English

Choose nationality

Registered foreigners are counted across 192 nationalities.

Afghanistan

People registered with Afghanistan nationality number 920, which is 0.1% of all registered foreigners and ranks 48 in size. Compared with 220 in 2015, 10 years earlier, that is an increase of about 318.2%. They live in 74 districts, and the largest counts are Incheon Yeonsu-gu with 202, Ulsan Dong-gu with 108, and Gyeonggi-do Yangju-si with 73. The index of dissimilarity (D) from Koreans is 0.706, the isolation index is 0, and interaction with Koreans is 0.953. The highest location quotient (LQ) is in Ulsan Dong-gu at 40.2, where this nationality is 0.1% of the foreigners in that district. The continent of origin is South Asia. The largest age group is 30-34 at 14.4%, and men are 62%. This value alone is based on staying foreigners. Estimated mother tongues are Pashto at 42% and Dari at 26.9%.

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook on Immigration and Foreign Policy 2025 (registered foreigners by nationality, registered foreigners by nationality and district, registered foreigners by status of stay), staying foreigners by nationality and age

The index of dissimilarity, the isolation index, and the location quotient are calculated from the open dataset.

Table 1.Key indicators and benchmarks, 2025Unit: people, organizations, index

Year 2025

Indicators	Afghanistan	All registered foreigners	Relative to total
Registered foreigners	920	1,604,920	0.1% of the total
Districts of residence	74	250	29.6% of the total
Index of dissimilarity (D)	0.706	0.280	rank 22 of 107
Isolation index	0.0002	0.045	rank 37 of 107
Interaction with Koreans	0.953	0.955	rank 70 of 107
Continent	South Asia	193,031 (12.0% of the total)	0.5% of those from South Asia

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (registered foreigners by nationality), segregation indicators from the open dataset.

Note: the dissimilarity index D measures how far a nationality's distribution across districts differs from that of Korean nationals; 0 means the two distributions match and 1 means complete separation. Isolation is the probability that a member meets someone of the same nationality, and interaction the probability of meeting a Korean resident. In the All registered foreigners column the three indices treat all registered foreigners as one group and use the same formulas. In the Relative to total column, rank 1 is the highest value among nationalities with 100 or more registered foreigners that year; in the continent row that column gives this nationality's share of all registered foreigners from the continent.

Figure 1.Afghanistan nationals among registered foreigners, 2006–2025Unit: 10,000 persons

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook, each year.

Note: The vertical scale resets to the size of the selected nationality.

View as table

Year	Afghanistan	Vietnam
2006	35	52,157
2007	41	67,197
2008	74	79,848
2009	98	86,166
2010	118	98,225
2011	172	110,564
2012	201	114,211
2013	208	113,843
2014	230	122,571
2015	220	128,042
2016	213	137,769
2017	243	151,385
2018	312	170,707
2019	340	187,334
2020	310	181,415
2021	767	178,928
2022	832	196,883
2023	858	227,930
2024	893	261,581
2025	920	293,907

Table 2.Afghanistan nationality, top 10 districts, 2025Unit: persons, %

Year 2025

Rank	District	Afghanistan Nationality	Share of local foreigners
1	Incheon Yeonsu-gu	202	1.1
2	Ulsan Dong-gu	108	1.0
3	Gyeonggi-do Yangju-si	73	0.7
4	Gyeonggi-do Gimpo-si	58	0.2
5	Incheon Michuhol-gu	33	0.2
6	Seoul Yongsan-gu	32	0.2
7	Gyeonggi-do Yongin-si Cheoin-gu	31	0.3
8	Jeollabuk-do Jeonju-si Deokjin-gu	27	0.4
9	Chungcheongnam-do Nonsan-si	27	0.4
10	Incheon Namdong-gu	24	0.2

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (registered foreigners by district and nationality).

Note: Nationwide, Afghanistan nationals make up 0.1% of all registered foreigners, so an area whose share is above that holds relatively many of them.

Table 3.10 districts with the highest location quotient, 2025Unit: people, ratio, %

Year 2025

Rank	District	Afghanistan Nationality	Location quotient (LQ)	Share of local foreigners
1	Ulsan Dong-gu	108	40.2	0.1
2	Incheon Yeonsu-gu	202	27.4	0.0
3	Chungcheongnam-do Nonsan-si	27	14.1	0.0
4	Gyeonggi-do Yangju-si	73	13.7	0.0
5	Jeollanam-do Yeongam-gun	8	8.9	0.0
6	Seoul Yongsan-gu	32	8.8	0.0
7	Gyeonggi-do Gimpo-si	58	6.7	0.0
8	Gyeonggi-do Yongin-si Cheoin-gu	31	6.1	0.0
9	Gyeonggi-do Suwon-si Paldal-gu	18	5.2	0.0
10	Jeollabuk-do Jeonju-si Deokjin-gu	27	4.9	0.0

Source: Location quotient from the open dataset.

Note: the location quotient is the local share divided by the national share; above 1.5 counts as over-representation.

