Costa Rica Digital Nomad Visa

The threshold is measured on income already received rather than assets held, and it has two levels depending on whether the applicant comes alone or with the household.

Article 5(e) of Decree 43619 requires bank statements accompanied by a sworn declaration that those statements were requested and obtained through the financial institution itself, evidencing that over the past year the person has received a payment or remuneration originating abroad of at least three thousand US dollars per month.

Where legal stay is sought for the family group, that figure becomes four thousand dollars per month. Conversion uses the official selling rate set by the Central Bank of Costa Rica, not a market rate. Three details are easily missed.

First, the provision requires the money to come from abroad — a condition on origin, not merely on amount. Second, it measures across the whole preceding year rather than at the moment of filing, so one short month out of twelve is something to be explained.

Third, the gap between one person and a whole household is only one thousand dollars a month and does not scale with the number of dependants — four thousand is the figure for the group however many people it contains.

Besides statements, the authority accepts one alternative: a certification issued by a public accountant or notary public, or their equivalents abroad under the law of the place of issue.

What is granted is not residence status, and the law says so through the classification itself.

Article 1 of Decree 43619 provides that the foreign national is admitted and allowed to remain under the migration category of non-resident, subcategory estancia, or stay, styled “Remote Worker or Provider of Services”. It does so pursuant to Law No. 10008 of 11 August 2021, published in La Gaceta No. 168 of 1 September 2021.

This is the most easily inverted point about the route: it is commonly called a residence visa, yet the instrument creating it files the holder squarely in the category meant for people who are not resident.

The purpose is stated openly in the recitals too: to encourage long-stay visitation and increase spending of foreign-origin resources in the country. The substance of the status is tax rather than any right of residence.

Article 12 of the decree gives those in this subcategory the incentives in Title V of Law 10008, namely total exemption from the tax on profits under Title I of Law 7092, the Income Tax Law of 21 April 1988, and exemption from all import taxes on basic personal computing, it, telecommunications or analogous equipment needed for the work.

Article 14 of the decree lists exactly five items: personal computer, mobile telephone, tablet, camera, and one sound recording or reproduction device with accessories; equipment not forming part of the luggage must go through the exemption procedure on the Exonet system.

The sanction is tied straight to money: falsehood in the documents filed to obtain the visas or the benefits brings an order to pay immediately the whole of the exonerated taxes plus twenty-five per cent as a fine, without prejudice to the corresponding judicial proceedings.

Where legal stay was granted on false or altered documents the Migration Law applies instead.

One maintenance condition outside tax is worth knowing as well, although it is not an operative article of the decree: recital IX of Decree 43619 cites the fourth paragraph of Article 62 of the Code of Tax Rules and Procedures, under which failure to meet any obligation to the Costa Rican Social Security Fund, established through due process, is a ground for losing any exemption granted.

The authority is bound to a short deadline that comes with a clock-stop mechanism, and how it stops and restarts is the part worth reading. Article 7 of Decree 43619 gives the Immigration Management or the Regional Coordination fifteen calendar days from filing to resolve the subcategory application in writing.

Within a maximum of five calendar days of receiving the application, the handling office must issue a request for completion — and the decree states expressly that this is one time only, in writing, identifying the omitted requirements or asking the user to clarify. The five calendar days are the decree's; Article 7 of Law 10008 sets the check at five business days, so the two instruments do not count this step the same way.

The applicant then has eight business days to complete or clarify. Once everything is filed the clock does not restart but resumes counting the remainder of the fifteen days — a detail that favours the applicant, because it blocks extension by further questioning.

Conversely, if the requested items are not filed within those eight business days the application is denied by a reasoned administrative act and the file is archived.

After approval the clock switches to the applicant's side: the person and their dependants have three months to obtain the document accrediting their migratory status, failing which the authority begins proceedings to cancel the very status just granted.

For holders of a Vietnamese passport, the file carries one condition that comes before the fifteen-day clock. Viet Nam is in the third group of the general entry-visa directives issued by the immigration directorate on 17 November 2025, the group that requires a consular visa, and Article 5(d) of Decree 43619 requires a valid consular visa for the applicant's country group as a filing document, subject to the exceptions listed in those directives.

The decree gives preference to digital filing, but the directorate's page for this route, as archived on 29 August 2025, states that online filing is suspended until further notice and directs applicants to the directorate's service counter in Costa Rica; the current status of that page has not been verified. On documents, Costa Rica is not among the states that objected to Viet Nam's accession to the Apostille Convention, which entered into force for Viet Nam on 11 September 2026; for this route, Article 5(e) of Decree 43619 requires consular legalisation or an apostille only for the income certification issued by a public accountant or notary.

The route does carry a presence threshold, and it is tied to renewal: Article 15 of Law 10008 allows the single one-year extension only where the beneficiary has been in Costa Rica at least 180 days during the year originally granted, and Article 10 of Decree 43619 repeats that condition for renewal files. Beyond that threshold, the law imposes two maintenance conditions running throughout the authorised period.

