Romania's population register, place by place · 2011–2026

Paper residents: 151,347 people from abroad registered in 33 towns and villages in eastern Romania, while their schools keep losing children

From 2011 to 2025, 543,831 Romanian citizens officially moved their registered address from abroad to Romania, most of them from the Republic of Moldova, the neighbouring country across the Prut river. More than a quarter registered in 33 towns and villages in eastern Romania, most of them near that border, home to 1% of Romania's population. There the register grew by 61% between 2011 and 2024, while the schools lost nearly a quarter of their children, more than twice the national rate.

Find your town ↓

Vaslui: the people in the register, one mark per 100

1 January 2026

131,722 in the register · 63,035 at the census · 6,535 pupils

pupils, kindergarten to age 14

residents at the censususual gaprest of the registerpupils, kindergarten to age 14

Vaslui: 131,722 people in the register, 63,035 counted by the census

On 1 January 2010, 74,184 people had their registered address in Vaslui, a county seat in eastern Romania. By January 2023 there were 148,926, twice as many, although the 2021 census found 63,035 people living in the city. Between 2011 and 2025, 70,871 people moved their registered address to Vaslui from abroad: more than live in the whole city.

Why register an address in a city one does not live in? According to the explanatory memorandum of a bill tabled by members of parliament in 2023 (PL-x 358/2023), a Romanian citizen at the time domiciled abroad could not hold a permanent identity card, only a provisional one or a passport; the ordinary card required an address in Romania. What this means for each person registered here, the data do not say. Between 2013 and 2025 the number of children in the city's kindergartens and schools, up to the last year of lower secondary (age 14), fell from 7,567 to 6,535. In May 2025 Vaslui's permanent electoral lists held 128,888 voters.

Each mark is 100 people. Filled: residents counted by the 2021 census. Grey ring: the usual gap between register and census in a Romanian city, 26%, mostly people who left and kept their address. Stamp: the rest of the register.

A wave that moved from village to village, 2013 to 2025

The 33 places grew in the register one after another, not all at once. Each row below is a locality; each square shows how many people moved their registered address there in one year, from within Romania or from abroad, per 100 residents counted by the census. Rows are ordered by the year in which the register grew most.

In 2014, Moșna and Grajduri, two communes near Iași (eastern Romania's largest city), each took more than 2,400 people from abroad in a single year; Moșna had 2,421 residents at the 2021 census. Vaslui's register grows every year from 2011 to 2022. Huși, Hârlău and the villages of Botoșani county along the Prut grow mostly between 2017 and 2023. In 2023–2025 it reaches villages that had been shrinking, such as Ferești, Bogdana and Cozmești, where more than half of the newcomers to the register moved there from other places in Romania.

Arrivals in one year, per 100 residents:<22–55–1010–2525–5050+

The year beside each row is the year in which that locality's register grew most.

Your town: register, census and school

Search for a locality or click the map. The colour shows how many people moved their registered address there from abroad between 2011 and 2025, per 100 residents. The dark outline marks the 33 places.

Locality

Choose a locality on the map or in the search.

