One woman standing and others are sitting in public transport. They are all looking at their phone.

In 2022, among the 197 million employed people aged 15-64 years in the EU, more than 12.5 million people (6.4% of all employed) commuted to work from one region to another within their country of residence. This marked an increase of 4.4% compared with 2021 (12.0 million people).

The highest share of regional commuting in total employment was recorded in the Belgian province of Brabant Wallon (45%), followed by another Belgian province, Vlaams-Brabant (42%), Pest in Hungary (41%), the province of Namur in Belgium (38%), and the Austrian regions of Burgenland (36%) and Niederösterreich (29%). 

Looking at absolute numbers, several German regions, including Brandenburg (297 000), Arnsberg (248 000) and Lüneburg (223 000), along with Pest in Hungary (272 000) and Niederösterreich (236 000) in Austria, recorded the most employed people commuting to a different region within their respective countries to work.

 

Source datasets: lfst_r_lfe2ecomm and lfst_r_lfe2emp

 

People also commute for work to other countries. In 2022, 2.09 million employed people aged 15-64 years (1.1% of all employed) commuted from their region of residence to a different country, slightly up compared with 2021 (1.94 million).

At regional level, Luxembourg province in Belgium led with the highest share of commuters to a different country, accounting for 32%. Following by Trier in Germany at 18% and Lorraine in France at 14%. Franche-Comté in France and Vorarlberg in Austria, each with 10%, also registered relatively high percentages.

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Methodological notes

  • Commuters are defined for the purpose of this article as those people who travel — at least once a week — from the region where they have their usual residence to a different region in order to be at their place of work.
  • Data on regional commuting are compiled on the basis of the EU Labour Force Survey (EU-LFS).
  • Data are based on the 2021 version of the Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (NUTS). Out of the 242 NUTS level 2 EU regions, data for the number of intra-country commuters are available for 210 regions, while data for the commuters to another country are available for 127 regions. For the complete list of regions with available data and data reliability flags, please consult the respective datasets on the Eurostat database.

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