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One in eight prisoners in England and Wales is a foreign national: a percentage that has remained largely unchanged in recent years, despite increases in overall prison numbers.
PA news has analyzed the latest figures and trends for foreign offenders in prison, based on data published by the Ministry of Justice.
How many foreign nationals are in prison?
Some 10,772 foreign nationals were in prison in England and Wales as of June 30, 2025, the latest figure available.
This is 3% more than the figure from a year ago and 16% more than that of 2020.
But, as the number of foreign nationals has increased in recent years, the overall number of prisoners has also increased.
As of June 30, there were 87,334 people in prison, marking a 10% increase from 79,514 in June 2020.
While foreign nationals made up 12.3% of all prisoners in June 2025, the percentage has only increased slightly from 11.7% in 2020.
This is not the highest percentage ever recorded, which is 12.5% in June 2021.
What are the most common nationalities?
Of the 87,334 people in prison as of June 30 this year, 76,181 (87.2%) were British.
The next largest nationality was Albanian (1,193, or 1.4% of the total), followed by Poles (759, 0.9%), Romanians (716, 0.8%), Irish (707, 0.8%) and Lithuanians (339, 0.4%).
These were followed by Jamaicans (338, 0.4%); Indians (320, 0.4%); Pakistanis (317, 0.4%); Portuguese (297, 0.3%) and Iraqis (287, 0.3%).
Meanwhile, there are also 381 registered stateless prisoners.
Has the mix of nationalities changed over time?
Poles were the most common nationality abroad among foreign prisoners every year from 2015 to 2018, before falling to second place in 2019, behind Albanians.
The two main foreign nationalities, Albanian and Polish, have remained the same since 2019.
Albanians have risen from the sixth most common foreign nationality in 2015 to fifth in 2016, third in 2017, second in 2018 and first in 2019.
Ireland has moved in the opposite direction, falling from second place in 2015 to third in 2018 and fourth in 2019, where it remains today.
The Jamaican has fallen from third to sixth place over the decade, while the Romanian has climbed slightly from fourth to third place.
Eight of the top 10 foreign nationalities in June 2015 were still in the top 10 in June 2025: Albanians, Indians, Irish, Jamaicans, Lithuanians, Pakistanis, Poles and Romanians.
The two exceptions are Nigerians and Somalis, who have been replaced in the top 10 by Iraqis and Portuguese.
Does the percentage of foreign nationals in prison vary by criminal offense?
While 12.3% of all prisoners in England and Wales in June 2025 were foreign nationals, the proportion is lowest among those serving sentences for violence against the person (10.5%) or for sexual offences (10.6%), and highest for weapons possession (11.5%) or for drugs offences (19.7%).
Which prisons have the highest percentage of foreign nationals?
Excluding those prisons specifically for foreign offenders, Huntercombe in Oxfordshire, Morton Hall in Lincolnshire and Maidstone in Kent, Wandsworth prison in south London had the highest proportion of prisoners with non-British nationality in June 2025 (44.8%).
This is followed by Belmarsh in south-east London (30.0%) and Pentonville in north London (27.4%).
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