Eurostat has released the interactive publication "Migration and asylum in Europe", which presents European statistics on migration and asylum, through short texts and interactive visualisations. It shows inter alia the following trends:

Population diversity:

• In 2023, 9% of the people living in EU countries were non-nationals. 3% were citizens of another EU country and 6% of a non-EU country.
   
• In 2023, all the EU countries combined issued over 3.7 million first residence permits to non-EU citizens. Most of the first-residence permits were granted to citizens of Ukraine. 
   
• While work was the main reason for residence permits in the EU in 2023, family was the main reason in Belgium (45%).

Protection and asylum:

• In 2023, Syrians, Afghans and Turks lodged the most asylum applications in the EU. 
   
• In 2023, over 50% of first-instance decisions granted protection status.
   
• In 2023, 272.000 asylum applicants were less than 18 years old, accounting for 24% of all applicants in the EU. Of these, around 40.000 or 15% were unaccompanied minors.

Irregular migration and return:

• In 2023, 123.000 non-EU citizens were refused entry into the EU at one of its external borders.
   
• In 2023, around 1.3 million non-EU citizens were found to be illegally present in the EU. 
   
• In 2023, the number of people returned to a country outside increased by 26%. The biggest groups of people returned to a country outside the EU were Georgians (10 300), Albanians (7 800) and Turks (5 600).

Skills of migrants:

• In 2023, around 89.000 highly qualified non-EU workers received an EU Blue Card. Citizens of India were granted the most EU Blue Cards in 2023, ahead of citizens of Russia, Türkiye and Belarus.
   
• Permits for researchers and students were mainly granted to citizens from India, China, Morocco and the United States.
   
• 40% of employed non-EU citizens aged 20-64 years with a degree, were overqualified in 2023, meaning they were working in a low- or medium-skilled job position, for which a degree was not required.

Please find much more indicators and trends in the online publication.