A municipality in Lanzarote has registered the greatest population growth in the Canary Islands and ranks as one of the five Spanish municipalities that gained the most population in the last year. This can be inferred from the data published by the National Institute of Statistics (INE) that came to light a few days ago regarding the annual population census.
At the beginning of 2025, the Spanish population had grown by half a million inhabitants, reaching more than 49.1 million people. Of these, 14.1% of the population held foreign nationality.
In total, two Canary Islands municipalities are found on the list of the ten municipalities with the most population growth in the entire country: Arrecife and Granadilla de Abona (Tenerife).
Arrecife grows more in population than towns in Ibiza or Valencia
In the case of the capital of Lanzarote, the relative population growth in 2024 was 3.3% compared to the previous year. It only ranked behind other coastal cities such as Torrevieja (Alicante), Gandia (Valencia), Benidorm (Valencia), and Hospitalet de Llobregat (Barcelona). Furthermore, Arrecife grew more in population than other areas like Colmenar Viejo (Madrid), Elda (Valencia), Valdemoro (Madrid), Eivissa (Ibiza), and Granadilla de Abona (Tenerife).In contrast, the municipalities where the population has grown the least have been Cádiz, Fuengirola (Málaga), Talavera de la Reina (Toledo), Sant Cugat del Vallès (Barcelona), Coslada (Madrid), Fuenlabrada (Madrid), San Fernando (Cádiz), Getxo (Vizcaya), Córdoba, and Puerto de Santa María (Cádiz)
Foreign Population by Nationality
As of January 1, 2025, the most frequent nationalities among the foreign population residing in Spain are people born in Morocco, Romania, Colombia, Italy, Venezuela, the United Kingdom, China, Peru, Ukraine, and Honduras. On the same list are those born in Argentina, Germany, Ecuador, France, Bulgaria, Paraguay, Pakistan, Portugal, Russia, and Brazil.