Saudi Arabia Investor Visa

The threshold is seven million Saudi riyals, and the authority does not state it as a single figure but ties it to four different proofs.

Those four are four separate gates, so meeting one does not carry an applicant past another: a valid investment licence issued by the Ministry of Investment with a minimum value of SAR 7,000,000 as the applicant's own ownership share.

The company's Memorandum of Association in the Kingdom together with other documents proving an ownership share equivalent to at least SAR 7,000,000.

Proof of capital injection of at least SAR 7,000,000 for the applicant's share, through audited financial statements, a capital injection certificate, or any other documents as determined by the Center; and maintaining a minimum investment of SAR 7,000,000 through the first two years.

The figure is therefore not a sum paid once and finished with — it is a level that must be held, and whether it is held decides the residence status later.

One further condition carries no money but blocks just as firmly: proof of employing ten staff within the applicant's ownership share, verified through the company's GOSI certificate, and ten must likewise be maintained through the first two years.

Alongside sits a document with no figure attached: a valid commercial registration issued by the Ministry of Commerce in the Kingdom.

The product page itself carries a warning this table records verbatim rather than passing over: all requirements are subject to change.

Worth reading with it: the framework Law fixes no threshold at all — Article 3(2) leaves the products and their fees to be proposed by the Center's Board and approved by the Council of Economic and Development Affairs.

The outcome is permanent residence, but conditional permanent residence, and the two halves must travel together because dropping the second misstates what the route actually gives.

The product page files it under special benefits, verbatim: directly obtaining permanent residency. No temporary class first, no ladder to climb — that is what separates the investor route from most others in this table.

Yet the very next section on the same page puts conditions on what it has just granted: permanent residency is conditional upon fulfilling the following — maintaining a minimum investment of SAR 7,000,000 during the first two years, and maintaining a minimum of ten employees during the first two years.

The legal footing is Article 3(1) of the Law: the premium residency permit is of two types, permanent and fixed-term; the investor route falls in the first.

The decision does not rest on an automatic set of criteria: Article 5 provides that the Center reviews the application and decides thereon subject to public interest, with the permit issued pursuant to a decision by the CEO of the Center.

And Article 9 keeps a revocation door wider than the usual list of breaches:

Beyond cases such as conviction carrying imprisonment of not less than sixty days or a fine of not less than one hundred thousand riyals, false information in the application, or a deportation order, paragraph 2 lets the Board terminate the permit if public interest so warrants.

There is no expiry, but there is a clock, and the clock is what an applicant must watch. The permit is of the permanent type under Article 3(1) of the Law, so there is no expiry date to renew against, and the page does not mention renewal anywhere.

The clock sits elsewhere: the page mentions the first two years only in connection with two things that must be maintained — the SAR 7,000,000 investment, and the ten employees.

After those two years neither obligation is restated, but the page does not say what happens if either lapses midway, so freedom should not be inferred.

Two further periods sit in the Law, and both are short.

Article 4(1)(e) requires the medical report proving freedom from communicable diseases to be dated not more than six months before the application.

Article 6(1) gives the applicant thirty days from notification of the approval decision to pay the fees and provide a medical insurance policy. Miss it and, under paragraph 2, the application is deemed canceled.

The date the permit's validity begins is not fixed by the Law: Article 6(3) leaves it to the Implementing Regulations.

Residence rights here run wider than a place to live, and three of them are things most routes in this table do not give.

The product page lists nine general benefits, of which the three worth reading first concern movement and work:

The holder and their family may exit and return to Saudi without requiring a visa; they may use the tracks dedicated to citizens at airports; and they may work in the private sector and move freely between establishments, that right extending to the husband, the wife and dependents.

Three more touch property and business: own and usufruct real estate; obtain visit visas for relatives; and conduct business under the Investment Law.

But the property right carries a geographic limit the product page omits and the Law states plainly, so both must be read: Article 2(1)(d) allows ownership of real estate for residential, commercial and industrial purposes in areas other than the cities of Mecca and Medina and border areas.

