To accommodate rising numbers of missionaries (now at more than 72,000), The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will open 36 new missions on July 1, 2024. This puts the total number of missions at 450 — the highest number in Church history.Church leaders will create these new missions from existing missions. This adjustment will allow mission leaders to have more interaction with missionaries and more missionaries to be assigned to wards and branches.
More missionaries are serving now than the 67,000 who were sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ just before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. The increase is thanks in large part to Church President and Prophet Russell M. Nelson’s April 2022 call for more missionaries.
“We are incredibly grateful for the response we have seen by so many young people to our beloved Prophet’s clarion call for missionary service in April of last year,” said Elder Quentin L. Cook of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, who chairs the Church’s Missionary Executive Council. “We are witnessing an increased enthusiasm for sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ throughout the world. These new missions, spread all around the world, will be a blessing locally as we desire to have more missionaries supporting the units of the Church.”
President Nelson’s call was for missionaries young and old. He said the “decision to serve a mission, whether a proselyting or a service mission, will bless you and many others. We also welcome senior couples to serve when their circumstances permit. Their efforts are simply irreplaceable.” The prophet stressed that “all missionaries teach and testify of the Savior. The spiritual darkness in the world makes the light of Jesus Christ needed more than ever.”
Elder Marcus B. Nash of the Seventy, who serves as executive director of the Missionary Department, said he is “thrilled and grateful” that so many of the rising generation are choosing to serve.
“They are stepping forward against countervailing winds and trends of the world,” Elder Nash said. “They’re stepping forward to serve. President Nelson teaches that they have been held in reserve. I agree. It’s a special group.”
Sister Amy A. Wright of the Primary General Presidency said the increased number of missions will help mission leaders better minister to each missionary.
“Our desire, our hope, our prayer for every single missionary is that when they look back upon their missionary experience they will see that they experienced great joy — not only the joy that comes from living the gospel, but also the joy that comes from sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ,” said Sister Wright, who also serves on the Missionary Executive Council.
The number of young teaching and service missionaries and senior missionaries has gone from 56,000 at the end of 2021 to 62,500 at the end of 2022 to today’s more than 72,000 (of which nearly 5,300 are senior missionaries). They serve in more than 150 countries and teach in more than 60 languages.
“I was just with someone whose son has been called to serve in Vietnam,” said Elder Ronald A. Rasband of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, who also serves on the Missionary Executive Council. “The places the Church is established, where we’re being welcomed, is increasing all the time. Leaders of other countries are coming to Salt Lake City. They’re meeting with the First Presidency and they’re inviting the Church to come [to their countries] because they know we do good. This is not the plateau. We’re going to continue to see this growth. And The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is going to fill the earth as prophesied by the prophets of old.”
Church leaders have also adjusted a policy: Prospective missionaries can submit their missionary recommendations up to 150 days prior to their availability date instead of 120 days. This change gives prospective missionaries more time to prepare for their missions, shortens the period between a prospective missionary’s availability date and mission start date and reduces visa delays for missionaries assigned to serve outside their home countries.
New missions are coming to 18 of the Church’s 22 areas around the world. These additional areas of service will be created in the following locations, effective July 1, 2024:
Africa Central
- Democratic Republic of the Congo Kinshasa South
- Democratic Republic of the Congo Kolwezi
- Kenya Nairobi East
Africa South
- Madagascar Antananarivo North
Africa West
- Ghana Accra North
- Ghana Takoradi
- Nigeria Calabar
- Nigeria Port Harcourt North
- Sierra Leone Bo
Asia
- Cambodia Phnom Penh East
- Thailand Bangkok East
Asia North
- Japan Sendai
Brazil
- Brazil Manaus South
Caribbean
- Dominican Republic Santo Domingo North
Europe Central
- Germany Hamburg
Europe North
- Portugal Porto
México
- México Mexicali
- México Puebla East
North America Central
- Montana Missoula
North America Southeast
- Florida Tallahassee
- South Carolina Charleston
North America Southwest
- Nevada Henderson
- Texas Dallas South
- Texas El Paso
North America West
- California Modesto
Philippines
- Philippines Dumaguete
- Philippines General Santos
- Philippines Tuguegarao
South America Northwest
- Bolivia Cochabamba South
- Ecuador Quito West
- Perú Lima Northeast
South America South
- Argentina Tucumán
- Chile La Serena
Utah
- Utah Salt Lake City East
- Utah Saratoga Springs
- Utah Spanish Fork
