Luxembourg has retained its number of Belgian cross-border workers virtually unchanged. According to figures from the National Institute for Health and Disability Insurance (Inami) as at 30 June 2025, analysed by SD Worx, 48,601 Belgian residents were working in the Grand Duchy. There were 48,703 of them a year ago. A difference of just 102 people, or around 0.2%.
This stabilisation follows several years of growth. Between 2019 and mid-2024, the number of Belgians working in Luxembourg had risen by 9%, with nearly 4,000 additional workers. Year-on-year, this growth has therefore come to a halt, though there is no sign of a significant decline.
The Grand Duchy’s share of Belgian cross-border employment remains virtually unchanged. More than 85,500 Belgians work in one of the four neighbouring countries, compared with 86,056 a year earlier – a decrease of 0.6%. With 48,601 workers, Luxembourg still accounts for nearly 57% of these cross-border workers, a proportion comparable to that recorded a year earlier.
Inflows to Belgium on the rise
The gap with other destinations remains considerable. The Netherlands comes in second place with 21,593 Belgian workers and is still seeing its workforce decline. Luxembourg thus hosts more than twice as many Belgian cross-border workers as its Dutch neighbour. Over a five-year period, the contrast is even more striking: whilst the number of workers in Luxembourg rose by 9% between 2019 and 2024, the number travelling to the Netherlands fell by 31%.
The Belgian province of Luxembourg remains at the heart of these trends. It has 38,026 residents working abroad, ahead of Liège with 15,480 and Limburg with 12,535. It also bucks the national trend, with an increase of 103 cross-border workers in one year, whilst Limburg (-294) and Liège (-239) have recorded the sharpest declines.
Conversely, the flow of workers into Belgium is rising slightly again. The country is hosting 51,867 workers from neighbouring countries, compared with around 51,500 a year ago. The increase is around 0.7%, but it is largely driven by French workers, whose numbers continue to rise.
A clear imbalance
Nearly 40,000 French nationals now work in Belgium. They account for 77% of cross-border workers from neighbouring countries, compared with around three quarters a year earlier. Conversely, the number of Dutch and Luxembourgish workers continues to fall, to 10,536 and just 448 respectively.
These movements maintain a clear imbalance: Belgium still sends far more workers to its neighbours than it receives. And in this cross-border dynamic, Luxembourg remains its main magnet. Following a 9% rise over five years, the number of Belgian workers there has now levelled off at around 48,600. This is still a marginal decline, but it marks a break from the trend of recent years.
