Status security scores 25: the permit ends on the same day as the employment contract, and the law gives no grace period.
Montenegro lets people in easily: the salary bar is the minimum wage, decisions come within a couple of months, and the number of residence and work permits keeps rising, to a record 40,567 in 2025. The country is bringing its rules into line with the EU, and most of the 2026 changes hit people who already live there. In 2025 the European Commission rated migration management as broadly satisfactory but noted thin staffing in the responsible directorate. The government set the 2025 quota below actual 2024 issuance, 28,988 against 38,019, and is preparing mandatory Employment Bureau approval for the single permit: demand for workers is real, but policy leans towards restraint.
The main weakness is how secure your status is. The permit ends on the same day as the employment contract: the law gives no time to find a new job, the employer must notify the ministry within 8 days, and up to 30 days are allowed only for leaving. Changing employer means a new permit from scratch. The law does not expressly let you work while a renewal is pending. The spouse of a foreign worker may work only one year after getting the permit.
Amendments to the Law on Foreigners in force since 17 January 2026 also hit people who got their status long ago: company owners must show three employees and €5,000 in taxes at renewal, and employees are renewed only if in full-time work. Property-based permits issued before that date were protected: holders need not prove the new €150,000 threshold. The state does not publish refusal statistics. We found no revocations of status already granted, and none appear in the US State Department's 2024 report.
Day to day: you must register your place of stay within 24 hours of arrival or moving in, through the landlord or a tourist organisation. Residents open bank accounts with a passport and registration without much trouble, but banks charge prohibitive fees to some nationalities. State school is free for children of legal residents.
The index score ignores nationality. This is what changes for citizens of specific countries.
No visa for up to 90 days, according to the Government of Montenegro. After that, the same residence procedure as for everyone.
A visa is required to enter from 1 November 2026. For Turkish citizens, some banks charge €500 to open an account.
Visa-free entry; holders of a valid Schengen visa may enter on it.
No visa for up to 90 days, according to the Government of Montenegro. Montenegro is not in the EU and runs its own temporary protection for people from Ukraine, extended until 4 March 2027. Some banks charge €500 to open an account.
A visa is required to enter from 1 November 2026, under a decision the government announced on 27 July 2026. The announcement does not say what this means for renewing permits of people already living there. Non-residents face a €100,000 balance cap at banks, and some banks charge €500 to open an account.
A visa is required to enter from 1 November 2026, under the same government decision. Some banks charge €500 to open an account.
The place interval 44-62 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.
The thin mark on each bar is the average across 97 countries
The strongest category here is Access to entry: 80 out of 100, against a 97-state average of 65.7. The weakest is Status security: 25 against 57.9. Above the world average: 4 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.
About 40 days by rule, 1-2 months in practice, longer in the tourist season. Since 2026 you can apply electronically.
Yes, but the routes are getting pricier: your own company needs three employees and €5,000 a year in taxes at renewal, property starts at €150,000, and the digital nomad visa closes on 31 December 2026.
Fees of €2, €60 and €5, so €67 a year per person. The permit is annual: €335 per adult over five years and about €1,000 for a family of three.
Yes, and fast: the permit ends with the employment contract, there is no time to find a new job, only up to 30 days to leave. Since 2026 company owners are renewed only with three employees and €5,000 a year in taxes.
Permanent residence after 5 years of continuous residence and a basic Montenegrin language exam. Citizenship after 10 years; dual citizenship is generally not allowed, so you must give up your previous one.
The entry bar is low, and we found no campaigns against foreign residents. But status is fragile, the rules for people already living there were tightened in 2026, and the visa regime is being rebuilt to EU standards.
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.