Foreigner numbers by state in Germany 2021

This statistic shows the number of foreigners in Germany according to the Central Register of Foreign Nationals in 2021, by state. In 2021, North-Rhine-Westphalia had the most foreign nationals at over 2.8 million, followed by Bavaria with more than 2 million and Baden-Württemberg with around 1.89 million. Foreigners are those who are not German based on Article 116, Paragraph 1 of the German constitution. These include stateless persons and those with unclear citizenship as well as the population group with a migration background. Individuals with a migration background can either have immigrated into Germany or been born in the country to at least one parent who was born a foreigner.

Number of foreigners in German federal states in 2021

Characteristic	Number of foreigners
North Rhine-Westphalia	2,815,800
Bavaria	2,051,505
Baden-Württemberg	1,885,925
Hesse	1,163,800
Lower Saxony	895,490
Berlin	848,400
Rhineland-Palatinate	532,230
Hamburg	328,375
Schleswig-Holstein	286,270
Saxony	244,415
Brandenburg	149,540
Bremen	140,330
Saarland	134,350
Saxony-Anhalt	127,670
Thuringia	126,270
Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania	87,410

Loading statistic...

Download

Source

Show detailed source information?

Already a member?

Source

Use Ask Statista Research Service

Release date

April 2022

More information

Region

Germany

Survey time period

December 31, 2021

Supplementary notes

Foreign population based on the Central Register of Foreign Nationals as of December 31, 2021.

Based on the Central Register of Foreign Nationals, statistics on foreigners were rounded up to the nearest multiple of 5, due to demands for statistical privacy and personal data protection in population statistics publications.

Citation formats