Overview

• The 2024 Mikrozensus counted about 5.7 million residents with a migration background in North Rhine-Westphalia, of whom four in five report using German in their households.
• About 27 percent of migrants converse exclusively in German at home and roughly 55 percent mix German with at least one other language.
• Nearly 18 percent of people with a migration background do not use German at home, primarily communicating in Turkish, Russian, Arabic or Ukrainian.
• First-generation immigrants use German exclusively in 18.8 percent of households and do not use it in about 25 percent, compared with 42.8 percent and 5 percent respectively among their children.
• The findings have intensified calls to expand heritage-language education to leverage multilingualism for improved literacy and integration outcomes.