Where to live in Denmark
We track 3 cities in Denmark: Århus, Copenhagen and Odense. Average temperatures run from 9°C to 10°C. We estimate a couple needs €3,982 to €4,318 a month to live centrally. Denmark sits in our high tax tier. For citizens from outside the EU, EEA and Switzerland, long-term residency is possible, with conditions.
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- Tax tier
- High
- High personal income tax
- Languages
- Danish, English
- Good English
- Safety
- 75/100
- country-level
- Healthcare
- 80/100
- country-level
- Internet
- ~220 Mbps
- median fixed broadband
The 3 cities we track
| City | Size | Setting | Avg temp | Rain a year | Est. cost a month |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Århus | mid-sized | coastal | 9°C | 647 mm | €4,064 |
| Copenhagen | large | coastal | 10°C | 645 mm | €4,318 |
| Odense | smaller | coastal | 10°C | 616 mm | €3,982 |
Source: City size from GeoNames, temperature from the Open-Meteo archive (2019 to 2023 averages), rainfall from TerraClimate (1991 to 2020 normals), coast distance from Natural Earth. Cost is our model estimate for a couple living centrally.
Taxes
Denmark sits in our high tax tier: high personal income tax. The tier applies to every city here, and couples who cap tax below it will not see these cities in their results.
Source: OurNextCity tax tiers, assigned by hand from each country's top marginal personal income tax rate and overall tax reputation, with no fixed rate cut-offs. Coarse by design; not tax advice.
Residency and visas
Possible, with conditions, for people from outside the EU, EEA and Switzerland. Long-term residency runs through employer-sponsored skilled-work routes (Pay Limit Scheme, Positive List, Fast-track, EU Blue Card) or the Start-up Denmark entrepreneur scheme; there is no golden visa and no passive-income or sufficient-means route for non-EU nationals.
Citizens of the EU, EEA and Switzerland have freedom-of-movement or simplified residency rights here.
For short visits, 93 of 198 passports can enter visa-free and 105 need a visa in advance.
Source: OurNextCity residency dataset, hand-reviewed approximations researched against published immigration rules. Not legal advice: check the official source before you apply. Short-stay entry from the passport-index dataset (ilyankou, MIT).