Czechia's foreign population has nearly tripled over the past decade

The number of foreigners living in Czechia has risen sharply over the past decade, with official figures now putting the total above 1.1 million and a broader estimate suggesting as many as 1.52 million people may live or work in the country.

The latest official figures recorded 1.13 million foreigners in Czechia at the end of 2025, up by more than 37,000 from the previous year. Foreigners now account for roughly one in 10 people in the country, according to Czech Statistical Office data reported by Novinky.cz.

The wider estimate includes people who work and stay in Czechia without being registered, as well as some EU citizens who legally work in the country but are not registered as residents. The latest estimate gives a significantly larger picture of the foreign workforce and population than residence records alone.

In 2015, fewer than 470,000 foreigners were officially registered in Czechia. The number has since grown by well over 600,000, with migration from Ukraine playing a major role but not solely accounting for the entire increase.

The Czech Statistical Office has noted that growth was already well underway before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Between 2015 and 2021 alone, the total number of foreigners increased by approximately 188,000. From 2022, an additional 477,000 people, many Ukrainian refugees, have officially registered in the country.

The composition of the foreign population has also changed. EU citizens once represented the majority of foreigners in Czechia, but people from outside the EU now make up nearly two-thirds.

At the end of 2025, Ukrainians accounted for 54 percent of all officially registered foreigners, followed by Slovaks at 11 percent, Vietnamese at 6 percent and Russians at 3 percent.

Foreign residents are also heavily concentrated in areas with large employment markets. Prague is the main destination for the country's largest foreign communities, followed by the Central Bohemian and South Moravian regions, reflecting the economic importance of Prague, Brno and industrial centers such as Mladá Boleslav.

Foreigners are disproportionately represented in the working-age population. In 2024, nearly 81 percent of legally resident foreigners were of working age, compared with less than 64 percent among Czech citizens, according to figures cited by the Czech Statistical Office.

Most foreigners in Czechia are employees, although the number of foreign entrepreneurs has also been rising. There were about 139,000 foreign business owners in 2025, representing roughly one in 10 foreigners.

Income levels vary considerably between nationalities and occupations. Slovaks working in Czech private companies had an average monthly wage of CZK 65,044 last year, compared with CZK 52,235 for Czech employees and CZK 38,050 for Ukrainians, according to data cited in the report.

The lower earnings among Ukrainians are partly linked to their concentration in lower-paid manual jobs, including construction, agriculture, hospitality and health care — sectors where Czech employers have long faced labor shortages.

Meanwhile, migration from Slovakia tends to include a higher proportion of university graduates, specialists and people moving for specific career opportunities.