Portugal's unemployment rate edged higher to 5.8% in the third quarter from 5.7% in the previous three months, but fell from 6.1% a year ago, official data showed on Wednesday.

Between July and September of this year, the total number of those unemployed increased by 2.3% to 305,800 people from the second quarter and fell 4.1% from the same period last year, the National Statistics Institute said.

The total workforce was little changed compared to the previous quarter at 5.2 million people. (Reporting by Joao Manuel Maurcio in Gdansk, editing by Andrei Khalip)