More than half of Ukrainian refugees living in Poland say they intend to go home, but almost none of them mean “soon.” A Rating Group survey published on Friday, 11 September 2026, found that 51 percent plan to return to Ukraine. Only 8 percent said they were ready in the near future. Forty-three percent would wait until the war with Russia is over. Twenty-six percent do not plan to return at all, and 23 percent could not give a firm answer.
The poll was carried out online (CAWI) between 21 and 25 August among adult Ukrainians who left after Russia’s full-scale invasion and were living in Poland at the time of the interview. Reports of the study put the sample at about 1,000 people. It is not a census of every PESEL-UKR holder, but it is one of the fuller snapshots this autumn of how a large, settled wartime diaspora now talks about “home.”
Safety dominates the conditions attached to return. Seventy-one percent named security and stability in Ukraine as the factor that would most encourage them to go back. Economic recovery came next (36 percent), then job prospects (26 percent) and the absence of internal language, religious or other conflicts (21 percent). Social infrastructure and a chance to influence public life were each cited by 12 percent; taking part in reconstruction and a worsening of life abroad by 11 percent each. In other words, the war still sits at the centre of the decision. Housing, wages and diplomas matter, but they do not outrank the basic question of whether it is safe to live in Ukraine again.
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That hesitation sits beside a second, almost evenly split question: would they like to stay abroad permanently? Forty-four percent said yes; 43 percent said no. Among those who want a life outside Ukraine, 40 percent would choose Poland, 17 percent another European country and 6 percent a country outside Europe. Thirty-seven percent could not name a preferred country. Thirty-four percent are considering Polish citizenship; 46 percent are not; 20 percent are undecided. The help they most want is not a one-off cash grant. Thirty-five percent put Polish citizenship first, followed by language courses (17 percent), recognition of Ukrainian diplomas (16 percent) and financial support (14 percent).
The integration numbers help explain why a sudden exodus is unlikely even if 51 percent “plan to return.” Seventy-three percent of those surveyed have a job, and 87 percent of that group work in Poland itself. Sixty percent rate their Polish as intermediate or high; 26 percent as basic; 12 percent as beginner; only 2 percent say they know none at all. Eighty-one percent rent; 7 percent already own a home in Poland. Material conditions over the past year improved for 36 percent, stayed the same for 41 percent and worsened for 20 percent. Fifty-seven percent say they are satisfied with their social adaptation.
The picture is not frictionless. Thirty-one percent said they had faced discrimination in the past 12 months because of nationality or ethnicity; 22 percent because they spoke Ukrainian; 6 percent because they spoke Russian. Forty-nine percent reported none of the listed forms of discrimination. Refugees’ own feelings toward Poles were mostly warm (50 percent) or neutral (44 percent). Their reading of how Poles feel about them was cooler: 30 percent warm, 46 percent neutral, 22 percent cold. Forty-five percent still socialise mainly with other Ukrainians; only 8 percent mainly with Poles.
Those findings land in a country that remains the EU’s second-largest host of people under temporary protection from Ukraine, after Germany. Eurostat put the Polish total at 953,060 at the end of July 2026 — 21.5 percent of the EU’s 4.43 million — down 8,110 on the month. Temporary protection in Poland has been extended to 4 March 2027, with a path toward CUKR residence cards for those who want a more ordinary status. Polish opinion has hardened at the same time. A CBOS survey in July 2026 found, for the first time in that series, that opponents of taking in Ukrainian refugees outnumbered supporters (52 percent against, 42 percent for). Ukrainian views of Poland as a “friendly” country have also fallen sharply in separate Rating Group work earlier in August.
For Warsaw the practical meaning of a 51 percent “return” headline is therefore modest in the short run and large in the long run. Eight percent ready to leave soon is not a labour-market shock. A majority waiting on the end of the war is a reminder that Poland’s schools, clinics, rental market and factories are still hosting a population whose legal status, family plans and political mood can shift with the front line. A quarter who say they will not return — and a similar share who want to stay abroad for good, often in Poland — is the start of a settled minority, not a temporary queue at the border.
The survey does not tell us when the war will end, or whether “security and stability” will arrive on a timetable anyone in Warsaw or Kyiv can use. It does show a community that has learned Polish, found work, rented flats and still keeps a packed bag in the mind if not by the door. Poland-24 readers should treat the 51 percent figure as a statement of intent under conditions that do not yet exist — and treat the 8 percent as the only number that describes next month.
