Since 2023 a state campaign has been running with collective expulsions to the Libyan and Algerian borders: pressure on newcomers scores 17, which is a red flag. An employment contract for a foreigner is renewed exactly once.
red flagSince 2023 Tunisia has run a state campaign against migrants. It began with the president's speech in February 2023 and goes on: regular collective expulsions to the desert borders with Libya and Algeria since May 2024, camps demolished in Sfax in April 2025, a ban on undocumented people receiving money transfers or working, and arrests of staff at organisations that helped migrants. In July 2026 UN experts counted more than 7,400 victims of arbitrary detention, collective expulsion and trafficking. In our index this is a red flag that outweighs any comfort.
The campaign targets people from sub-Saharan Africa above all, but it also reaches those with legal status. Arrests without document checks are on record, more than 40 students among those held; students' cards go unrenewed without explanation; the state stopped recognising refugee documents issued by the UN agency. The law lets police withdraw a card when the grounds for stay lapse and expel a foreigner who threatens public order.
The procedure itself is simple and cheap for people living on their own means: you apply in person at the police station or National Guard post where you live, with a French-language form and revenue stamps, and queues last weeks. There is no income threshold, only means of subsistence. But everything rests on discretion: the law sets no processing deadline, the state publishes no refusal statistics, and since 2023 renewal depends on having no tax debts. Every move must be reported in advance to the police where you lived and within 3 days to the police where you move.
Working legally is close to impossible, and that covers the whole family: a spouse, like any foreigner, may work only on a ministry-approved contract after a check that no Tunisian is available. Breaking the rules costs the employer 12-30 dinars a day per worker and the worker expulsion. Legal residents can open a bank account, including in convertible dinars, but currency controls limit moving money out. Residents' children attend state schools taught in Arabic and French. From 2026 the wealth tax covers bank deposits, and the social contribution rises from 0.5% to 1% in 2027.
The index score ignores nationality. This is what changes for citizens of specific countries.
The Arab Maghreb Union creates no free movement, so they have no special right to live or work in Tunisia. They are the largest groups among residence card holders: Algerians 23%, Moroccans 10%.
When we checked on 9 August 2026 we found no nationality restrictions. The residence card procedure is the same as for all foreigners.
The place interval 78-91 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.
Red flagOne of the three core categories, how the agencies work, pressure on newcomers or the reliability of status, has fallen below the critical mark. The score is capped: a disaster in the core is not cured by comforts at the edges.
The thin mark on each bar is the average across 97 countries
The strongest category here is Path to citizenship: 77 out of 100, against a 97-state average of 57.1. The weakest is Pressure on newcomers: 17 against 65.2. Above the world average: 1 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.
The law sets no deadline. In practice the card arrives in 2-3 months, faster in Sousse and Sfax; while you wait you get a receipt for your application.
Yes, that is the main route: the card goes to people who prove means of subsistence, housing and insurance, with no fixed threshold. But it gives no right to work, and there is no digital nomad visa.
Only on a contract approved by the Ministry of Employment when no Tunisian is available for the job; the contract runs up to a year and can be renewed once. Changing employer means the whole procedure again.
Two 10-dinar revenue stamps, 20 dinars in total (about $6.5) per application and the same for each yearly renewal. Sources describe another 150-dinar charge in conflicting ways, and we found no official tariff.
There is no permanent status: after 5 years of residence you get a two-year renewable card. Citizenship is possible after 5 years by law without giving up your own, but the decision is fully discretionary and rare; in February 2026 a proposal to raise the term to 7 years was tabled in parliament.
Since 2023 the state has run a campaign against migrants, with collective expulsions to the borders; it hits people from sub-Saharan Africa hardest, but also reaches people with legal status. For those living on their own means the procedure is simple, but status rests on police discretion.
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.