Where Schengen visas get refused most

Name: Schengen visa refusal statistics, 2025
Creator: VISAXS
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Guides tell you whether a visa is required. This page answers the second question: will you get it. We unpacked the European Commission's official 2025 statistics across 118 filing countries and every “country → Schengen state” pair. The Schengen-wide average is 14.5%.

VISAXS 2025 data

Refused most often in Bangladesh

1,768,605 refusals out of 12,201,026 applications

see the ranking →

14.5%avg refusal

54.1%highest refusal — Bangladesh

1.3%lowest refusal — Denmark

12,201,026applications in the year

118countries ranked

Strictness ranking: where refusals are highest

Sorted by refusal share. Only countries with at least 1,000 applications in the year are ranked — below that the percentage swings wildly. Click a row to open that country’s busiest route.

# Filing country Applications Refusals Rate

1 Bangladesh 38,642 20,918 54.1% 2 Comoros 2,538 1,355 53.4% 3 Burundi 5,288 2,765 52.3% 4 Guinea-Bissau 6,308 3,274 51.9% 5 Guinea 22,335 11,531 51.6% 6 Senegal 71,923 36,980 51.4% 7 Congo 25,693 12,266 47.7% 8 Nigeria 113,359 53,196 46.9% 9 Ghana 63,725 29,354 46.1% 10 Angola 72,766 32,712 45.0% 11 Pakistan 89,270 40,026 44.8% 12 Bolivia 16,230 7,191 44.3% 13 Mali 11,336 4,716 41.6% 14 Cameroon 57,469 22,951 39.9% 15 Togo 10,427 4,148 39.8% 16 DR Congo 52,048 20,508 39.4% 17 Eritrea 5,772 2,240 38.8% 18 Rwanda 8,323 3,049 36.6% 19 Uganda 20,691 7,514 36.3% 20 Haiti 3,322 1,151 34.6% 21 Mauritania 25,265 8,618 34.1% 22 Iraq 70,312 23,692 33.7% 23 Central African Republic 3,346 1,121 33.5% 24 Ethiopia 26,166 8,657 33.1% 25 Tajikistan 4,350 1,422 32.7% 26 Djibouti 4,308 1,404 32.6% 27 Kenya 77,760 25,227 32.4% 28 Ivory Coast 81,886 25,969 31.7% 29 Algeria 444,577 137,860 31.0% 30 Madagascar 16,489 5,048 30.6% 31 Malaysia 7,345 2,235 30.4% 32 Chad 8,292 2,501 30.2% 33 Ecuador 106,167 31,878 30.0% 34 Benin 15,364 4,611 30.0% 35 Equatorial Guinea 10,139 3,045 30.0% 36 Gabon 17,270 5,043 29.2% 37 Sri Lanka 25,663 7,431 29.0% 38 Iran 107,512 30,554 28.4% 39 Chile 1,679 462 27.5% 40 Syria 3,216 847 26.3% 41 Dominican Republic 52,063 13,525 26.0% 42 Sweden 10,215 2,536 24.8% 43 Nepal 7,085 1,726 24.4% 44 Egypt 226,865 54,354 24.0% 45 United Arab Emirates 298,064 71,261 23.9% 46 Brazil 2,498 578 23.1% 47 Cape Verde 27,598 5,889 21.3% 48 Jordan 73,264 15,538 21.2% 49 Cuba 38,585 8,101 21.0% 50 Tunisia 188,579 36,673 19.4% 51 Tanzania 16,227 3,117 19.2% 52 Morocco 619,827 114,320 18.4% 53 Israel 31,500 5,718 18.2% 54 Cambodia 14,228 2,478 17.4% 55 Burkina Faso 9,631 1,662 17.3% 56 Myanmar 7,393 1,263 17.1% 57 Lebanon 120,364 20,412 17.0% 58 Niger 3,134 534 17.0% 59 Peru 1,103 181 16.4% 60 Uzbekistan 61,328 9,983 16.3% 61 Palestine 5,302 839 15.8% 62 India 1,153,748 181,111 15.7% 63 Libya 43,701 6,821 15.6% 64 Zimbabwe 9,657 1,461 15.1% 65 Qatar 102,930 15,341 14.9% 66 Mongolia 21,997 3,276 14.9% 67 Turkey 1,268,376 183,196 14.4% 68 Mozambique 21,695 3,026 13.9% 69 Turkmenistan 8,909 1,221 13.7% 70 Georgia 10,642 1,451 13.6% 71 Suriname 21,281 2,571 12.1% 72 South Korea 5,161 583 11.3% 73 Zambia 2,621 292 11.1% 74 Argentina 1,068 118 11.0% 75 Kyrgyzstan 30,843 3,367 10.9% 76 Armenia 111,550 12,081 10.8% 77 Bahrain 25,110 2,681 10.7% 78 Botswana 1,504 161 10.7% 79 Ukraine 7,057 750 10.6% 80 United Kingdom 512,426 53,398 10.4% 81 Oman 53,700 5,566 10.4% 82 Azerbaijan 104,143 10,130 9.7% 83 Kosovo 1,530 146 9.5% 84 Vietnam 116,289 10,916 9.4% 85 Montenegro 4,674 427 9.1% 86 Kazakhstan 182,002 16,294 9.0% 87 Canada 43,982 3,914 8.9% 88 Laos 4,526 359 7.9% 89 Philippines 235,674 16,245 6.9% 90 Moldova 2,199 151 6.9% 91 Jamaica 5,418 357 6.6% 92 Russia 679,425 42,953 6.3% 93 Taiwan 1,728 109 6.3% 94 Panama 1,400 88 6.3% 95 Thailand 264,190 15,544 5.9% 96 Bosnia and Herzegovina 2,842 164 5.8% 97 Kuwait 146,194 8,278 5.7% 98 Serbia 19,656 1,116 5.7% 99 Japan 16,369 920 5.6% 100 Mexico 2,647 139 5.3% 101 South Africa 195,946 10,203 5.2% 102 Albania 1,343 70 5.2% 103 Saudi Arabia 553,967 28,467 5.1% 104 Indonesia 223,862 11,504 5.1% 105 Singapore 39,226 1,997 5.1% 106 North Macedonia 2,725 138 5.1% 107 United States 187,033 9,194 4.9% 108 Cyprus 12,980 641 4.9% 109 New Zealand 2,714 125 4.6% 110 Netherlands 1,054 46 4.4% 111 China 1,915,149 76,655 4.0% 112 Sao Tome and Principe 8,822 337 3.8% 113 Ireland 30,696 931 3.0% 114 Australia 19,163 576 3.0% 115 Namibia 4,615 137 3.0% 116 Hong Kong 15,954 439 2.8% 117 Belarus 157,028 3,652 2.3% 118 Denmark 2,223 28 1.3%

