4
 Recognition Rates

Main citizenships

Over the three years preceding 2025, the recognition rate—which reflects the percentage of asylum applicants granted refugee status or subsidiary protection—was broadly stable at around 40% at first instance, ranging between 40% in 2022 and 42% in both 2023 and 2024. It then fell to 29% in 2025. During the first half of 2026, the EU+ recognition rate stood at 31%, remaining close to the 2025 level. Refugee status continued to be granted more frequently than subsidiary protection.

The low overall recognition rate by historical standards, reflects the composition of decisions issued across different citizenships. In the first half of 2026, almost 45,000 decisions were issued to Syrians, for whom the recognition rate stood at 19%, compared with 28% in 2025 and 90% in 2024. Large numbers of decisions were also issued to citizenships with very low recognition rates, including Bangladeshis (3%), Venezuelans (3%), Egyptians (2%) and Peruvians (3%). Taken together, these citizenship-specific patterns contributed to keeping the overall EU+ recognition rate low.

More broadly, the EU+ recognition rate is a composite indicator, shaped by differing citizenship profiles and evolving protection needs. Recognition rates vary widely by nationality and many remain relatively stable over time. For example, the recognition rate for Bangladeshis remained at 3% in the first half of 2026, while that for Pakistanis stood at 13%, compared with 12% in 2025.

Several citizenships, however, have experienced marked changes in recent years, all of which can be seen in the interactive version of Figure 6:

  • Türkiye: after a long decline from 54% in 2019 to 13% in 2025, the recognition rate increased slightly to 18% in the first half of 2026.
  • Afghans: the recognition rate continued its long term increase, from 32% back in 2017 to 73% in the first half of 2026. The large majority of positive decisions granted refugee status. 
  • Haiti: following a dramatic increase from 16% in 2021 to 89% in 2025, the recognition rate remained very high at 84% in the first half of 2026, with the vast majority of positive decisions granting subsidiary protection. 
  • Mali: the recognition rate increased further from 84% in both 2024 and 2025 to 87% in the first half of 2026. 
  • Ukraine: after jumping to 86% after the full-scale Russian invasion in 2022, the recognition rate has since declined from the peak of 92% in 2023, to 58% in the first half of 2026. 
  • Colombia: in contrast, the recognition rate increased markedly from 5% in 2024 and 2025 to 15% in the first half of 2026.

Context

It should be noted that some applicants, especially those from Venezuela and to a lesser extent from Somalia, Afghanistan and Pakistan have often been granted national (rather than international) forms of protection, which are unregulated at the EU level and are therefore considered as negative asylum decisions in these statistics. Also, the recognition rates presented here are based on first instance decisions issued by asylum authorities and thus do not account for cases decided by the judiciary and other authorities at second or higher instance, i.e. in appeal and review.

Across the EU+

The aim of EUAA’s work is to foster a harmonised implementation of the Common European Asylum System across the EU so as to reach a situation where an application for international protection would receive the same decision, no matter where it was lodged. Recognition rates, the percentage of asylum applications that receive decisions granting refugee status or subsidiary protection, are sometimes cited as an indicator of the level of such harmonisation between EU+ countries. 

It is important to recognise, however, that several factors can lead to variation in recognition rates. The assessment of an asylum application cannot be reduced to a single characteristic such as nationality. Differences in applicant profiles, national jurisprudence, national policies and the application of specific legal concepts may all influence outcomes. Applicants from the same country of origin may also have different profiles across receiving countries. As a result, differences in recognition rates should not be interpreted mechanically as evidence of divergent decision making.

Against this background, Figure 7 illustrates first instance recognition rates across the EU+ for selected citizenships during the first half of 2026. Within each column, circles of the same colour represent different issuing countries; circle size reflects the number of decisions issued, while vertical position indicates the corresponding recognition rate.

As in previous reporting periods, some citizenships had relatively high recognition rates across the main decision-issuing countries. For Afghans, whose EU+ recognition rate stood at 73%, Germany issued by far the most decisions, around 36,000, with a recognition rate of 79%. France and Greece each had recognition rates of 69%, while Switzerland stood at 64% and Austria at 82%. Lower recognition rates were recorded in some other countries, including Belgium at 39%, but generally with considerably smaller decision volumes. Haitians also had a very high recognition rate, although almost all decisions were concentrated in France, where around 6,400 decisions were issued with a recognition rate of 84%.

