Sri Lanka Golden Visa

The condition is a deposit rather than a purchase: the applicant opens a Golden Paradise Foreign Currency Account at a local bank licensed by the Central Bank of Sri Lanka and deposits a minimum of US$200,000.

The investor may withdraw up to 50 per cent of that minimum investment amount after completing the first year from the date the visa is issued.

One discrepancy between two documents of the same authority is worth noting: internal circular no. 01/2022/visa of 25 May 2022, still posted on the Department e-services portal, states a minimum investment of US$100,000 and requires that a minimum of US$50,000 be maintained in the account throughout the visa period after the first year.

The US$200,000 figure is the one on the live programme page

The outcome is a residence visa and it stops there — a boundary read from the source itself rather than inferred: the programme page does not mention citizenship, permanent residence or naturalisation.

The programme publishes no route from this visa to permanent residence or Sri Lankan citizenship, says nothing about what happens once the ten years end, and contains no renewal or transfer provision.

On who benefits, the authority describes this as a programme for investors together with their families, so what is created is a family package rather than an individual status to which others are later added. And the point that matters most about its nature: this status is not separable from the deposit.

It is not a completed outcome but a maintained state — the deposit stays in the applicant’s own name in a foreign currency account rather than passing to anyone, and it is released only when the visa ends.

The authority also publishes a separate document for this route titled Legal Facilitation, downloadable from the programme page itself.

The visa runs for ten years, and the visa fee of US$2,000 is payable once for the whole of that ten-year period. The short clock sits in the paperwork: the police clearance report must be obtained from the country of domicile within six months.

On processing speed, circular no. 01/2022/visa describes the procedure as the application being entered into the visa system and then forwarded to the Competent Authority for approval of the ten-year visa under the Immigrants and Emigrants Act within one week of submission.

If approved a visa grant email is sent, and if not, a rejection email

A Golden Paradise visa holder may invest, live and study in Sri Lanka. The investment may take one of four directions: a government-approved investment; the purchase of a condominium property in Sri Lanka; obtaining lands and buildings on a lease basis; or the purchase of Sri Lanka Development bonds.

One post-approval step is rarely mentioned: under circular no. 01/2022/visa, the Personal Particular Form together with the police clearance report is sent to the ministry of defence for security clearance, and if that clearance fails the Golden Paradise visa already granted is cancelled, with the holder informed by email.

On cancellation the deposited sum may be withdrawn.

A holder wishing to cancel voluntarily does so by written request, and the investment is released upon cancellation of the visa of the holder, the spouse and the dependants

For a spouse and dependants the programme page requires three documents: the marriage certificate; a police clearance report obtained from the country of domicile of the spouse; and the birth certificates of the dependants.

Circular no. 01/2022/visa states the scope more precisely: the spouse and children below 16 years are eligible for this Golden Paradise visa.

The same circular makes clear that the US$2,000 visa payment for the ten-year period must be paid for the spouse and dependants as well, so the fee is charged per person rather than per application

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 Sri Lanka passport and becomes the holder's only once they are issued a Sri Lanka passport.

According to the Passport Index of Prosperous Intelligence, on data dated 30 September 2026, the Sri Lanka passport reaches 32 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 three official documents of the programme — the visa page, the internal circular and the Department of Immigration and Emigration brochure — do not mention tax, taxation or exemption.

No exemption, no special rate, no undertaking of any kind about tax treatment. Internal Circular No. 01/2022/visa of 25 May 2022 closes that door with a catch-all: government rules and regulations will be applicable for any privileges under Golden Paradise visa.

There is nonetheless real tax content for this record, and it sits in an unexpected place: two exemptions in the Third Schedule to the Inland Revenue Act fall squarely on two of the investment channels the programme requires.

Paragraph 3(i)(iii), effective from 1 January 2020, exempts interest accruing to any person on moneys lying to their credit in foreign currency in any foreign currency account opened by them or on their behalf in any commercial bank or specialised bank, with the approval of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka.

The programme account is exactly such an account.

Paragraph 3(l)(ii) exempts interest or discount on government securities issued in foreign currency, including Sri Lanka Development Bonds — again one of the channels the programme lists.

But one distinction must be held: those exemptions attach to the type of account and the type of instrument, not to the status of the visa holder; anyone opening such an account qualifies, and a visa holder who places funds elsewhere does not.

On the tax-residence line, section 69(1)(b) of the Inland Revenue Act No. 24 of 2017 as consolidated to the 2025 changes treats an individual as resident where present in Sri Lanka for an aggregate of 183 days or more in any twelve-month period commencing or ending during the year; paragraph (a) adds the test of residing in Sri Lanka.

The Inland Revenue Department rate chart for the 2025/2026 year of assessment divides income in this order: the first LKR 1,000,000, the next 500,000, the next 500,000, the next 500,000, and the balance. The rate on each band:

Gains on realisation of investment assets at 10%; a personal relief for residents and non-resident citizens of LKR 1,800,000, not available against gains on investment assets; and foreign-source income received in foreign currency and remitted to Sri Lanka through a bank taxed at a maximum of 15%.

Some programme parameters are needed to read those exemptions in context.

The applicant must open the programme dedicated foreign currency account at a bank licensed by the Central Bank and deposit a minimum of USD 200,000, with up to 50% of the minimum withdrawable after the first year.

The visa runs ten years, at a fee of USD 2,000 for the whole term, and the deposit is released only on cancellation of the visa.

The 2022 circular still carries the old figures of USD 100,000 with a minimum of USD 50,000 maintained throughout — two sets of figures from the same authority, of which the newer is the one on the programme page.

Read this cell within its scope: no provision gives a holder of this visa an election of tax regime, a grace period, or an exemption for income arising outside Sri Lanka beyond the 15% ceiling available to everyone; and the full text of the Central Bank instrument governing this class of account has not been checked at source.

The visa fee is the only charge the programme page publishes, and the first thing to do is separate it from the deposit: the USD 200,000 is not a cost but money held in the applicant’s own name, released when the visa is cancelled — putting it in a cost column misreads how the programme works.

The real costs that no fee schedule captures sit in the mandatory documents, and the heaviest of them is the medical report. The authority requires one issued by an authorised local hospital, clearing every applicant of four named diseases: malaria, filariasis, tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS.

The word local is what decides both the money and the schedule: an examination abroad will not substitute, so the whole family must be in Sri Lanka for this step, and the travel cost of the whole party becomes part of the cost of the file.

For the same reason the application must be submitted in person at the Head Office of the Department of Immigration and Emigration, not by post and not online.

One marker of currency for readers to weigh: the footer of this very page carries a copyright line reading 2010–2022.