Best Countries for Digital Nomads to Settle In (And the Worst!)

by Working Remotely31 comments

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Do you want to move abroad and work remotely as a digital nomad? Do you want to start a traveling lifestyle and country-hop as you go?

For these kinds of decisions, it’s always important to identify the best countries in the world so that you can make a well-informed decision for where you will be setting off to. To determine these places, the sample factors that you would surely want to know as dependent on your goals and preferences are the cost of living, the safety ‘score’, the weather situation, and the internet speed (especially for digital nomads).

However, it could be such a dizzying experience to do all that research for yourself, most especially if you want an up-to-date and unified resource. Fortunately for us though — the traveling and working nomads — this is where the ultimate guide, NomadList, comes to play!

Curated by digital nomads and perpetual travels around the globe, NomadList has come up with a comprehensive website that showcases all the details that you would ever want to know! The data on their site are easily filterable by a mix of the criteria below:

  • Places (cities, countries, or regions)
  • City-Type (small city, big city, or mega city)
  • Visa-Free Places (as based on your nationality)
  • Cost of Living (low to high as applied to locals, long-term expats, or short-term nomads)
  • Overall Weather and Temperature (cold, mild, warm, humid, dry, or comfy)
  • Internet Speed (mbps)
  • Safety Rating (can rank places that are female-friendly)
  • Traffic (as measured by TomTom’s index)
  • Air Quality (as measured by AQI index)
  • One Way Airplane Ticket Price (from where you are located)
  • Community (English-speaking, friendly, fun, or good nightlife)
    .

.
Isn’t it amazing? Because I think that it definitely is! They even have an algorithm: NomadScore™ that ranks the places based on the summation of the metrics (like cost, weather, etc.). And as a bonus, their website also has a hub for all traveling and working nomads around the world given their dedicated forum and meet-up sections. They also have a lot of other features in store! In fact, the team behind the platform are constantly coming up with new apps and systems to help all the wandering souls out there, so come and visit their site:

Visit NomadList NOW!

To summarize their data…
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[box_title class=”” subtitle=”” subtitle_font_size=”15″ font_size=”23″ border_color=”#ed2665″ animation_delay=”0″ font_alignment=”center” border=”around” animate=”” ]Best Countries In the World for Traveling & Working Nomads[/box_title]Take note though that this is a summation of all their metrics; which means that it’s not only based on cost but also the weather, internet speed, safety, etc.

[two_fourth class=”” last=”no” ]

  1. Czech Republic
  2. Hungary
  3. South Korea
  4. Rwanda
  5. Bosnia-Herzegovina

[/two_fourth]

[two_fourth class=”” last=”yes” ]

  1. Croatia
  2. Portugal
  3. Thailand
  4. Serbia
  5. Armenia

[/two_fourth]

If you rather want to know the best cities (since by country takes the area as a whole), then the top-rated ones would be:

[two_fourth class=”” last=”no” ]

  1. Chiang Mai, Thailand
  2. Bangkok, Thailand
  3. Phuket, Thailand
  4. Florianopolis, Brazil
  5. Prague, Czech Republic

[/two_fourth]

[two_fourth class=”” last=”yes” ]

  1. Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia
  2. Taghazout, Morocco
  3. Las Palmas, Spain
  4. Oaxaca, Mexico
  5. Budapest, Hungary

[/two_fourth]

[separator color=”#cdcdcd” margin_top=”10″ margin_bottom=”20″ style=”dashed” ]

Now, if you want to know the cheapest and most expensive countries in the world in order to know what you should take note of and what you should avoid, I will be making use of the data of Numbeo — the world’s largest database of user-contributed data on costs and prices around the world.
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[box_title class=”” subtitle=”” subtitle_font_size=”15″ font_size=”23″ border_color=”#ed2665″ animation_delay=”0″ font_alignment=”center” border=”around” animate=”” ]Countries With The LOWEST Cost of Living[/box_title]

