People who moved to the UK for at least 12 months, minus people who moved away; nearly half the previous year's estimate.
YEAR ENDING DECEMBER 2025 · PROVISIONALOFFICE FOR NATIONAL STATISTICS ↗
THE NATIONAL PICTURE / UNITED KINGDOM
UK MIGRATION.
UK MIGRATION.
THE NUMBERS, IN CONTEXT.
Official statistics on people arriving, moving for the long term, claiming asylum and being resettled. Each number has its own date and definition.
DATA RELEASE27 AUG 2026Home Office · year ending June 2026OPEN FULL RELEASE ↗
01 / THE BIG PICTURE
OFFICIAL DATA · LATEST AVAILABLEDifferent measures. Different questions.
Border crossings count journeys; migration estimates count people moving for at least a year; visa grants count permissions; asylum claims count applications. These figures are not interchangeable.
Recorded UK arrivals of all kinds; 57% were British nationals. Visitors and repeat journeys make up much of this total.
YEAR ENDING JUNE 2026HOME OFFICE ↗Entry-clearance visas for reasons such as work, study, family and humanitarian routes. A grant is not proof of travel.
YEAR ENDING JUNE 2026HOME OFFICE ↗People claimed asylum in the UK; 41% had held a visa or other leave before claiming.
YEAR ENDING JUNE 2026HOME OFFICE ↗2024331k
2025171k
02 / ROUTES & PERMISSIONS
VISA GRANTS · NOT ARRIVAL COUNTSWhy people come
Visas across all work categories, including dependants; 120,105 were in the Worker category.
YEAR ENDING JUNE 2026HOME OFFICE · WORK ↗Study visa grants, including students and eligible dependants; 11% fewer than the previous year.
YEAR ENDING JUNE 2026HOME OFFICE · STUDY ↗Family-related entry-clearance visa grants; this excludes dependants on work and study visas.
YEAR ENDING JUNE 2026HOME OFFICE · FAMILY ↗Grants of leave allowing people to come to or remain in the UK across safe and legal routes.
YEAR ENDING JUNE 2026HOME OFFICE ↗Sponsored study383,455
Work234,841
Family57,590
Visa grants are permissions, not confirmed journeys. Humanitarian grants are shown separately above because they include in-country leave extensions.
HOME OFFICE · IMMIGRATION SYSTEM STATISTICS ↗03 / ASYLUM SYSTEM
YEAR ENDING JUNE 2026 · UKClaims, decisions and support
Asylum claimants whose recorded route was a small boat; not the same measure as small-boat arrivals.
YEAR ENDING JUNE 2026HOME OFFICE ↗Share of initial decisions on main applicants that resulted in protection or other leave.
YEAR ENDING JUNE 2026HOME OFFICE ↗People waiting at the end of June, relating to around 32,000 cases.
AS AT 30 JUNE 2026HOME OFFICE ↗People receiving Home Office asylum support; around 16,000 were in hotel accommodation.
AS AT 30 JUNE 2026HOME OFFICE ↗Visa or other leave41% · 34,999
Small boat40% · 33,949
Other irregular route12% · 10,348
Other / unmatched8% · 6,595
Shares are rounded. Routes are based on the latest recorded route before the claim, not necessarily the route on the day of arrival.
HOME OFFICE · ASYLUM CLAIMS ↗Asylum claims and small-boat arrivals are related but separate datasets. Claims can be lodged later, and the route dataset and arrival count do not necessarily match one for one.
04 / ENGLISH CHANNEL
OPEN THE LIVE CROSSINGS PAGE ↗Small-boat arrivals & returns
All nationalities combined, recorded by the Home Office.
YEAR ENDING JUNE 2026 · 23% LOWER YEAR ON YEARHOME OFFICE ↗An average of 65 people per arriving boat over the same year.
YEAR ENDING JUNE 2026HOME OFFICE ↗People who arrived by small boat since 2018 and were subsequently returned from the UK.
2018 TO YEAR ENDING JUNE 2026HOME OFFICE ↗2025about 43k
202633,374
Home Office estimates of crossings prevented in France are shown separately on the Small Boat Crossings page. They are not UK arrivals and are not added to arrival totals. The nationality dataset excludes cases where nationality was not recorded.
05 / AFGHANISTAN
OPERATIONAL DATA · 30 JUNE 2026The UK Afghan resettlement programme
These are UK-run resettlement schemes, not one bilateral resettlement deal with Afghanistan. The Afghan Resettlement Programme brings together UK relocation and protection schemes created after the 2021 evacuation.
Arrivals recorded following the evacuation. This includes people who did not need resettlement, such as British citizens and people who already had settled status.
Scheme-level total in the Home Office resettlement statistics; provisional and subject to revision.
For eligible Afghans who worked for or with the UK government in exposed or meaningful roles.
Pathway 1: 10,693 · Pathway 2: 1,778 · Pathway 3: 1,682.
Created for certain people affected by the 2022 MOD data incident.
Included in the published resettlement programme total.
ARAP20,407
ACRS14,153
Afghanistan Response Route4,468
Route not recorded30
The four scheme counts sum to the 39,058 recorded programme total. They do not include all 42,100 post-evacuation arrivals.
HOME OFFICE · AFGHAN OPERATIONAL DATA ↗38,373Afghans who have claimed asylum since October 2021. The Home Office says most arrived by small boat.HOME OFFICE ↗
5,952Afghan asylum claims in the year ending June 2026, down 25% from the previous year.HOME OFFICE ↗
The resettlement total and asylum-claim total are separate measures and may include people who also appear in other immigration datasets. Do not add them together. ARAP closed to new principal applications, ACRS stopped new pathways/referrals, and ARR was discontinued in July 2025; existing eligible cases continue to be processed.
What the totals do and don’t mean
Arrivals aren’t migrants. Border-arrival figures count movements across the border, including British citizens, visitors and repeat journeys.
Net migration is a different measure. ONS estimates long-term immigration minus long-term emigration for people moving for 12 months or more.
Permissions aren’t trips. Visa grants record permission to travel or stay; a visa grant does not confirm that someone travelled.
Claims aren’t decisions. An asylum application, an initial decision, a grant of protection and a resettlement arrival each count a different stage.