Portugal now has 1.6 million foreign residents, more than ever before

There have never been more foreigners living in Portugal. It's Wednesday, 23 September. Thirty-one degrees. Air quality: 56 (Moderate). Here's what you need to know.

🗞️ PORTUGAL NOW HAS NEARLY 1.6 MILLION FOREIGN RESIDENTS

Portugal ended 2025 with 1,585,854 foreign residents, a new record. The figure comes from AIMA's annual Migration and Asylum Report, published this week, and it means foreign nationals now make up 14% of the population, roughly one in seven people in the country, though the true number is likely higher once you count those without documented status.

The rate of growth, though, is slowing. That nearly 1.6 million is about 38,000 more than the year before, a far more modest rise than the surges of recent years. AIMA reads that as a sign the foreign community is stabilising and settling in, an established part of the country's economic and social life rather than a wave still building. The government, which has spent the past year tightening the rules, would frame it as the effect of closing what it calls the "doors wide open" era of the previous Socialist administration.

That tightening is the other half of the story. Even as the resident population hits a record, the routes into it are narrowing. Recent laws have shut down the old regularise-after-arrival pathway, stretched out family reunification, and toughened the residence and citizenship rules, the changes we have tracked through the summer. So the picture is a country with more foreign residents than ever, but a harder road for the next person trying to join them.

And the machine that processes all of this is under visible strain. AIMA issued over 500,000 residence permits in 2025 and completed nearly 606,000 in-person appointments, out of more than 671,000 scheduled, an enormous operational load. This week, the union representing AIMA's own staff went public with a pointed demand: they want the same salary supplement the government has just proposed for PSP and GNR police officers assigned to border control. Their argument is sharp, if the state is paying a premium for the security side of immigration, it should pay the same for the documentation side, the people actually issuing residence cards. The union warns that favouring the police component effectively recreates the old border-police force that was supposed to be dismantled when SEF, the immigration and borders service, was shut down.

For anyone navigating the system, the report paints the world you are dealing with. It is bigger than ever, it is straining, and it is getting stricter. If you already hold a permit, you are part of a now-established 14% of the country. If you are still working through the process, or helping someone who is, the combination of a stretched agency and tighter rules is exactly why it pays to get every piece of paperwork right the first time.

Bottom line: Portugal is now home to nearly 1.6 million foreign residents, a settled and significant part of the country. But the doors are narrowing behind them, and the agency processing it all is asking for the resources to keep up.

⚡ QUICK HITS

Hundreds of trucks will stage a motorway go-slow on Friday over fuel prices, expect disruption on the A1, A41 and A42. Organised by quarrying, earthworks and haulage firms who say diesel now eats up around 70% of their operating costs, the protest is due to set off near the A42 at Lordelo around 8am on Friday 25 September, moves along the A41 and A1, and aims to reach Coimbra Sul by about 1pm. Organisers have 300 trucks confirmed and hope for more than 500, with a possible second convoy from Carregado in the south. It comes as diesel rose again this week, toward roughly €2.24 a litre, and on the same day the environment minister renewed her appeal for people to cut fuel use and lean on public transport. If you are driving north or through the centre on Friday morning, plan around it.

Portugal has record employment, but its productivity has fallen below where it was in 2000. More than five million people are now in work, a 79.6% employment rate, close to full employment and above the EU average. Yet a Business Roundtable Portugal study finds productivity per hour worked has slipped to 66.9% of the EU average, dropping Portugal from 17th to 24th of 27 member states since 2000. The reason is the one readers feel in their wages: most of the jobs being created are low-value, low-wage roles, alongside chronic under-investment and too many very small firms. It is the statistical version of a familiar complaint, plenty of work, not enough of it well paid.

A Lisbon startup just raised €350,000 to turn cafés, hotels and restaurants into workspaces. DeskAmigo lets venues, a restaurant between lunch and dinner, a hotel lobby in the afternoon, sell their spare capacity as places to work, no membership fees, the venue sets the price and the seats. It already lists more than 140 spaces and reported 144% revenue growth over the past three months. For the remote-working and digital-nomad contingent among our readers, it is a neat answer to the eternal question of where to actually get work done that isn't your kitchen table or a fourth flat white in a café that would rather you left. A monthly subscription is on the way.

Fantastic Frank — A New Design-Led Showroom Comes to Ericeira

If you have ever fallen down an internet rabbit hole of beautiful Portuguese homes, there is a decent chance you have landed on a Fantastic Frank listing. The international agency built its name on treating property the way a magazine treats design: architecture first, character over square-metre count, homes photographed to look like somewhere you would actually want to live.

Its Lisbon arm pairs local market knowledge with that international eye for presentation, curating design-led properties across Portugal, and this month it is stretching to the coast.

On Friday 25 September, Fantastic Frank opens a new showroom in Ericeira, the surf town up the coast from Lisbon that happens to be home to Europe's first World Surfing Reserve. It is a fitting spot for an agency that trades on character. Ericeira's whole identity is bound up with the Atlantic and its surf culture, and the new space, shared with Saints Studio, will be Fantastic Frank's base for the coast, home to a growing roster of properties in the town and along the shoreline. The opening also marks the launch of VAGA, a new Ericeira development the agency will represent, with more to come on that shortly.

→ Register your interest in VAGA

To mark the occasion, they are bringing their Fantastic Friday to Ericeira for the first time: an informal evening of drinks and a first look at the new showroom, with the people behind it. Whether you are house-hunting on the coast, curious about the VAGA project, or simply like good design and a glass of something by the sea, you are welcome.

Fantastic Friday: Ericeira
Friday 25 September, 5pm to 8pm, Ericeira.

We only partner with businesses we think genuinely help our community. If this is useful to you, or if you know someone drawn to the coast and to homes with a bit of soul, every click and every share goes a long way to keeping this newsletter free every morning.

🍽️ SPOT OF THE DAY

MIRADOURO DA SENHORA DO MONTE (GRAÇA)

A change of pace today: not a restaurant, but the single best free thing you can do in Lisbon on a hot evening. Miradouro da Senhora do Monte, up in Graça, is the highest viewpoint in the city, and the view is the whole of Lisbon laid out beneath you, the castle, the tumble of terracotta rooftops, the river beyond, and on a clear day the 25 de Abril bridge in the haze.

It is quieter and less touristed than the big-name miradouros lower down, which is part of the appeal, and it comes into its own at golden hour, when the light goes soft on the rooftops and the city starts to glow. There is a small kiosk for a beer or a glass of wine, a scattering of benches under the pines, and not a great deal else, which is kind of right. In a week this hot, a sunset up here with a cold drink beats any air-conditioned room in the city.

It is free, always open, and a stiff walk uphill or a short ride on tram 28, which stops nearby.

→ Find it here ←

Insider tip: go about 45 minutes before sunset to claim a bench or a bit of wall, bring something cold from the kiosk or a bottle of your own, and stay past the sunset itself, the moment the street lights come on across the city is one people remember.

📅 WHAT'S ON

See you tomorrow morning.

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