Immigration to British Columbia, Canada | Annual Arrivals and Census Trends
In 2025, British Columbia was the destination for 50,640 new immigrants.
Source: IRCC
- In 2025, 393,530 new permanent residents were admitted to Canada, 12.9% of them landed in British Columbia.
- From 2020 to 2025, British Columbia was the destination for 343,780 new immigrants.
- The immigration data highlights a growing trend pre-pandemic levels, a sharp decline in 2020, a strong rebound leading up to 2024, and a decline by 2025.
Immigration to British Columbia by Class
In 2025, economic immigrants made up 56.3% of British Columbia’s new permanent residents, while family sponsorships accounted for 30% and refugees comprised 11.3%.
Source: IRCC
- From 2016 to 2025, British Columbia admitted a total of 311,085 economic immigrants, 156,925 family immigrants, and 48,880 refugees.
- Except for the economic stream, refugee and family immigration remained stable between 2016 and 2019. After a pandemic-driven downturn in 2020, an upward trend persisted through 2024, culminating in a contraction across all admissions classes after that.
- Compared to 2024 levels, 2025 immigration admissions fell most in the economic category (26,6%), followed by a contraction in the refugee class (22.2%), and the family class decreased by 12.9%.
Provincial averages smooth over local realities; dig deeper into the metropolitan data by exploring our localized Vancouver Immigration report.
IMMIGRATION TO BC – ANIMATED CHARTS