At the other end of the spectrum, several citizenships had consistently low recognition rates across the main decision-issuing countries. For Bangladeshis, Italy issued around 20,000 decisions with a recognition rate of 2%, while rates were below 1% in Greece, 5% in Ireland and 12% in France. Egyptians showed a similar pattern: Italy issued around 10,000 decisions with a recognition rate of 1%, while Greece issued around 4,400 with a rate below 1%. Recognition rates were also generally low across the main decision-issuing countries for Moroccans, Peruvians and Georgians.

For some other citizenships, however, substantial differences persisted between EU+ countries, including in countries issuing sizeable numbers of decisions:

Syrians showed the widest variation. Germany issued around 29,000 decisions with a recognition rate of just 7%, while rates were similarly low in the Netherlands (4%), Belgium (7%) and Cyprus (2%). In contrast, recognition rates stood at 83% in Austria and Switzerland, 74% in France and 90% in Italy. 

Ukrainians also had sharply divergent outcomes. France – with most decisions issued (5,100) – had a recognition rate of 90% and Italy 95%, compared with 5% in Poland and 2% in Germany. 

Somalis had recognition rates ranging from 21% in the Netherlands, 31% in Greece and 42% in Germany to 81% in Switzerland, 91% in Italy and 98% in Spain. 

Sudanese applicants had generally high recognition rates, but with an important difference between the two largest decision-issuing countries: Greece issued around 4,600 decisions with a recognition rate of 75%, compared with 42% among around 2,700 decisions issued in France. 

Malians similarly had recognition rates of around 95% in Spain and 91% in Italy, compared with 40% in France. Importantly, Spain accounted for by far the largest number of decisions, with around 6,900. 

Turkish recognition rates were relatively low in Greece (2%), Italy (12%), Germany (13%) and France (15%), but higher in Switzerland (36%) and Belgium (31%), and substantially higher in some countries issuing fewer decisions, such as Denmark (73%) and Norway (68%).

Taken together, the data show that recognition rates were relatively consistent for some citizenships but highly variable for others. In interpreting these differences, both recognition rates and the volume of decisions issued are important: a very high or low rate based on a small number of decisions does not carry the same weight for the overall EU+ recognition rate as a comparable difference between countries processing thousands of cases.

Read EUAA Country Guidance on Afghanistan and EUAA Country Focus on Afghanistan.

Low recognition rates and safe countries of origin

The Pact on Migration and Asylum introduces procedures that are particularly relevant to applicants from countries with low recognition rates and from countries designated as safe countries of origin. Under the mandatory border procedure, one relevant category concerns applicants from citizenships with an EU-wide recognition rate of 20% or less. This is intended to allow applications considered more likely to be unfounded or inadmissible to be assessed rapidly at the EU’s external borders.

A related concept is the safe country of origin, referring to countries considered to ensure effective protection. With the Pact entering into application on 12 June 2026, a common EU list now applies and includes Bangladesh, Colombia, Egypt, India,  Kosovo, Morocco and Tunisia. EU accession candidate countries are also designated as safe, provided that there is no international or internal armed conflict, no restrictive measures affecting fundamental rights and freedoms, and their EU-wide recognition rate does not exceed 20%. The European Commission monitors whether these exceptions apply or cease to apply. For further information, see the EUAA Overview of the Implementation of Safe Country Concepts.

Ukraine is the exception among the EU accession candidate countries. On 12 June 2026, the European Commission exempted Ukraine from designation as a safe country of origin because of the continuing armed conflict, characterised by widespread and indiscriminate violence.

Figure 8 shows the 20 citizenships lodging the most applications in the first half of 2026, divided into four mutually exclusive groups: accession countries; other countries on the EU list of safe countries of origin; other citizenships with a 2025 EU-wide recognition rate of 20% or less; and all remaining citizenships. Several of the largest applicant groups fell within the first three categories. These included Venezuelans among low-recognition-rate citizenships, Bangladeshis and Egyptians among the other EU safe countries of origin, and Turkish nationals among accession countries.

Across all applications lodged during the first half of 2026, 56% of applications lodged in the first half of 2026 fell within one of these three policy-relevant groups. However, these categories should not be interpreted as meaning that every application from the citizenships concerned will necessarily be processed under the same procedure; individual circumstances remain relevant.