Illegal arrivals to the European Union fell by 55% over the last two years (2024-2026).

Omissions

• Frontex counts 'detections of irregular border crossings', not unique persons or 'arrivals' per se; a single person crossing more than once can be counted more than once.
• The 55% two-year figure is a rounded compound of the annual changes reported by Frontex (-38% in 2024 and -26% in 2025), which compound to about -54% (2023 base ≈380,000 → 2025 ≈177,000), not an independently published '55%' statistic in the Frontex releases found.
• Frontex notes the 2025 level was the lowest since 2021, and the 37% 'this year' figure is the first-half-2026 figure; within the same year Frontex reported larger declines for shorter windows (-52% in the first two months, -40% in the first four months), so the 37% is a conservative rather than cherry-picked figure.
• The exact same phrasing ('-55% in the last two years, another -37% so far this year') appears in an official European Commission statement (Commissioner Brunner, Ceuta), i.e. the figure is part of the Commission's own messaging rather than an independently derived number.

Sources

• PrimaryFrontex — Irregular border crossings into the EU down 37% in the first half of 2026The number of irregular border crossings into the European Union continued to fall in the first six months of 2026, with detections down by 37%.
• PrimaryFrontex — Irregular border crossings down 26% in 2025Frontex: Irregular border crossings down 26% in 2025 ... Initial consolidated figures from Frontex. Published 2026-01-15.
• PrimaryFrontex — Irregular border crossings into EU drop sharply in 2024New preliminary data from Frontex reveal a significant 38% drop in irregular border crossings into the EU in 2024, reaching the lowest level since 2021 (about 239,000 detections).
• SecondaryEuropean Commission — Remarks by Commissioner Brunner on the situation in CeutaIllegal migration went down by -55% in the last two years, another -37% so far this year. This led to just over 49,000 people crossed...