Not what the data shows. The record was 2023 — net migration peaked at 944,000 in the year ending March 2023 and was 171,000 in 2025, though arrivals remain high by any pre-2021 standard.
Figures in the text were correct on 4 September 2026; the charts below are drawn live from the same series and will move as new periods are published.
Net migration — arrivals minus departures — peaked at 944,000 in the year ending March 2023. ONS's estimate for 2025 is 171,000: less than a fifth of the peak, and lower than any year since 2021. Gross immigration tells the same story: 1,469,000 people arrived in the year ending March 2023, against 813,000 in 2025.
On the current measurement, 2025's 813,000 arrivals sit slightly below the pre-pandemic peak of 849,000 (year ending March 2019) — so arrivals are now back in the range of the late 2010s, not merely down from the 2023 surge. The longer historical series (measured differently, by passenger survey) never recorded more than 681,000 arrivals in any year to 2019, which is why the 2022–2023 levels were genuinely without precedent. "At record levels" was true then; it is not true now, and the direction since has been sharply down.
The nationality split shows what the total hides: in 2025, net migration of non-EU+ nationals was +350,000, while British nationals (−136,000) and EU+ nationals (−42,000) both left in greater numbers than they arrived. These figures are provisional and ONS has revised recent years substantially before.
Published valueProvisional or revisedLatestOne point a year is drawn; the source publishes overlapping year-ending figures, and every one is in the history table and CSVShaded bands: governments (see labels)Hover or use arrow keys to read a value
Source: ONS, Long-term international migration, provisional.
Published valueProvisional or revisedLatestOne point a year is drawn; the source publishes overlapping year-ending figures, and every one is in the history table and CSVShaded bands: governments (see labels)Hover or use arrow keys to read a value
Source: ONS, Long-term international migration, provisional.
Published valueProvisional or revisedLatestOne point a year is drawn; the source publishes overlapping year-ending figures, and every one is in the history table and CSVShaded bands: governments (see labels)Hover or use arrow keys to read a value
Source: ONS, Long-term international migration, provisional.
How claims are checked
A verdict here says what the named official series show, on the periods named in the text — nothing more. Where two reasonable measures disagree, the verdict is “Depends which measure you use” and both are shown. Every series links to its full page with the publisher, the exact source cell, revisions and caveats. Free to reuse with attribution to Civometry and the original publisher.