CONFIRMING THE OBVIOUS: Colorado losing luster as a migration destination state.

The US Census Bureau consistently updates its methodology for conducting population estimates and forecasts, revising previous results based on new methods.

In its newest standard, the Census Bureau improved its methodology to better estimate the increase in net international migration.

This revision resulted in an additional 1.85 million international migrants into the US from 2020 to 2023 than previously estimated.

For Colorado, the new methods now indicate the state’s population is 5,956,729, which is 24,120 more than previously thought.

Historically, Colorado’s in-migration has been predominantly from within the United States, but most of the newly estimated population growth since 2022 is attributed to international migration, rather than domestic.

In fact, the rate of domestic migration into Colorado has been stagnating and actually declined from 2023 to 2024.

It’s nice to see the Census Bureau catching up to what everybody around here noticed a while ago.