The 33 places

Locality	County	At the census (2021)	In the register (1 Jan 2026)	Arrivals from abroad 2011–2025	Pupils 2013 → 2025
Vaslui	Vaslui	63,035	131,722	70,871	7,567 → 6,535
Scânteia	Iași	5,505	13,777	9,316	845 → 624
Vârfu Câmpului	Botoșani	7,077	11,892	7,294	425 → 282
Huși	Vaslui	25,045	34,522	6,977	3,244 → 2,627
Hârlău	Iași	10,349	16,230	5,198	1,889 → 1,511
Grajduri	Iași	3,687	6,040	4,831	509 → 349
Moșna	Iași	2,421	5,001	4,654	244 → 228
Popești	Iași	4,287	7,150	3,846	748 → 626
Ripiceni	Botoșani	3,771	4,795	3,344	273 → 178
Prisăcani	Iași	3,638	8,601	3,110	445 → 296
Păltiniș	Botoșani	4,145	6,091	2,986	307 → 153
Costuleni	Iași	4,080	7,550	2,970	608 → 368
Buhuși	Bacău	14,152	21,134	2,879	1,705 → 1,526
Hănești	Botoșani	2,562	4,954	2,362	325 → 189
Drăgușeni	Botoșani	3,360	4,746	2,339	331 → 241
Târgu Bujor	Galați	5,946	9,855	1,880	765 → 560
Coțușca	Botoșani	4,126	6,436	1,851	720 → 356
Comarna	Iași	4,221	5,005	1,533	611 → 369
Vlăsinești	Botoșani	2,636	4,529	1,419	361 → 211
Mihălășeni	Botoșani	2,123	3,440	1,411	307 → 250
Ferești	Vaslui	1,871	4,262	1,080	299 → 175
Oancea	Galați	1,183	2,545	1,069	153 → 87
Zăpodeni	Vaslui	3,743	5,555	982	402 → 194
Cozmești	Iași	2,285	6,068	923	412 → 298
Mironeasa	Iași	4,422	5,005	895	937 → 801
Tansa	Iași	2,054	3,034	889	303 → 199
Manoleasa	Botoșani	2,990	4,202	866	560 → 382
Adășeni	Botoșani	1,328	2,254	751	187 → 108
Bogdana	Vaslui	1,313	3,480	690	206 → 147
Suceveni	Galați	1,491	2,398	688	202 → 105
Vlădești	Galați	1,829	2,234	659	225 → 158
Drăgoiești	Suceava	2,240	2,694	453	267 → 258
Arsura	Vaslui	1,416	1,670	331	198 → 112

Four signs that many of the people in the register do not live there

Schools lost children while the register gained them

In the 33 places, the register held 41,097 children under 15 in 2013 and 56,373 in 2026. Their kindergartens and schools, up to age 14, taught 26,580 children in 2013 and 20,503 in 2025. School numbers fell in every one of the 33 (one of the list's conditions). Across Romania over the same years, children in the register fell by 12% and children in school by 9%; in the 33 places the register gained 37% while the schools lost 23%.

Children under 15 in the registerChildren in kindergartens and schools

Deaths did not follow the register

Per 1,000 people in the register, the 33 places recorded an average of 10.6 deaths a year in 2011–2013 and 6.6 in 2023–2025; Romania as a whole, 11.3 and 11.1. INS books a death to the last registered address or usual residence, and the people added to the register are younger than the locals. So this sign is weaker than the others: a falling rate fits people registered who do not live there, but also a younger population.

the 33 placesall of Romania

Almost no houses were built

Few new homes is one of the list's conditions, so the sign here is what that means. Between 2012 and 2025, in none of the 33 places did completed homes exceed 6.8% of those that stood at the end of 2011. Taken together, completions equalled 3.6% of the old stock, while the register grew by 55% from 2011 to 2026. New homes say nothing about how many old houses stood empty.

The census found most of them missing

The 2021 census counted 204,331 residents in the 33 places; on 1 January 2022 the register held 352,417. The register usually holds more people than the census, because many who leave keep their address: 6% more in a typical commune, 26% more in a typical city. In Vaslui it holds 123% more, in Moșna 143%. Above the usual gap for each type of place, the register of the 33 held about 116,000 more people than the census found; between 2011 and 2021, 117,737 people had arrived there from abroad.

In 12 of them, though, the 2021 census counted more people than the 2011 census, even as the schools lost children: in Vârfu Câmpului, 7,077 against 3,420. That may be real growth. It may also come from a census rule that added people not found at home, at their registered address, when administrative records showed they had been in Romania in the previous 12 months. The published data cannot tell the two apart; if it was the second, the gaps on this page understate the real ones.

What a person who exists only in the register changes

Electoral lists

At the presidential run-off on 18 May 2025, the permanent electoral lists of the 33 places held 322,855 voters, more than all their residents counted by the census, newborns to the very old (204,331). A typical locality has 86 voters on its lists per 100 residents; Vaslui has 204.

Size of the local council

Romanian law sets the size of a local council from the population registered at an address on 1 January of the election year (Administrative Code, art. 112). With the January 2024 register, Vaslui falls in the band of 23 councillors; with its census population it would be in the band of 21. Moșna: 15 instead of 11. Vârfu Câmpului: 17 instead of 15.

