Swiss perspectives in 10 languages

Immigration to Switzerland dropped by 15% in 2024

Less immigration to Switzerland in 2024
Keystone-SDA

Immigration to Switzerland fell by 15.6% to 83,392 people in 2024 compared to the previous year. According to the State Secretariat for Migration, the majority entered the country together with family members.

+ Get the most important news from Switzerland in your inbox

The State Secretariat for Migration (SEM) added on Thursday that the aim of most immigrants is to pursue gainful employment. Last year, 170,607 people immigrated and became a part of the permanent foreign resident population, which corresponds to a decrease of 6% compared to the previous year (-10,946 people).

More

At 120,546 people, immigration from the European Union and European Free Trade Area Area (EU/EFTA) accounted for 70.7% of total immigration (-7.6%). According to the SEM, 50,061 people immigrated from third countries, which is 2.4% less than in the previous year.

Overall, 5.9% more EU/EFTA nationals and 1.3% more third-country nationals moved away. At the end of 2024, 2,368,364 foreign nationals were living permanently in Switzerland.

Translated from German by DeepL/jdp

This news story has been written and carefully fact-checked by an external editorial team. At SWI swissinfo.ch we select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools such as DeepL to translate it into English. Providing you with automatically translated news gives us the time to write more in-depth articles.

If you want to know more about how we work, have a look here, if you want to learn more about how we use technology, click here, and if you have feedback on this news story please write to english@swissinfo.ch.

Popular Stories

Most Discussed

News

After the radiologists' strike, doctors demonstrate in Berne

More

After strike by radiologists, doctors demonstrate in Bern

This content was published on Following a strike by radiology technicians in Fribourg, doctors, vets, dentists and chiropractors expressed their frustration on Friday outside parliament in the Swiss capital.

Read more: After strike by radiologists, doctors demonstrate in Bern
Ticino hotels record boom in the winter month of December

More

Ticino hotels record December boom

This content was published on Hotels in the southern Swiss canton of Ticino welcomed significantly more guests last December than in the same month of the previous year.

Read more: Ticino hotels record December boom

In compliance with the JTI standards

More: SWI swissinfo.ch certified by the Journalism Trust Initiative

You can find an overview of ongoing debates with our journalists here . Please join us!

If you want to start a conversation about a topic raised in this article or want to report factual errors, email us at english@swissinfo.ch.

SWI swissinfo.ch - a branch of Swiss Broadcasting Corporation SRG SSR

SWI swissinfo.ch - a branch of Swiss Broadcasting Corporation SRG SSR