Point (e) allows usufruct of real estate located in Mecca and Medina for a period not exceeding 99 years, with the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Investment setting the procedure for the usufruct deed.

Two entry conditions also sit in the Law: Article 4 requires proof of a clear criminal record, and requires the applicant to reside legally in the Kingdom if the application is filed from inside it.

One final limit, Article 10(3): apart from the rights granted to them specifically, the holder and their family remain subject to the laws applicable to non-Saudi residents.

Family is defined by three groups, and one of the three carries an age limit applications routinely miss. The product page states: reside in Saudi with family members, including parents, spouses, and children under 25.

That age limit sits in that one sentence and is not repeated anywhere else on the page, so a quick reading loses it.

Parents being inside the definition is itself uncommon: most routes in this table admit only spouses and children.

The right to work follows the dependants rather than stopping at the principal applicant, and the page describes that reach unusually widely, verbatim: the entitlement to work in the private sector and move between establishments applies to the husband, wife, and dependents, including the daughters' and sons' dependents.

The Law underpins all of this and adds two points the product page does not carry. First, Article 2(1)(c) permits the recruitment of domestic workers according to need.

Second, and more important because it speaks to the moment things fall apart: Article 11(1) provides that cancellation or termination of the permit does not transfer its rights to family members — anyone who qualifies must apply in their own right.

But paragraph 3 of the same article keeps one exception: where the permit is cancelled because the holder has died or lost competence, the family continue to enjoy its rights and privileges until the end of its validity period.

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 Saudi Arabia passport and becomes the holder's only once they are issued a Saudi Arabia passport.

According to the Passport Index of Prosperous Intelligence, on data dated 30 September 2026, the Saudi Arabia passport reaches 95 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.

The product page does not mention tax, income tax included; everything it says about money concerns fees and sums in riyals.

What is easily misread as a tax concession is a different thing entirely: the holder is exempt from the fees levied on expats, their dependents and their companions.

That is the per-head levy payable in Saudi by employers and foreign residents, not a tax, and calling it a tax exemption misstates both its nature and its reach.

The Law creates no separate tax regime either, and says the opposite plainly in two places. Article 10(3): apart from the rights and privileges granted specifically to the permit holder and their family under the Law and the Regulations, they remain subject to the laws, regulations and instructions applicable to non-Saudi residents.

And Article 2(1)(g), immediately after granting the right to work in the private sector, attaches a sentence preserving the money obligations: this privilege shall not prejudice the fees applicable to non-Saudis. Anyone who needs the actual tax position must therefore open the tax authority's own sources, not this residence portal.

The one-time fee is four thousand Saudi riyals, and the figure can be checked against two documents of the same Center.

The product page carries a onetime fee heading, and the English text prints: 4,000 SAR. The Arabic version of the same page prints 4,000 الاف ريـال سعودي, that is the figure in digits followed by the word for thousands. Read literally that would be four million, but the same page writes seven million riyals as 7 مليون, so the word الاف here repeats the figure rather than adding a second order of thousands.

The decisive document is the detailed conditions of the investor product, published under conditions and controls on the same portal: the Arabic text states the fee in digits and in words, verbatim (4,000) أربعة آلاف ريال سعودي, and the English text states four thousand (4,000) riyals; it is payable within thirty days of notification of approval.

The product page prints only that fee, but the detailed conditions add a second one: a processing fee of USD 170, charged at the registration and document submission stage. Beyond these two, the portal mentions fees only in the right to exemption from the fees imposed on expats and their dependents and companions.

That exemption is the larger money in this route, because it removes a recurring annual cost rather than a single payment.

The Law attaches two conditions to paying, both within thirty days of notification of approval, under Article 6(1): pay the fees approved by the Council of Economic and Development Affairs, and provide a medical insurance policy under the Cooperative Health Insurance Law.

Failing either within the period cancels the application.

And the amount is not fixed by statute: Article 3(2) lets the Center's Board propose products together with their fees, for approval by the Council of Economic and Development Affairs — so the figure can change without the Law being amended.