Migration to Armenia is changing the linguistic environment and the service sector

The flows of foreigners who moved to Armenia since 2022 have led to noticeable changes in the daily life and service sector of Yerevan, as reported by The Armenian Weekly. In the first year after the start of hostilities in Ukraine, 113,753 people arrived in the republic from Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine, and in the first half of 2026, the authorities issued 10,561 residence statuses to foreign citizens, which is 59% more than the figure for the same period last year.

The arrival of tens of thousands of specialists and entrepreneurs has had a noticeable impact on the domestic market. In 2022, citizens of Russia registered over 7.3 thousand commercial structures in Armenia, including about five thousand individual entrepreneurs, most of whom are employed in the software development sector. New residents have begun to actively use the Russian language in the service sector, relying on the Soviet linguistic legacy, thanks to which almost 90% of the republic's residents are proficient in Russian.

However, not only Russian-speaking specialists are arriving in Armenia. Migrant workers from India and Iran, employed in construction, cleaning, and catering, face acute adaptation problems. According to the 2026 assessment by the International Organization for Migration (IOM), the language barrier has become the main obstacle for 52.5% of men and 40.4% of women, and 27.8% of respondents noted difficulties in interacting with government agencies.

The IOM study also revealed the high vulnerability of the foreign workforce: almost 40% of those surveyed work without written contracts, and unregulated intermediaries often charge applicants fees exceeding 1.5 million drams. Experts emphasize that Armenia's rapid transformation into a regional hub requires the state to launch language programs for personnel and implement effective labor rights protection standards.