The population of the Netherlands grew by 77,500 in the first nine months of this year, down some 7,000 on the same period in 2024, national statistics office CBS said on Wednesday.

The increase, which is entirely due to people moving to the Netherlands, took the population to 18.12 million by the end of September, the CBS said. Some 243,000 people moved to the Netherlands in the first nine months and 161,000 left.

In addition, 125,000 babies were born and 129,000 people died, in line with developments last year. That means that without immigration, the population would be shrinking.

Syrian and Iraqi nationals accounted for most of the new arrivals, but the number of Syrians applying for asylum in the Netherlands has fallen substantially. The country received 16,600 first-time asylum applications in the first nine months of 2025, down 33% on the previous year.

The number of people coming to the Netherlands from India continues to decline, while the number of European immigrants fell from 29,000 to 21,000, the CBS said. The drop was particularly notable among EU nationals, especially Polish, Bulgarian and Romanian citizens.