Immigration to the UK is estimated to have halved in the biggest fall since the pandemic after a drop in foreign workers and students being issued visas.
The number of people coming to Britain versus the number leaving stood at an estimated 431,000 in the year ending December 2024, the Office for National Statistics said on Thursday.
This is down 49.9% from 860,000 12 months earlier.
It is the biggest calendar-year drop since the early stages of the pandemic when net migration fell from 184,000 in the year ending December 2019 to 93,000 in the year ending December 2020.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said: “The 300,000 drop in net migration since the election is important and welcome after the figures quadrupled to nearly a million in the last Parliament.
“Our Immigration White Paper sets out radical reforms to further reduce net migration.
“These figures show a big increase in returns of failed asylum seekers and foreign national offenders, record levels of illegal working penalties, and the asylum backlog and hotel use coming down.
“We are going even further by introducing new counter terrorism style powers to boost our border security and smash the people smuggling gangs responsible for their vile trade."
The latest decrease is the biggest numerical drop for any 12-month period and the ONS said the decline has been driven by falling numbers of people coming to work and study in the UK.
Emigration rose by around 11% to an estimated 517,000 for the year to December, up from 466,000 in the previous year.
It means people leaving the UK has returned to a similar level to the year ending June 2017.
The new estimates follow a visas crackdown by the previous Conservative government early last year.
The salary thresholds for Skilled Worker Visas was introduced in April 2024. It included a general threshold of £38,700 -a-year with a discounted new entrant threshold of £30,960.
Director of population statistics at the ONS Mary Gregory said: “Our provisional estimates show net migration has almost halved compared with the previous year, driven by falling numbers of people coming to work and study, particularly student dependants. This follows policy changes brought in restricting visa applications.
“There has also been an increase in emigration over the 12 months to December 2024, especially people leaving who originally came on study visas once pandemic travel restrictions to the UK were eased.”
The latest figures come less than a fortnight after Sir Keir Starmer said high net migration had caused “incalculable” damage to British society, as he set out a series of measures aimed at reducing further the number of people moving long term to the UK.
The Prime Minister, who said the country risks becoming an “island of strangers” without better integration, added that he wanted net migration to have fallen “significantly” by the next general election – but refused to set a target number.
Sir Keir’s plan includes reforming work and study visas and requiring a higher level of English across all immigration routes, and is expected to reduce the number of people coming to the UK by up to 100,000 per year.
Sir Keir’s reference to strangers faced criticism – including from Labour backbenchers – as it was said by some to have echoes of Enoch Powell’s infamous “rivers of blood” speech.
But Home Secretary Yvette Cooper defended the Prime Minister, insisting the tone of his plan was “completely different” from the 1968 anti-immigration speech.
The Prime Minister’s spokesman later confirmed Sir Keir stood by the words he used and rejected “absolutely” the Powell comparisons.
For many years, the level of immigration – people coming to the UK – has been higher than the level of emigration – people leaving – meaning more people are coming to settle in the UK than are leaving to settle in another country.
The Government’s promise to “take back control of our borders” comes as Labour battles a surge in support for Reform UK, which won a by-election and council seats across England earlier this month, with policies including a “freeze” on immigration.
