Moving to Saudi Arabia from Canada

Our residency index: 55/100, possible, with conditions. It is our own rating of how realistic long-term residency in Saudi Arabia is for Canadian citizens, based on the routes Saudi Arabia publishes. Long-term residency is realistic mainly through the Premium Residency ('Saudi green card') program, either as a one-time flat fee for permanent status or via asset-based investor, real-estate-owner, entrepreneur, and special-talent categories, all without a local sponsor; there is no passive-income or means-tested route, and the ordinary work iqama needs an employer sponsor (SAR pegged at 3.75/USD).

The cheapest self-funded routes we track:

• Investment: about $213k (Saudi Premium Residency unlimited-duration (permanent) product, one-time fee SAR 800,000; a limited-duration alternative runs SAR 100,000/yr and the real-estate-owner route needs SAR 4M in property; as of June 2026)

Check the official requirements before you apply: amounts, conditions and exchange rates change, and what a couple needs can differ from a single applicant's threshold.

For short visits, Canadian passport holders can get a visa on arrival for a visit, according to the passport-index dataset. Short-stay entry covers visits; living there takes a residence permit.

Ranked by our match model for a typical couple who both hold Canadian passports, using the preset answers of our best places to live list. Your own answers would change the order. We pick the cities, up to five, by how often English Wikipedia readers looked them up over the past year.

1. 1

   1. Riyadh

   59% match

   Est. cost

   €3,061/mo

   Avg temp

   27°C

   Safety index

   80/100

2. 2

   2. Dammam

   59% match

   Est. cost

   €2,928/mo

   Avg temp

   27°C

   Safety index

   80/100

3. 3

   3. Madinah

   57% match

   Est. cost

   €2,992/mo

   Avg temp

   28°C

   Safety index

   80/100

4. 4

   4. Jeddah

   56% match

   Est. cost

   €3,073/mo

   Avg temp

   28°C

   Safety index

   80/100

Our estimate for a couple living centrally runs from €2,928 a month in Dammam to €3,073 in Jeddah. For comparison, we estimate €3,991 a month in Toronto. Use these figures to compare places rather than to set a budget.

Saudi Arabia is in our zero or very low tax tier (little to no personal income tax); Canada is in our high tax tier (high personal income tax). Tiers describe each country's own income tax. They do not cover tax you may still owe in Canada after you leave, or the treaty between the two countries, so check both with a tax adviser before you move.

• Best warm, dry cities to live in
• Best places to live in the Middle East and North Africa
• Best cities to live in with zero or very low income tax
• Warm, affordable cities to live abroad

• Moving to Saudi Arabia from the US
• Moving to Saudi Arabia from the UK
• Moving to Saudi Arabia from Australia
• Moving to Saudi Arabia from Ireland
• Moving to Saudi Arabia from New Zealand

Every country and origin we cover

Every figure here comes from the datasets behind our city and country pages:

• Short-stay entry: the passport-index dataset (ilyankou, MIT license), which records the entry rule for short visits on each passport.
• Residency index, routes and thresholds: the OurNextCity residency dataset, hand-reviewed against published immigration rules, figures as of June 2026. It is a summary, not legal advice.
• City ranking: our match model, the one behind the quiz, run with a typical couple's preset answers and both partners holding Canadian passports. It ranks up to five of the country's best-known cities: of the cities in our quiz (100,000 people or more, capitals and a few towns movers seek out, such as Faro), the five most read about on English Wikipedia over the past year. It folds suburbs into their main city and leaves out countries with a residency index under 40 and areas under a US State Department Level 4 advisory, as our best-cities lists do.
• Costs: our cost model, a country-level cost-of-living index scaled for city size, from our city dataset (last rebuilt June 2026).
• Tax tiers: three coarse bands we assign by hand from each country's top marginal personal income tax rate and overall tax reputation.