This is a demography of the population of

Kuwait Kuwait, officially the State of Kuwait, is a country in West Asia and the geopolitical region known as the Middle East. It is situated in the northern edge of the Arabian Peninsula at the head of the Persian Gulf, bordering Iraq to Iraq–Kuwait ...

().

Expatriate An expatriate (often shortened to expat) is a person who resides outside their native country. The term often refers to a professional, skilled worker, or student from an affluent country. However, it may also refer to retirees, artists and ...

s account for around 60% of Kuwait's total population, with Kuwaitis constituting 38%-42% of the total population. The government and some Kuwaiti citizens consider the proportion of expatriates (which has been relatively stable since the mid-1970s) to be a problem, and in 2016 the number of

deportations Deportation is the expulsion of a person or group of people by a state from its sovereign territory. The actual definition changes depending on the place and context, and it also changes over time. A person who has been deported or is under sen ...

increased. Most were deported for outstaying their residency permits but others also for traffic offences.

Population size and structure

Source:https://gulfmigration.grc.net/kuwait-population-by-nationality-kuwaiti-non-kuwaiti-and-sex-1990-2023/ The biggest population difficulty in Kuwait involves the

Bedoon The Bedoon or Bidoon (), fully Bidoon jinsiya, are stateless people in several Middle Eastern countries, but particularly in Kuwait, where there is a large population of stateless people who lack access to many of the country's basic services. It ...

, stateless people. According to Human Rights Watch in 1995, Kuwait has produced 300,000 stateless Bedoon. Kuwait has the largest number of stateless people in the entire region. The statelessness challenge for the Bedoon in Kuwait is largely

sectarian Sectarianism is a debated concept. Some scholars and journalists define it as pre-existing fixed communal categories in society, and use it to explain political, cultural, or religious conflicts between groups. Others conceive of sectarianism a ...

. According to recent statistics provided by the Central Statistics Bureau, as of January 2024, Kuwait's population reached 4.91 million, an increase of 119,700 from the previous year's 4.79 million. The number of Kuwaiti citizens rose by 28,700 to reach a total of 1.545 million. Specifically, the number of male citizens increased to 758,700, and female citizens reached 787,000. Concurrently, the expatriate population also increased by 90,990, totaling 3.36 million. Amongst the expatriates, the male population reached 2.26 million and the female population 1.1 million.

Structure of the population

Structure of the population (Estimates) (1.01.2020): Source:

Governorates

Kuwait consists of six

governorate A governorate or governate is an administrative division headed by a governor. As English-speaking nations tend to call regions administered by governors either states or provinces, the term ''governorate'' is typically used to calque divisions ...

s: Hawalli, Asimah, Farwaniyah,

Jahra Al Jahra () is a city and area located west of the centre of Kuwait City in Kuwait. Al Jahra is the capital of the Al Jahra Governorate of Kuwait as well as the surrounding Al Jahra District which is agriculturally based. Encyclopædia Britanni ...

Ahmadi Ahmadiyya, officially the Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama'at (AMJ), is an Islamic messianic movement originating in British India in the late 19th century. It was founded by Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (1835–1908), who said he had been divinely appointed a ...

and Mubarak Al-Kabeer. Most people in Kuwait live in the governorates of Hawalli, Asimah, and Farwaniyah. Source:

Vital statistics

;UN estimates

Registered births and deaths

Life expectancy

Source: ''UN World Population Prospects''

Ethnic groups

By continent

Source:

By nationality

The following is a firm containing estimations from countries' embassies: Kuwaiti 41.4%, Arab expat 21.4%, Asian (mostly

South Asia South Asia is the southern Subregion#Asia, subregion of Asia that is defined in both geographical and Ethnicity, ethnic-Culture, cultural terms. South Asia, with a population of 2.04 billion, contains a quarter (25%) of the world's populatio ...

n) 35.3%, African 1%, other 0.7% (includes

European European, or Europeans, may refer to: In general * ''European'', an adjective referring to something of, from, or related to Europe ** Ethnic groups in Europe ** Demographics of Europe ** European cuisine, the cuisines of Europe and other West ...

North American North America is a continent in the Northern and Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Caribbean Sea, and to the sou ...

South American South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

, and

Australian Australian(s) may refer to: Australia * Australia, a country * Australians, citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia ** European Australians ** Anglo-Celtic Australians, Australians descended principally from British colonists ** Aboriginal Aus ...

) (2018 est.)

Languages

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

(official) *

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Culture, language and peoples * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England * ''English'', an Amish ter ...

(lingua franca, spoken widely) *Minority languages include, **

Tagalog Tagalog may refer to: Language * Tagalog language, a language spoken in the Philippines ** Old Tagalog, an archaic form of the language ** Batangas Tagalog, a dialect of the language * Tagalog script, the writing system historically used for Tagal ...

Gulf Pidgin Arabic Gulf Pidgin Arabic is a group of Arabic-based pidgins which are primarily used by migrant workers in the Arab states of the Persian Gulf. The variety was first published on in 1990, with the author reporting that the variety existed as early as th ...

(lingua franca) **

Hindi Modern Standard Hindi (, ), commonly referred to as Hindi, is the Standard language, standardised variety of the Hindustani language written in the Devanagari script. It is an official language of India, official language of the Government ...

Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...

Bengali Bengali or Bengalee, or Bengalese may refer to: *something of, from, or related to Bengal, a large region in South Asia * Bengalis, an ethnic and linguistic group of the region * Bengali language, the language they speak ** Bengali alphabet, the w ...

Urdu Urdu (; , , ) is an Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in South Asia. It is the Languages of Pakistan, national language and ''lingua franca'' of Pakistan. In India, it is an Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of Indi ...

French French may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France ** French people, a nation and ethnic group ** French cuisine, cooking traditions and practices Arts and media * The French (band), ...

Malayalam Malayalam (; , ) is a Dravidian languages, Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry (union territory), Puducherry (Mahé district) by the Malayali people. It is one of ...

Pashto Pashto ( , ; , ) is an eastern Iranian language in the Indo-European language family, natively spoken in northwestern Pakistan and southern and eastern Afghanistan. It has official status in Afghanistan and the Pakistani province of Khyb ...

Turkish Turkish may refer to: * Something related to Turkey ** Turkish language *** Turkish alphabet ** Turkish people, a Turkic ethnic group and nation *** Turkish citizen, a citizen of Turkey *** Turkish communities in the former Ottoman Empire * The w ...

Armenian Armenian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Armenia, a country in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia * Armenians, the national people of Armenia, or people of Armenian descent ** Armenian diaspora, Armenian communities around the ...

Kurdish Kurdish may refer to: *Kurds or Kurdish people *Kurdish language ** Northern Kurdish (Kurmanji) **Central Kurdish (Sorani) **Southern Kurdish ** Laki Kurdish *Kurdish alphabets *Kurdistan, the land of the Kurdish people which includes: **Southern ...

Religion

Muslim Muslims () are people who adhere to Islam, a Monotheism, monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God ...

(official) 74.6% *

Christian A Christian () is a person who follows or adheres to Christianity, a Monotheism, monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus in Christianity, Jesus Christ. Christians form the largest religious community in the wo ...

18.2% * Other and Unspecified 7.2%

References

{{Asia topic, Ethnic groups in Society of Kuwait