How we build this

1. Official source

The European Commission (DG HOME) publishes yearly statistics for every Schengen consulate worldwide: applications filed, visas issued and refusals.

2. Unpacked into pairs

The source is a fifteen-hundred-row spreadsheet. We aggregate consulates by filing country and lay the data out per “filing country → Schengen state” pair, so the number shows up on the page for your exact route.

3. What we compute

The strictness rank, the deviation from the Schengen average and the 1,000-application threshold are our own calculations on top of the official figures, not Commission data.

A limitation we state openly: the Commission counts applications by where they were filed, not by the applicant's nationality — applications by other nationals at the same consulate fall into the same row. And a refusal rate is an average: it does not account for your travel purpose, visa history or how complete your documents are. Source — European Commission, DG HOME

Take this data

We did the work of collecting and unpacking these figures — and we give them away. Use them in articles, research and your own products: the only condition is a link back to the source.

CSV Refusals per country → Schengen state pair 1514 rows · CSV ↓ CSV Summary by filing country 161 rows · CSV ↓ CSV Consulate map: which country hosts which mission all sources · CSV ↓

How to attribute

Data source: VISAXS (https://visaxs.com/schengen-refusals), licensed under CC BY 4.0

Or paste this HTML

<a href="https://visaxs.com/schengen-refusals">VISAXS</a> — licensed under <a href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY 4.0</a>

Licence: CC BY 4.0 — copy, adapt and use commercially, as long as you credit the source.

We follow the same rule ourselves. Underlying source: European Commission, DG HOME — Visa statistics for consulates (licence Decision 2011/833/EU). The derived calculations, classification and pairwise breakdown are ours.

Frequently asked

What is the average Schengen visa refusal rate?

According to European Commission data for 2025, the average refusal rate is 14.5% — roughly one in 7 applications is turned down. The spread between countries is enormous, from a few percent to more than half of all applications.

Which country has the highest refusal rate?

The highest refusal rate is at consulates located in Bangladesh: 54.1% of applications refused across 38,642 filed.

How is the refusal rate calculated?

It is the share of visas not issued out of applications filed: refusals divided by applications. The Commission publishes per-consulate figures; we aggregate them by filing country and by the pair “filing country → Schengen state”.

Is this by nationality or by filing country?

By filing country. The Commission counts applications at consulates — for example every application filed at consulates located in Uzbekistan. For most countries this closely tracks the applicants' nationality, but it is not identical to it.

Does the country I apply to matter?

Yes, noticeably: the same filing country can face very different refusal rates at consulates of different Schengen states. Open a specific pair page to see the figures for your exact route.