The Report on World Population Monitoring, is the first comprehensive global migrant survey in five years.
During 1975 to 1990 the number of migrants worldwide increased by 41 million to 175 million during the 1975-1990, despite a lower world population.
But the report said migration had become increasingly important to population growth in developed countries.
The developed world, led by the United States, still takes in the larger share of the world's migrants, up to 61 per cent last year, compared with 53 per cent in 1990.
The report noted that because of low fertility, net migration today accounted for 75 per cent of the population growth in the developed world.
"If current trends continue, between 2010 and 2030 net migration will likely be responsible for all the population growth in those regions," it said.
Last year 64 million migrants lived in Europe, 44.5 million in North America, 4.7 million in Australia and New Zealand and two million in Japan.
Positive impact
The migrant population of the developing world meanwhile has risen a mere three million since 1990, totalling 75 million last year. That includes 51 million in Asia, 17 million in Africa and seven million in Latin America and the Caribbean.
The report, discussed at a session of the UN Commission on Population and Development, concluded that family reunification accounted for a major share of the migration flow to North America and Europe, although the share of labor migration and skilled migration also rose.
It described the net economic impact of international migration as generally positive for host countries.
"Although the presence of international migrants may have a small adverse effect on the wages of non-migrants or may raise unemployment when wages are rigid, such effects are small at the national level," it noted.
"Over the medium and long term, migration can generate employment and produce net fiscal gains," it added.