// DATA_REPORTAGE · STATISTICS POLAND “TRACES OF LIFE” · AS OF 31.12.2025
When we think about migration in Poland, we think about Warsaw, Kraków, Wrocław. But the highest shares of foreigners turn up in places that almost never enter the debate: Mława, Mszczonów, Jelcz-Laskowice, Mikstat.
According to experimental data from Statistics Poland (GUS), around 2.3 million foreigners were living in Poland at the end of 2025. On a map of absolute numbers, Warsaw, Wrocław, Kraków, Poznań and Łódź dominate.
The number of foreigners does not tell you where migration has changed local communities the most. So instead of the number, show the share: foreigners as a part of everyone living in a gmina.
Warsaw stops dominating. Mikstat, Stryków, Sława, Jelcz-Laskowice, Mszczonów, Mława, Głowno and Raszyn appear - places that almost never come up in the debate about migration.
In Mikstat, more than half. In Stryków, 39 in 100. In Jelcz-Laskowice 34, in Mszczonów 32, in Mława 28. In Warsaw: 15.
/ NUMBER vs CONCENTRATION
/ 100 PEOPLE
Of every 100 people living in this town, 32 are foreigners.
/ WHY HERE
The largest concentrations do not cluster around market squares and universities. They cluster around factories, warehouses, processing plants and road junctions. Stryków sits where the A1 meets the A2. Mszczonów on the S8. Jelcz-Laskowice in an industrial zone outside Wrocław. Mława has an electronics factory.
/ FIVE PLACES · FIELD_REPORTS
/ AND YOUR TOWN?
/ RANKING · TOTAL_RECORDS: …
* People residing according to GUS, not registered address. Experimental data. “As GUS”: town and rural area of an urban-rural gmina listed separately. “Merged gminas”: combined.
/ WHO LIVES HERE · POLAND
Ukrainians make up 73% of all foreigners. But the fastest growth is from Colombia (+50%), Nepal (new to the top ten) and India (+15%). Turkey dropped out of the list.
GUS publishes citizenship only for the whole country. Breakdown by gmina: [NO_DATA].
// THESIS
/ METHODOLOGY
The data does not show registered addresses. Statistics Poland estimates where a person actually lives from information held in many administrative registers - “traces of life”. That is why we speak of “people residing”, not “inhabitants”.
A foreigner means a person without Polish citizenship. The data does not reveal the reason for someone's stay, or whether they are a labour migrant.
Source: Statistics Poland (GUS), experimental study “Ślady życia” (Traces of Life), as of 31.12.2024 and 31.12.2025 · No address for 22,721 people · Boundaries: PRG / GUGiK · Gmina positions on the map approximated to the county centroid