Schengen Visa Statistics 2021

Schengen Area

New data published by the European Commission show that the consulates of the EU countries and Schengen Associated Countries received around 3 million applications for short-stay visas in 2021. The impact of Covid also felt with schengen visas. The global travel restrictions in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2021 continued to drastically depress the demand for Schengen visas worldwide. As a result, the level of visa operations stayed low 2.4 million visa issued (2.5 million visas issued in 2020).

Worldwide, 13.4% of all visa applications were refused, the same percentage as in 2020. 1.7 million or 71 % of the 2.4 million visas issued in 2021 allow for multiple entries into the Schengen area, a share that despite the overall decline in the numbers of applications remained stable compared to the share in previous years.

In addition to the 2.4 million visas issued abroad, in 2021 the Schengen States also issued 69 401 uniform visas directly at the external borders.

Total Schengen Visas

Schengen State Uniform visas applied for Total uniform visas issued (including MEV) Multiple entry uniform visas (MEVs) issued Total LTVs issued Uniform visas not issued
France 6,52,331 4,80,057 2,56,048 1,561 1,28,672
Spain 4,83,469 3,77,440 2,22,707 3,490 69,863
Greece 2,95,634 2,69,287 2,39,711 5,549 18,545
Germany 3,46,284 2,67,757 2,53,021 18,774 53,987
Czech Republic 2,07,470 2,00,053 1,21,919 403 6,916
Italy 2,12,806 1,90,451 1,66,212 1,425 20,930
Netherlands 1,37,866 1,17,162 86,259 784 18,409
Switzerland 1,14,025 84,417 69,087 14,838 14,770
Hungary 70,269 66,294 30,669 103 3,320
Finland 61,015 54,337 45,540 1,545 2,745
Portugal 47,415 40,243 29,308 466 5,610
Austria 44,616 39,393 36,551 785 4,438
Poland 41,891 39,362 31,994 553 2,350
Estonia 40,657 38,372 36,219 17 2,210
Belgium 50,796 34,710 23,913 192 8,971
Lithuania 24,764 23,973 20,612 25 683
Denmark 26,469 19,265 10,562 246 5,212
Latvia 16,764 15,972 14,338 210 582
Sweden 22,260 14,174 7,146 887 6,654
Norway 9,895 6,858 3,944 1,028 2,795
Slovenia 6,109 4,772 4,632 844 459
Slovakia 3,886 3,718 2,540 88 107
Malta 4,295 3,557 2,233 20 691
Iceland 2,735 2,369 431 41 259
Luxembourg 2,383 2,286 2,013 10 29
Total Result 29,26,104 23,96,279 17,17,609 53,884 3,79,207

Source: European Commission Data

Refusal Rate

Sweden is the No.1 country for refusing the most number of visa applications for 2021, refusing one third of applications, followed by Norway and France. Luxembourg refused only 1.2% of schengen visa applications (easiest to obtain).

Schengen state Refusal %
Sweden 30.60%
Norway 26.20%
France 21.10%
Denmark 21.10%
Belgium 20.40%
Malta 16.20%
Germany 15.90%
Spain 15.50%
Netherlands 13.50%
Switzerland 13.00%
Portugal 12.10%
Austria 9.90%
Italy 9.80%
Iceland 9.70%
Slovenia 7.60%
Greece 6.30%
Poland 5.60%
Estonia 5.40%
Hungary 4.80%
Finland 4.70%
Latvia 3.50%
Czech Republic 3.30%
Lithuania 2.80%
Slovakia 2.70%
Luxembourg 1.20%

 

Top Consulates

These are the top consulates issuing most schengen visas worldwide. The Greek consulate in Moscow issued almost 1.5 million visas followed by Czech Republic in Kiev

Schengen state Consulate Total Visas issued (Uniform + MEV)
Greece MOSCOW 1,49,886
Czech Republic KYIV 98,955
Czech Republic LVIV 84,984
Spain MOSCOW 62,229
Italy MOSCOW 55,872
France ALGIERS 25,270
Germany ISTANBUL 39,485
France TUNIS 27,988
France RIYADH 35,256

Download

Visa Data 2021 – XLS sheet

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