Visa income requirements by country vs the cost of living

Ratio is the visa bar divided by our couple estimate, both in US dollars. Above 1, one person's required income is more than two people spend a month in the city.

* Cost index from World Bank indicators; see how the table is built below.

We also track an income route for Lebanon, Uganda and Venezuela, but have no city with a cost estimate there, so they are not in the table.

105 more countries with a city we rank have no income-based route with a fixed figure in our residency dataset, so they are left out.

In 22 of 74 countries the visa bar for one applicant is above our estimate of a couple's monthly costs: San Marino, Oman, Cayman Islands, Liechtenstein, Antigua & Barbuda, Romania, Rwanda, Colombia, Andorra, Mexico, Croatia, Taiwan, Greece, Malta, Slovenia, Barbados, Kazakhstan, Hungary, Grenada, Ireland, Moldova and United Arab Emirates.

In 29 of 74 it is under half of that estimate: Argentina, Bahrain, Belgium, Guatemala, Switzerland, Lithuania, Uruguay, France, Peru, Nicaragua, Portugal, Costa Rica, Panama, Chile, Türkiye, Czechia, Germany, Philippines, Finland, Cyprus, Bulgaria, Madagascar, Morocco, Serbia, Ecuador, Kyrgyzstan, Albania, Bolivia and Tonga.

Visa bar: the lowest monthly income one applicant must show on the cheapest income-based residency route we track for the country (a passive-income, retiree, rentista, sufficient-means or digital nomad visa), as of June 2026. The figures come from the OurNextCity residency dataset, which we review by hand against each country's published rules. A yearly figure is shown per month. Partners and children usually raise the bar, and many routes also ask for savings, health insurance or a clean record, which the table leaves out. The CSV keeps each rule's legal basis and the exchange rate we used. Some countries publish no fixed figure, and those are not in the table.

Couple estimate: our model estimate, in euros, of what a couple spends a month living centrally in the country's best-known city we rank (the one most read on English Wikipedia). It starts from our own country-level cost-of-living index (New York = 100) and rises with city size. It comes from our city dataset (last rebuilt June 2026), not a survey of current prices: it is an estimate for comparing cities, not a budget. For Rwanda, Kazakhstan, Moldova, Trinidad & Tobago, Honduras, Guyana, Latvia, Montenegro, Nepal, Belize, Vanuatu, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Lithuania, Uruguay, Nicaragua, Bulgaria, Madagascar, Serbia, Ecuador, Kyrgyzstan, Albania, Bolivia and Tonga, the cost index is a country-level estimate from World Bank indicators, calibrated to our other countries' figures. Source: The World Bank (World Development Indicators, Worldwide Governance Indicators), CC BY 4.0.

Conversions: each visa bar is converted to US dollars at the rate stated with the rule (mostly June 2026). The couple estimate is converted at €1 = US$1.16. The ratio divides one US dollar figure by the other.

This table compares published minimums. It is not legal advice: rules and thresholds change, so check with the consulate or immigration office before you apply.