Brussels – In December 2025, 47,650 non-EU nationals submitted their first asylum application for international protection in an EU country. This figure is down by 23 per cent compared to December 2024, when there were 61,515 applications, down by 13.1 per cent compared to November 2025, when 54,855 people applied. This is also the lowest figure since the summer of 2021, confirming a trend of gradual decline following the peak in applications reached in October 2023 (115,000 people). This was announced today (17 March) by Eurostat, the European statistical office, in its monthly report on asylum applications in the EU. The quarterly figure – relating to new asylum applications submitted between October and December 2025 – also shows a decline, of 25.9 per cent compared to the same period in 2024 (164,905 applications compared to 222,420).
The number of “subsequent applicants,” that is, those submitted by individuals who had previously had an application rejected, rose by 29 per cent between December 2024 (7,180 applications) and the same month in 2025 (9,255 applications). However, the figure is down compared to November 2025, when there were 11,435 applications, and – following a gradual increase between June and September 2025 – the overall trend has been negative since October.
The decline in new applications is enabling EU Member States to process pending cases more quickly. In the fourth quarter of 2025, the 27 Member States issued a total of 229,735 decisions, up 15 per cent compared with the same period in 2024 (200,005 cases processed) and up 10 per cent compared with the third quarter of 2025 (209,770). Of particular significance is the data regarding the outcome of these decisions. Between October and December last year, 103,550 asylum applications were accepted, compared to 99,400 in the fourth quarter of 2024 (+4 per cent) and 89,865 in the third quarter of 2025 (+15 per cent). Overall, therefore, 45 per cent of decisions had a positive outcome, marking the highest percentage in the last eight years. Of the hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers whose applications were accepted, 56 per cent were granted refugee status, 23 per cent humanitarian protection, and 21 per cent subsidiary protection. The main increases were seen among refugees (+30.4 per cent compared to the last quarter of 2024) and recipients of subsidiary protection (+21 per cent), while the number of beneficiaries of humanitarian protection fell by 11.1 per cent (it should be noted that, as this is the only status defined at the national rather than the European level, some countries do not recognise it).
Turning to the country-by-country analysis, in December 2025 the majority of asylum applications came from Venezuelan nationals (6,675 applications, accounting for 14 per cent of the total and up 5 per cent year-on-year), Afghan (4,900 applications, accounting for 10.3 per cent but down 11.7 per cent compared to December 2024) and Bangladeshis (3,190 applications, accounting for 6.7 per cent of the total, with a significant increase of 18.6 per cent). A smaller proportion of applications came from Syrian, Egyptian, Turkish, Sudanese, Somali, Malian, and Moroccan nationals.
Regarding EU Member States that received the majority of asylum applications, the absolute figures show the four most populous countries leading the way: at the top of the list, with 9,985 applications (21 per cent of the total), is Italy, followed by Spain (9,655 applications, accounting for 20.3 per cent of the total), France (8,230 applications, accounting for 17.3 per cent of the total) and Germany (6,530 applications, accounting for 13.7 per cent of the total). Taken together, these four countries alone account for 72 per cent of the asylum applications received by the EU in the final month of 2025. Germany, Spain, and France are also the three countries with the highest number of accepted asylum applications in the fourth quarter of last year. Berlin accepted 34,940 applications, while Madrid and Paris approved 23,210 and 17,450, respectively. In percentage terms, however, the highest figures were recorded in Estonia (81.1 per cent of applications accepted), Austria (72.9 per cent), and Ireland (66.4 per cent), and the lowest in Portugal (0.4 per cent), Croatia (7.1 per cent), and Bulgaria (9.3 per cent). In Italy, the figure stands at around 30.5 per cent. Finally, the top three countries of origin for citizens admitted by an EU country in the last three months of 2025 are Afghanistan (36.6 per cent of all accepted applications), Venezuela (16.5 per cent), and Syria (4.7 per cent).
The latest figures released by Eurostat relate to a specific, and particularly vulnerable, category of asylum seekers: unaccompanied minors. In December, 1,130 under-18-year-olds arrived alone on European soil seeking protection, mainly from Somalia (18.8 per cent), Afghanistan (13.9 per cent), Egypt (10.2 per cent), and Eritrea (8.4 per cent). Most applications were received by the Netherlands (23.7 per cent), Greece (19 per cent), Germany (17.7 per cent), and Spain (14.2 per cent). In Italy, 65 asylum applications were filed by unaccompanied minors.
English version by the Translation Service of Withub
