Not all people in the world are fortunate enough when it comes to the strength of passport. The more powerful your passport is, the easier it is for you to travel the world.  So how is the passport strength determined and what makes a country’s passport powerful than others? 

Travel freedom depends upon the strength of your passport. Not many countries have that privilege of enjoying the travel freedom governed by passport strength.  Until now the Western European countries are dominating the list of the most powerful passport.

How is a passport strength determined?

Strength of a passport means how easy it is for you to travel around the world based on the value of your country’s passport.

Nomad Capitalist is a financial consulting company which has made a list(2018) of countries ranking them according to the strength of the passport.

How its the passport strength determined
Photo by Torsten Dettlaff from Pexels

The strength largely depends upon the economic and political stature which is frustrating because this could seriously restrict travellers international mobility.  However, there are other metrics according to Nomad Capitalist which better explain how and why are some countries passport are stronger than the others.

  1. Allowed number of countries: Every passport holder is allowed to travel a specific number of countries with either a visa on arrival or without a visa as well. This determines 50% for the total passport score that Noman Capitalist calculates.
  2. Taxes levied on overseas workers: The amount of tax that an individual who lives and earns overseas needs to pay in their country. This account for 20% of the passport score.
  3. Dual Citizenship: Wheather or not a country allows citizens to have citizenship of two or more countries. This accounts for 10% of the passport score.
  4. Country’s Image/Perception: This means how friendly or hostile is a country for foreigners and visitors. This account for 10% of the passport score.
  5. Level of Freedom: How freely are people allowed to live, travel, work, celebrate. This accounts for 10% for the passport score.

So, using these metrics, Western European countries (as mentioned earlier) rules the top spots on being the most powerful passports in the world. Below is the list of countries with the strongest passports.

CountryRank
Luxembourg1
Switzerland2
Portugal3
Sweden4
Italy5
Spain6
Finland7
Denmark8
Germany9
New Zealand10