with ONS on future developments, including to understand whether similar methodology can be applied to EEA nationals.

4. Future plans

Home Office statisticians are committed to continually improve the user experience and accessibility of the migration statistics publications for all users. This includes adapting the style of topics and reports to support users and increase accessibility of key information.

Work is underway to explore the feasibility of publishing further breakdowns of existing datasets, such as demographic information, and reviewing the categorisations of our visa and extensions data.

We are reviewing the Immigration system statistics release and the Migration Transparency Data release, with the aim of further aligning definitions, reducing any duplication, and improving the clarity of the statistics across the releases.

Home Office are investigating public facing dashboards to improve the dissemination of statistics.

5. Accredited Official Statistics

The immigration system statistics and other migration statistics releases are ‘Accredited Official Statistics’ (formerly known as ‘National Statistics’) or ‘Official statistics’. National Statistics is the legal term set out in the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007 for ‘Accredited Official Statistics’ that have been judged by the Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR), to comply with the Code of Practice for Statistics. This means these statistics meet the standards of trustworthiness, quality and value as set out in the Code of Practice for Statistics. Further information about accredited official statistics can be found on the OSR’s website.

The UK Statistics Authority’s Office for Statistical Regulation undertook a full assessment of the Home Office immigration statistics in February 2012. The continued designation of these statistics as National Statistics was again confirmed in September 2018, following a further compliance check by the Office for Statistics Regulation.