The Migration Policy Institute (MPI) has released a data resource tracking the U.S. immigrant population by metropolitan statistical area (MSA) covering the years 2020 through 2024. The dataset organizes foreign-born population figures for U.S. metro areas over the five-year window and is now available on the MPI website.

The release gives researchers, policymakers, and immigration practitioners a single reference point for how the foreign-born population is distributed across U.S. metropolitan regions. MPI structures the resource around the metropolitan statistical area, the standard geographic unit the federal government uses to group counties into urban labor markets.

What does the new dataset cover?

The resource spans four years of change, from 2020 to 2024, and reports immigrant population figures for individual MSAs rather than for states or the nation as a whole. Key features:

• Foreign-born population counts by metropolitan statistical area
• Coverage across the 2020-2024 period, capturing shifts during and after the pandemic years
• Data organized by MPI, a Washington-based nonpartisan research institute focused on migration policy

MPI publishes the full dataset, including its methodology notes and interactive tools, on its official website. Readers who need the underlying figures for a specific metro area should consult the MPI resource directly.

Who uses MSA-level immigration data?

Metro-area figures serve a distinct audience that national statistics do not. State-level numbers mask the concentration of immigrant populations within urban regions, while MSA data shows where foreign-born residents actually live and work.

Typical users include:

• State and local agencies planning language services, schools, and workforce programs
• Researchers studying settlement patterns and secondary migration
• Employers and economic analysts assessing labor market composition
• Immigration service providers allocating legal and integration resources by region

How does this fit MPI's data portfolio?

The Migration Policy Institute maintains one of the most widely cited data collections on U.S. immigration. Its U.S. Immigration Data Portal aggregates figures on immigrant populations, origins, education, employment, and language by geography. The new MSA-level resource for 2020-2024 extends that portfolio to the metropolitan level for the most recent period.

Where can readers find the figures?

MPI publishes the complete dataset on its website at migrationpolicy.org. The resource includes the underlying tables and any methodology documentation that accompanies the estimates. Passport File does not reproduce the full tables here; readers requiring exact counts for a specific metropolitan area should retrieve them from the official MPI publication.

For analysis of what the 2020-2024 numbers show about shifting immigrant settlement across U.S. metro areas, follow the data release on the MPI site.