Births and marriages

Romania's statistics office books births to the mother's registered address or usual residence and marriages to the town hall where they are concluded. Compared with their 2011–2013 level, the statistics of the 33 places hold in total 9,969 more births and 7,411 more marriages over 2014–2025. Prisăcani registered 177 marriages in 2022; in 2013 it had 11.

Emigration

In 2025, 8,435 of the 54,966 Romanians who officially moved their registered address abroad (15%) were registered in the 33 places, which are home to 1% of the population.

Who the people in the register are

The register does not say where the people registered in a given locality come from. Romania's statistics office publishes the country of origin only nationally: of the 543,831 Romanian citizens who arrived with a registered address from abroad between 2011 and 2025, 303,631 (56%) came from the Republic of Moldova. Arrivals rose from 15,538 in 2011 to 65,678 in 2018 and fell to 19,637 in 2025.

from the Republic of Moldovafrom other countries

In the 33 places the register grew mostly at working age: people aged 35–44 numbered 37,293 in 2013 and 77,265 in 2025. Children up to 9 rose too, from 26,981 to 42,224.

What prosecutors and the authorities found

1 July 2025The Prosecutor's Office attached to the High Court of Cassation and Justice: more than 200 searches in Botoșani county; more than 7,000 people born in Russia, Ukraine, Moldova or other former Soviet states allegedly set up fictitious addresses in 2023 and 2024, using false declarations of accommodation (Europa Liberă, 1 July 2025).
3 July 2025The same office: 93 searches in Suceava county, concerning about 1,700 people (Europa Liberă, 3 July 2025).
January 2026Botoșani's population records service: in 2024–2025 the registered address in 5,839 identity documents ceased to be valid and the documents are being cancelled; for another 2,179 people the procedure began in January 2026. According to the Agerpres news agency, about 10,000 citizens of Ukraine, Moldova or Russia had held a fictitious address in Vârfu Câmpului over the past ten years (Newsweek România, 29 January 2026). The INS register for 1 January 2026 still held 11,892 people in Vârfu Câmpului.

The public sources consulted name no other place on the list; the Botoșani and Suceava investigations covered whole counties. For the other places, the data show only that the register moved in a way people do not.

What these data do not show

The register records addresses, not lives. The signs above fit mass registration of people who do not live there, and the census did not find many of them; aggregate data cannot say exactly how many of the newcomers live in the place, and nothing about any particular person.
What is legal is for prosecutors and courts to decide. This page accuses no person, town hall or official.
The rule for the 33 was chosen after exploring the data: at least 20 arrivals from abroad per 100 residents (2011–2025), pupils in 2025 at most 5% above 2013 (all 33 had fewer), and homes completed in 2012–2025 below 10% of the end-2011 stock. With the same conditions and a threshold of 10 arrivals per 100 residents there are 58 places; with 30, 26; with 50, 19.
Large cities (Iași, Galați, Suceava, Bacău, Bucharest) took tens of thousands of people from abroad, but they stay below the threshold of 20 arrivals per 100 residents (Galați enters only at 10), and students and workers from the Republic of Moldova also live there; the signs above cannot separate the two groups in a large city.
The 2021 census may have counted some paper residents (see above), and the address cancellations announced in Botoșani in January 2026 will appear only in the register for 1 January 2027.

Method

All data come from Romania's National Institute of Statistics (INS: the TEMPO database and the censuses) and from the Permanent Electoral Authority (AEP). The register here is INS's population by domicile on 1 January, computed from the National Register of Persons: Romanian citizens by the address on their identity card, wherever they actually live. The census counts the resident population, the people who usually live in a place.

Arrivals from abroad are INS's permanent immigrants: Romanian citizens who settle a registered address in Romania under the citizenship law (Law 21/1991) or re-establish one; for 2011, INS also counted people of other or no citizenship whose permanent residence in Romania was approved. Pupils are children in kindergartens, primary and lower-secondary schools, by the locality of the school. The accounts close: for Romania as a whole, the register from one year to the next differs from the sum of births, deaths, arrivals and departures by at most 23,650 people a year.

For each locality the page compares the register with the census, with arrivals from abroad, with pupil numbers, with new homes and with deaths. The data for every locality can be downloaded below.

Download the data for every locality (CSV)