There were 14,000 migrant arrivals in July 2025 (up 8% on July 2024). There were 9900 migrant departures in July (down 1% on July 2024).<\/p>\n
That took the monthly net migration gain to 4100.<\/p>\n
If annualised, that would equate to a net migration gain of nearly 50,000.<\/p>\n
The trend might show the fall in net migration was past its low point but the trend was still weak, ASB senior economist Mark Smith said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are few catalysts on the horizon to turn around this soft trend and a lengthy period of subdued net migration inflows beckons,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n
The past two years have seen a massive drop-off in net migration numbers as large numbers of New Zealand citizens have departed and fewer migrants have arrived.<\/p>\n
Annual migrant arrivals peaked at 234,800 in the year ended October 2023.<\/p>\n
Annual net migration also peaked in the year ended October 2023, with a gain of 135,500.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, annual migrant departures provisionally peaked at 127,500 in the year ended June 2025.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnnual net inflows remain well below decade averages and more than 120k persons lower than the late 2023 peak,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n
Annual net outflows of New Zealand citizens hit fresh record highs (47,600), driven by strengthening migration departures to a record high 73,480.<\/p>\n
Work visa arrivals were steady at around 32,300 annually, well below 2023 peaks of close to 90,000.<\/p>\n
This largely reflected the subdued demand for labour and significantly less acute labour shortages, Smith said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is a large age gap between people leaving (median age 31) and people arriving (median age 21), suggesting a net loss of skills and experience abroad.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnnual net immigration of those aged 15-64, ticked up to 6288 persons, but is miles below decade averages (38,000) and the 110,000 late 2023 peak.\u201d<\/p>\n
On a more encouraging note, there was a lift in student arrivals, Smith said.<\/p>\n
Stats NZ noted that just under two in five migrant arrivals in July 2025 were on a student visa, coinciding with the start of the second academic semester.<\/p>\n
Student arrival numbers have ticked up to 31,000 annually but remain below 2023 peaks.<\/p>\n
Liam Dann is business editor-at-large for the New Zealand Herald. He is a senior writer and columnist, and also presents and produces videos and podcasts. He joined the Herald in 2003.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There were 14,000 migrant arrivals in July 2025 (up 8% on July 2024). There were 9900 migrant departures…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":12964,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[15294,4765,5195,4057,1596,3013,15293,15291,3592,15292,3014,917,5832,5511,5978,8751,111,43,139,69,384,6100,3040,102,8598,379,2963],"class_list":["post-12963","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-15294","tag-annual","tag-be","tag-behind","tag-brain","tag-but","tag-continued","tag-drain","tag-fall","tag-flowing","tag-gain","tag-immigration","tag-july","tag-just","tag-might","tag-migration","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-people","tag-still","tag-us","tag-with","tag-worst","tag-year","tag-zealands"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12963","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12963"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12963\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12964"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12963"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12963"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12963"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}