Most surveyed Kherson residents do not exclude from the local community those residents who left after the start of the full-scale war, and continue to consider them Kherson residents.
This is evidenced by the results of the study “Cohesion of Kherson Residents”, conducted in August 2026 by the Kherson City Community Foundation “Zakhyst”.
Most respondents consider Kherson residents to be those who lived in the community before the full-scale war and continue to remain in the city now — 75% of respondents said so.
67% of respondents recognize as full members of the community those who, after evacuation, decided to return home. The same share of respondents count as Kherson residents those townspeople who are now living as internally displaced persons in other regions of Ukraine.
Slightly fewer than half of respondents (48%) consider people who went abroad to be Kherson residents, except for those who moved to Russia or Belarus.
As for migrants from other settlements who moved to live in Kherson during the war, 46% of respondents consider them Kherson residents.
The level of recognition is significantly lower for those who in 2022 went to the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine — only 14% of respondents are ready to call them Kherson residents.
The lowest acceptance was recorded for people who, after the start of the full-scale invasion, went to Russia or Belarus — only 7% of respondents consider them Kherson residents.
Recall that currently in Kherson there remain about 60,000 residents – approximately 20% of the city’s pre-war population, which was about 300,000 people.