According to Experts.news, the decrease in the number of recorded attempts to illegally cross the state border has not yet been accompanied by a corresponding reduction in migration outflow from Ukraine through official border crossing points.

In the first half of 2026, border guards issued 7,523 citations for illegal border crossings or attempted illegal crossings—approximately one-third fewer than a year earlier.

At the same time, official border statistics show that over the course of six months, Ukrainians left the country 7.13 million times and returned 6.89 million times.

Thus, the negative difference between departures and returns amounted to 244,300 people. A year earlier, during the same period, this figure was comparable—about 251,000

At first glance, these figures demonstrate a significant gap between illegal attempts to leave the country and the overall migration outflow. However, these are fundamentally different statistical categories.

244,300 is not the number of identified emigrants, but rather the arithmetic difference between official departures and arrivals of citizens during the first half of the year. Some of these people may return to Ukraine later.

Furthermore, this figure includes all citizens who have legal grounds to cross the border, including women, children, men in certain categories, and other individuals.

The figure of 7,523, in turn, does not represent the number of Ukrainians who managed to leave the country illegally, but rather the number of administrative reports filed by border guards for detected illegal border crossings or attempts to do so.

However, the aggregate data show that the main demographic risk for Ukraine today is associated not only with illegal border crossings but also with the number of citizens who legally leave the country and subsequently do not return.

For the full year of 2025, the difference between the number of departures and returns of citizens was 290,300 people. This was 1.5 times less than in 2024, when the negative balance reached nearly 443,000 people. Over the four years of full-scale war, according to OpenDataBot’s estimates, the cumulative difference between official departures and returns amounted to approximately 3.1 million citizens.

At the same time, in the first half of 2026 alone, the negative balance had already reached 244,300 people, which is about 84% of the figure for the entire year of 2025.

June accounted for the bulk of this year’s difference: during that month, the number of people leaving Ukraine exceeded the number of those returning by 210,900. “OpenDataBot” attributes this, in particular, to a seasonal increase in travel during the vacation period; therefore, final conclusions regarding annual migration can only be drawn based on the results for 2026.

Thus, the decrease in the number of illegal border-crossing attempts represents a noticeable change compared to the peak year of 2024; however, this alone does not signify an end to the demographic outflow.

border demography migration population UKRAINE

Last modified: August 28, 2026