First, Article 9 of Decree 43619: a medical services policy covering both the applicant and their dependants for the whole of the authorised period of legal stay, guaranteeing cover for medical expenses in case of illness in Costa Rica of at least fifty thousand US dollars.

The policy must come from an insurer licensed and duly registered with Costa Rica's General Superintendency of Insurance, or be an international policy meeting the equivalent requirement.

Second, Article 15 of Decree 43619, read with Articles 12 and 13 of Law 10008: the beneficiary must remain current with the requirements of the subcategory throughout the period authorised by the immigration directorate.

If they cannot show that the situation which qualified them still holds, or if they carry out work or provide services other than those authorised, the directorate cancels the status.

And the equipment import relief applies only while that migratory condition is held, so losing the status takes the relief with it.

The definition of the family group sits in the statute itself, at article 3.3: the family group comprises the spouse or de facto partner, children under twenty-five years of age, children of any age who have a disability, and older adults living with them.

An unmarried partner is recognised, evidenced by a document conclusively showing the declaration or recognition of the de facto union, issued no more than six months earlier.

Children under 25 face no financial dependency test and no requirement to be in education, but the implementing regulation attaches a condition the statute does not carry: the supporting document is a birth certificate for minors or for unmarried persons under 25.

A child with a disability at any age is evidenced by a medical opinion. An older adult living with the applicant need show no blood relationship, only the existence of a link or of cohabitation by sworn declaration; parents enter only through that limb, and there is no separate heading for parents, grandparents or siblings.

The additional financial requirement is real but is set for the group rather than per head: a sole applicant needs USD 3,000 a month, an application covering the family group needs USD 4,000, and the income of the spouse or of another member may be aggregated.

Each member pays a separate fee of USD 100 and must hold a separate medical insurance policy. Two provisions tighten this: the tax benefit attaching to this category does not extend to the family group, and family members lose their status when the principal loses theirs.

The status this programme grants, whether a visa or a residence permit, does not replace the holder's passport. The holder still travels on the passport of their own country, so the figure below belongs to the Costa Rica passport and becomes the holder's only once they are issued a Costa Rica passport.

According to the Passport Index of Prosperous Intelligence, on data dated 30 September 2026, the Costa Rica passport reaches 157 destinations without applying for a consular visa in advance. The figure combines three forms of entry and does not count an e-Visa that must be obtained beforehand:

It is therefore a measure of how easily the holder travels, not a count of visa-free countries in the narrow sense.

For comparison, on the same source and the same method of counting, the Vietnamese passport reaches 44 destinations. The two lists of destinations do not nest inside one another, so the difference is an indication rather than a list of places newly opened.

Prosperous Intelligence dates its data and advises checking with the destination’s official authorities before travelling.

This programme carries a genuine tax benefit, and the benefit is written into the statute.

Article 16 of Law 10008 grants beneficiaries total exemption from the tax on profits defined in Title I of Law 7092, the Income Tax Law, and then adds two decisive clauses:

In no case shall beneficiaries be considered habitual residents of the country for tax purposes, and income they receive from abroad shall not be treated as Costa Rican-source income.

The second paragraph of the same article provides that the tax benefit does not extend to family members; each person must apply separately and meet the conditions applying to the principal applicant.

The implementing regulation goes a step further than the statute, exempting beneficiaries from both the formal and the substantive duties owed to the Directorate General of Taxation.

Article 17 exempts from all import duty the basic personal equipment carried as baggage, namely computers, telephones, tablets, cameras and recording equipment.

Three provisions tighten this.

Article 13 requires payment of all tax obligations with interest and penalties where work is performed other than that authorised. Article 18 ends the benefits immediately upon the immigration authority cancelling beneficiary status.

Article 21 ties every benefit to the term of the immigration permit, which runs for at most one year and may be renewed once for a further year, subject to having been in the country at least 180 days of the first year.

Four payments to the Government at two moments, one of them fixed by the approval decision and one a guarantee deposit, plus a mandatory cost that is not a fee at all.

At filing, Article 5(b) of Decree 43619 requires proof of payment to the Government of one hundred US dollars, or the equivalent in colones at the Central Bank of Costa Rica's reference rate, under Article 256 of the General Migration and Aliens Law.

At collection, Article 8 requires three receipts together.

The first is for the amount stated in the approval resolution itself, under Article 251, a figure that is therefore not fixed and is known only once the decision issues.

The second is ninety US dollars for the application and issuance of the document accrediting legal stay, which already includes the sums destined for the special and social migration fund under Article 33(4) and (5), Article 252 and Article 253.

The third is a one-off guarantee deposit for non-residents in the estancia subcategory, at the amount set by Decree 36539, whose Article 14 fixes it at one hundred US dollars.

Beyond fees there is a far larger mandatory cost that readers often miss because it does not carry the name of a fee: the medical insurance policy guaranteeing at least fifty thousand US dollars, covering dependants too, in force for the whole period of stay.

It is a condition of grant, so it belongs in the cost of the route even though it is paid to an insurer rather than to the state.