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Home » About Immigrants » Quick Statistics » Massachusetts

Quick Immigration Statistics: Massachusetts

The Immigrant Learning Center has compiled a list of quick immigration statistics and facts to answer your most pressing questions about the current immigration landscape in Massachusetts.

Our Publications & Resources page has many studies and reports focused on Massachusetts immigrants, and our Quick U.S. Immigration Statistics page will give you the basics on immigration in the United States.

If you’re looking for more detailed data or want to examine specific immigrant populations, you can request a free, personalized fact sheet through the Immigration Data on Demand service from our partner, the Institute for Immigration Research at George Mason University.

If you have questions or suggestions about these Massachusetts Quick Immigration Stats, feel free to contact us at public.education@ilctr.org.

There are approximately 1 million immigrants in Massachusetts.

How many immigrants are there in Massachusetts, and who are they?

There are approximately 1 million immigrants in Massachusetts.

About one in every six (17.5%) Massachusetts residents is foreign-born.

A pie chart showing the make-up of the U.S. population. U.S. born makes up 82.5 percent and foreign-born makes up 17.5 percent.

Source: U.S. Census 2022 American Community Survey 5-year Estimates

The five largest immigrant populations in Massachusetts are from:

A pie chart showing the makeup of the Massachusetts population's countries of origin. Other Countries make up 63.9 percent. Other countries include China, the Dominican republic, Brazil, India and Haiti.

Source: U.S. Census 2022 American Community Survey 5-year Estimates

What is the migration status of most foreign-born people in Massachusetts?

The majority (78%) of immigrants in Massachusetts have authorization.

A pie chart that shows 78 percent of the Massachusetts population is documented while 22 percent is undocumented.

Source: Pew Research Center estimates based on augmented 2016 U.S. Census Bureau data

More than half (54.5%) of all immigrants in Massachusetts have become United States citizens.

A pie chart of Massachusetts naturalization rates. 54 percent are citizens and 45.5 percent are non citizens.

Source: U.S. Census 2022 American Community Survey 5-year Estimates

How do immigrants impact the Massachusetts workforce?

Immigrants in Massachusetts have a 79.1 percent rate of workforce participation.*

An illustration of two gears. The one on the left is blue and says 77.7 percent U.S. born and the one on the right is red and says 79.1 percent foreign-born.

Source: U.S. Census 2022 American Community Survey 5-year Estimates

In Massachusetts, 9.8 percent of immigrants are self-employed.

Illustration of two people. One on the left is blue and says 7.5 percent U.S. born. The one on the right is 9.8 percent foreign-born.

Source: U.S. Census 2022 American Community Survey 5-year Estimates

* The workforce participation rate is calculated by dividing the number of people working and those actively seeking work by the number of non-institutionalized, working-age (16-65) civilians.

Nearly one third (31%) of new U.S. businesses are founded by immigrants.

Three illustrations of storefronts. The two on the left are blue and the one on the right is red.

Source: Indicators of Entrepreneurial Activity, UCLA, Jan 2024

Our interactive map, created in collaboration with the Institute for Immigration Research, features more detailed data on Massachusetts immigrants’ locations, countries of origin and more. Click on individual towns and cities to see breakdowns of the foreign-born populations, use the dropdown menu to dig into one of the 11 largest foreign-born populations in the state and use the Data Explorer to learn more about the shares each population makes up by locality.

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