Table 4.By status of stay Afghanistan nationality, 2025Unit: persons, %

Year 2025

Visa category	Persons	Share
Residential(F2)	478	52.0
Other(G1)	193	21.0
Dependent Family(F3)	86	9.3
Corporate Investment(D8)	42	4.6
Student(D2)	41	4.5
Other statuses(ETC)	29	3.2
Visiting Cohabitation(F1)	18	2.0
Permanent Residence(F5)	9	1.0
Other statuses	24	2.6

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (registered foreigners by status of stay and nationality).

Note: The rows of this table add to 920, the whole of the Afghanistan nationality.

Table 5.Age and sex, 2025Unit: persons, %

Year 2025

Age group	Total	Male	Female	Share
0-4	97	44	53	10.0
5-9	122	66	56	12.5
10-14	88	42	46	9.0
15-19	66	35	31	6.8
20-24	66	32	34	6.8
25-29	105	69	36	10.8
30-34	140	93	47	14.4
35-39	108	81	27	11.1
40-44	61	44	17	6.3
45-49	46	36	10	4.7
50-54	39	31	8	4.0
55-59	25	22	3	2.6
60+	11	9	2	1.1

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (staying foreigners by nationality and age).

Only this table counts all foreign residents, so it totals 974 rather than the 920 registered foreigners

Figure 2.Composition by age and sex, 2025Unit: %

Year 2025

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (staying foreigners by nationality and age).

Note: The bar length is the share each cell holds within the whole nationality. This figure alone uses staying foreigners, so its total differs from registered foreigners.

Figure 3.Change in status-of-stay composition, 2008–2025Unit: %

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook, each year (registered foreigners by status of stay and nationality).

Note: The share each status holds within this nationality in that year. The five largest statuses in 2025 are drawn.

View as table

Year
2008	0.0	5.4	1.4	48.6	37.8
2009	0.0	11.2	7.1	39.8	33.7
2010	4.2	20.3	9.3	37.3	23.7
2011	2.3	44.8	7.0	25.6	15.1
2012	2.5	38.3	15.9	21.4	15.9
2013	0.0	42.3	14.4	12.5	13.5
2014	1.8	42.5	17.1	12.3	15.8
2015	7.3	34.4	14.7	14.7	17.0
2016	7.2	27.8	14.8	16.7	21.1
2017	6.6	23.0	19.8	14.0	21.0
2018	5.1	21.8	21.8	12.2	18.6
2019	5.6	20.9	22.6	12.4	17.4
2020	5.2	21.6	20.0	13.2	13.2
2021	5.5	11.0	8.3	6.3	6.9
2022	50.8	14.5	10.7	6.1	7.3
2023	51.9	17.5	10.7	5.7	4.9
2024	51.4	19.6	10.9	5.2	4.1
2025	52.0	21.0	9.3	4.6	4.5

Figure 4.Residential segregation and exposure over time, 2014–2025Unit: index

Indicators

Source: Segregation indicators from the open dataset.

Note: the dissimilarity index D measures how far a nationality's distribution across districts differs from that of Korean nationals, isolation is the probability that a member meets someone of the same nationality, and interaction the probability of meeting a Korean resident. The three run on different ranges, so they are selected one at a time.

View as table

Year	Index of dissimilarity (D)	Isolation index	Interaction with Koreans
2014	0.773	0.000	0.965
2015	0.738	0.000	0.968
2016	0.732	0.000	0.969
2017	0.731	0.000	0.969
2018	0.713	0.000	0.966
2019	0.713	0.000	0.966
2020	0.743	0.000	0.969
2021	0.791	0.001	0.976
2022	0.681	0.000	0.967
2023	0.686	0.000	0.961
2024	0.697	0.000	0.956
2025	0.706	0.000	0.953

Table 6.Afghanistan nationality, mother-tongue compositionUnit: %

First language		Share
Pashto		42.0
Dari		26.9
Hazaragi		9.7
Uzbek		9.7
Turkmen		5.3
Aimaq		1.5
Balochi		1.3
Pashai		1.3

Source: Ethnologue 24th edition, first-language shares by country.

Note: the estimated demand on the language page is this share multiplied by the registered foreign population of each nationality. Shares below 0.5% are not listed, and a person who speaks more than one language is not distinguished.

Figure 5.By province, Afghanistan nationality, 2025Unit: persons

Year 2025

Count range

Note: The boundaries are shapes simplified for display and are drawn as pen lines. The fill values are the provincial totals from the yearbook and do not depend on the shapes.

Source: MOJ Statistical Yearbook (registered foreigners by nationality and district), summed to the province level.

View as table

Province	Afghanistan Nationality	Share of national
Incheon	300	32.6
Gyeonggi-do	270	29.3
Ulsan	108	11.7
Seoul	69	7.5
Jeollabuk-do	43	4.7
Chungcheongnam-do	33	3.6
Daejeon	29	3.2
Chungcheongbuk-do	22	2.4
Gyeongsangnam-do	10	1.1
Gyeongsangbuk-do	10	1.1
Daegu	9	1.0
Jeollanam-do	8	0.9
Gwangju	5	0.5
Gangwon-do	2	0.2
Busan	1	0.1
Sejong	1	0.1