A 2026 law allows you to bring your family only after two years of continuous residence, and a spouse may not work without a separate permit. Access to entry scores 87, family rights 50.
between leaguesCroatia recruits workers on a large scale: 80,780 stay and work permits were issued in the first 5 months of 2026, and a shortage occupations list removes the labour market test for those jobs. A bank account opens with a passport and a personal OIB number, which is issued even without residence status and even remotely. Children of legal residents attend state school free. Yet in 2026 permit numbers fell for the first time since 2022, by 14%, and the rules have been tightened twice in two years.
The 2025 law and the new version in force since 4 June 2026 also hit people already living in the country, with no transition rules. A worker may bring family only after 2 years of continuous stay, and a spouse gets no right to work without a permit of their own and a labour market test. Anyone who has lived on a work permit for more than a year will need a Croatian A1.1 exam at renewal; the employer pays for it, and the requirement takes effect around June 2027. No renewal is granted if the employer's turnover is under €100,000 a year or fewer than 20% of its staff are Croatian.
The tie to the employer is tight. In the first 6 months you may change jobs only if proceedings are opened against the employer or wages go unpaid. After that the new employer notifies the police, a decision takes up to 45 days, and a labour market test applies unless the job is on the shortage list. The Ombudswoman reports that when a permit is withdrawn through the employer's fault the worker must leave, and that people fear complaining in case they lose their status. Since 2025 the employment service must report foreigners who are not working to the police.
There is a cushion if you lose your job: the permit is not cancelled, and you get up to 3 months to find a new employer, or up to 6 if you have held the permit for more than two years. You must register with the employment service within 5 days, and on the last day of the period the permit ends by itself. A renewal filed on time keeps your right to live and work until the decision. Registering your address is mandatory and needed for the residence card. The state does not publish refusal statistics.
The index score ignores nationality. This is what changes for citizens of specific countries.
Visa-free short stays of up to 90 days in 180, as in the rest of the Schengen area. For living there, the same route through a work permit or digital nomad status.
No permit needed at all: EU free movement rules give the right to live and work.
EU temporary protection is extended to 4 March 2028. Since 31 July 2026 new applicants must show they left in line with their military obligations; people who already hold the status are not affected.
When we checked on 9 August 2026 we found no direct nationality restrictions on the stay and work permit. The procedure is the same as for other non-EU citizens.
The place interval 27-44 shows where the country lands when the data is nudged and the index is recalculated. One place of difference in the table means nothing; a difference of a league means something.
Between leaguesThe league holds in fewer than half of the recalculations. Read this country as sitting between two leagues, not as a member of the upper one.
The thin mark on each bar is the average across 97 countries
The strongest category here is Pressure on newcomers: 87 out of 100, against a 97-state average of 65.2. The weakest is Agency processing: 45 against 48.7. Above the world average: 3 out of 7.
All 97 states are calculated for one applicant: 35 years old, income of $2,500 and $3,856 a month before tax, passport not counted, the most accessible route that is actually in use.
Your passport, your income and your family do not change the table. They change which of its lines apply to you. A different income makes entry read differently, a family makes the family category read differently, and your passport makes everything read differently.
By law a decision is due within 90 days of a complete application and can be extended by 30 more. In practice processing takes 3-6 months, and 6-9 months pass from the employer's first application to the worker's arrival.
Yes: digital nomad status if you earn €3,622.50 a month or more, for up to 18 months with no extension, or self-employment and your own business. Nomad years do not count towards permanent residence.
A fee of €63-74 plus a biometric card at €13.27 with standard production time. The permit is renewed every year, so five years come to about €430 per adult.
If you lose your job the permit holds for up to 3 months, or 6 if you have had it for more than two years, then ends automatically. Renewal is also refused if the employer misses the new turnover and Croatian-staff requirements, and from about June 2027 without a Croatian A1.1 exam.
Permanent residence after 5 years of continuous stay. Citizenship after 8 years with permanent status at the time of applying, an exam in Croatian, the Latin script and the country's institutions; you must give up your previous citizenship.
The country needs workers and the door is wide open, but the rules for people already living there were tightened twice in two years with no transition rules. The weak spots: a tight tie to the employer, family only after 2 years, and an agency that misses its own deadlines.
97 states, 26 indicators, seven categories, 2,522 scores. Every score has a source and a source class: primary means the texts of laws and government portals; reliable secondary means reports by international organisations, tax reviews by audit firms and specialist legal publications; weak means community posts and single secondary sources. The classes add up to a confidence level for the country, and a country with low confidence gets neither a score nor a place.
Every indicator is scored against a fixed ruler, not against its neighbours. Adding new countries therefore does not move the old ones, and a change in a score means a change in policy and nothing else.
A high place does not mean a good country. It means one thing: the state machine treats newcomers predictably and by the rules. Living there may be expensive, dull or hot; that is not our question.
Checked 01/10/2026. Facts come from the country's index card and official websites.
We make mistakes and we will go on making them: policy changes faster than any database. Our answer is not a pose of infallibility but a visible trail of corrections. Every correction is published: what it was, what it became, the source and the reason for the error. The corrections log opens with the second issue, together with the first block of changes.