Although their number seems to have decreased by 4,678 people in 6 years, it is important to remember that 7,337 Portuguese citizens acquired the nationality of their host country in the same period.

[5] From 1875 onwards, Luxembourg's economy relied upon the immigration of cheap labor of mostly Italians to work in the country's steel mills and to counter the natural demographic decline of the native Luxembourgish population.

During the Second World War, when the German invasion of May 1940 undermined the sovereignty of the Grand Duchy, many Luxembourgers sought refuge in Portugal.

However, after the war, Portugal, which had been under the governance of an authoritarian regime headed by Oliveira Salazar, witnessed a significant portion of its population plunge into poverty.

[10] This coincided with the rise of a booming financial services sector, which caused native Luxembourgers to turn away from industrial jobs.

[11] This turned the Portuguese community into a demographically self-sustaining unit, marking it out as separate from the Germans, who had little desire to move permanently to Luxembourg, and Italians, who were not granted special status for family immigration.

All countries were given a transitional period of seven years to adapt to the new conditions, during which they could impose restrictions upon immigration from Portugal (and Spain, the other new EEC member).

[citation needed] Luxembourg was given a longer transitional period, of ten years, as the government feared a large influx of Portuguese immigrants.

Considering their date of arrival in the Luxembourgish territory, the age at which they came, and their place of birth (Portugal or Luxembourg), we categorized the adult individuals of Portuguese nationality or born in Portugal, who were present in 2006, into four groups: The profiles of the first-time entrants, regardless of their entry date in Luxembourg, show relative uniformity.

This might be due to the better economic conditions found in Portugal, as well as to the ageing of the Portuguese community in Luxembourg, meaning older migrants are starting retiring and are going back to their homeland.

[19][5] As of today, the Portuguese are part of a wider Portuguese-speaking community in Luxembourg, comprising up to 13,000 people from PALOP countries (the overwhelming majority being from Guinea-Bissau or from Cape Verde), Timor-Leste or Macau[20][21][22][23][24][25] and 10,000 Brazilians.

[28] The Portuguese community in Luxembourg retains strong ties with its homeland and, between 2000 and 2021, it has sent approximately 2.035 billion euros (€) to Portugal in remittances.

"The actual figure may be 4,000, almost 1% of the total population, which would make it the highest ratio of Cape Verdeans in any foreign country.