  1. India
  2. Nepal
  3. Pakistan
  4. Tunisia
  5. Algeria
  1. Moldova
  2. Egypt
  3. Macedonia
  4. Syria
  5. Colombia
  1. Bangladesh
  2. Indonesia
  3. Georgia
  4. Morocco
  5. Philippines

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[box_title class=”” subtitle=”” subtitle_font_size=”15″ font_size=”23″ border_color=”#ed2665″ animation_delay=”0″ font_alignment=”center” border=”around” animate=”” ]Countries With The HIGHEST Cost of Living[/box_title]

  1. Switzerland
  2. Norway
  3. Venezuela
  4. Iceland
  5. Denmark
  1. Australia
  2. New Zealand
  3. Singapore
  4. Kuwait
  5. UK
  1. Ireland
  2. Luxembourg
  3. Finland
  4. France
  5. Belgium

DISCLAIMER: Numbeo’s data above is as of January 2015 (which is unlike NomadList’s data that is updated regularly). Numbeo also compiled this list with a traveling and working nomad in mind; NOT a person who is looking for an office job abroad, etc. It is also per country as a summary, so chances are, some of the cities or towns in the countries listed above could have a cheaper or more expensive cost of living than that of the above.

With this in mind, it helps then to mainly refer to NomadList’s data! And if I may add, if you really want to know the best place to start your nomadic lifestyle, start thinking of ASIA. It’s a known fact that most of the countries in this continent do not only have good conditions but very low cost of living as well. What’s more is that you’ll find a LOT of your fellow nomads there!

TIP: If you’re a digital nomad, heed NomadList’s advice and head out to Chiang Mai in Thailand! In my opinion, it really is the BEST place for a remote worker like you and me!

• • •

Best Countries for Digital Nomads

Overall

• • •

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At 21, I quit my corporate job in the Philippines to pursue my dreams. Today, I am a successful digital nomad (online entrepreneur, travel writer, & vlogger) living a sustainable travel lifestyle.

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31 Comments

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  1. Kirstie

    Love stats like this! Don’t love that I’m currently living in the country with the 6th highest cost of living :)

    Reply
    • Aileen

      I’m in the 15th one! Whoop. Looking into moving to another country soon, haha!

      Reply
  2. Ana

    Nomadlist is awesome, I didnt know about this! And Jon to the World totally read my mind! If the internet worked faster in the Philippines, I would definitely move there!
    Chiang Mai is good but I also loved the expat atmosphere in Ubud and Yogyakarta (Indonesia). Well, anywhere in Southeast Asia is so cool! :)

    Reply
    • Aileen

      I’m happy to introduce Nomadlist to you then! ;) I hope it helps you! And yeah… PH internet really sucks haha. Thanks for your input too on these places in Indonesia. And indeed, Asia is a very dynamic place so it’s a good starting area for traveling nomads :D

      Reply
  3. Shelly I Norway to Nowhere

    I love NomadList – such a great new resource for us digital nomads! My boyfriend and I used it to determine our next location to work digitally – Playa del Carmen, Mexico! Thailand was our top choice, but my doggy is coming along for the journey and it’s a bit easier to get him to Mexico from the US! ;) Thanks for putting all this data together, super helpful!

    Reply
    • Aileen

      Yes, I really LOVE them! The data they have accumulated as well the community that they have is absolutely helpful :D Happy to hear that you like them too!

      Reply
  4. Ellen @ The Cynical Sailor

    Really interesting list. We lived in New Zealand for five years and the cost of living was surprisingly high there. We had lived in Scotland previously and I thought it would be cheaper to move to NZ, but it was so much more expensive.

    Reply
    • Aileen

      Yeah, I can understand what you mean that’s why it’s often really imperative to do a thorough research. Talking to locals and expats through online communities also helps in gauging the costs in a certain country.

      Reply
  5. JONtotheworld

    Philippines could have ranked high if not for our very SLOW internet connection!

    This post has so much valuable information. :)

    Reply
    • Aileen

      I know right! Haha, we have a low cost of living in a sense but we really have bad internet so it’s not so friendly for digital nomads. And thanks Jon for your input, I’m happy that you find this post helpful!

      Reply
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