Households show growing Ethnic Diversity

In 2023, 17.2 percent of New Zealand households had at least one person belonging to the Asian ethnic group, according to new data from Stats NZ.

This is an increase from 15.1 percent in 2018. At the same time, the number of households with Māori or Pasifika members also grew, while households with European members slightly decreased.

Stats NZ says these changes show how New Zealand’s population is becoming more diverse. “Looking at households through an ethnicity lens gives us a better understanding of family life in New Zealand,” said Rosemary Goodyear, principal analyst at Stats NZ.

The data showed that Asian households were most often made up of three or four people, with an average household size of 3.3 people. In comparison, European households had the smallest average size of 2.6 people.

Asian households were usually made up of one family, often a couple with children. They tended to have one or two children on average. Māori and Pasifika households were more likely to be larger or include more than one family. European households, on the other hand, were often couples without children or individuals living alone.

Looking at individuals, about 973,700 people identified as Asian in 2023, making them the second-largest ethnic group after Europeans. The Asian population grew by 4.8 percent each year from 2018 to 2023.

In June 2023, the ethnic Māori population was 911,200 people, while the Pasifika population was 464,200. The group called MELAA (Middle Eastern, Latin American, and African) grew the fastest, rising 6.1 percent per year to reach 103,700 people.

By mid-2023, there were 1,036,000 people of Māori descent in New Zealand—meaning about one in every five people had Māori ancestry.