Show HN: Compare benefits of second passport based on the one you have | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: Compare benefits of second passport based on the one you have

multinational.io

201 pointsaskytb143 comments

I believe Germany makes you renounce your old citizenship in most (not all) cases to gain German citizenship, but you have it listed as allowing it?

Though I believe they recently made an exception for Americans getting charged ridiculous fees to renounce if it was more than a month of income, or similar.

Thanks for making this! I'm a US citizen applying for naturalization in a few months. Here's to 7% more territory! Though really, the EU ought to be something of a block since it means the right to live and work throughout, not just in one country. For now, at least.

Also, worth noting that Republic of Ireland might get a bonus factor, in a sense, for soon being the only passport that lets you work throughout the EU and the UK.

To give you some data point with regard to enforcement, my SO has a Japanese passport and acquired US citizenship. No issues entering/leaving Japan after acquiring US citizenship. Japan technically allows only Japanese citizenship past age of 20.

I also have a friend that was born with both US and Japanese. Didn’t have to pick. However, US embassy indicates that even if you notify Japan that you pick Japanese and renounce other citizenships, it is in fact a very formal process (almost difficult) to lose US citizenship.

The United States is (I think) the only country that makes overseas citizens pay taxes. So they have a financial interest in making it difficult.

United States and Eritrea.

It’s quite irregular. As an American abroad, we get zero awareness or sympathy from people „back home“. They either assume it is normal among countries or that it doesn’t exist.

Taxation treaties only go so far. Declaration overhead, schedule category, and tests make the process hellish. And I haven’t even begun to mention the FBAR and other disclosures. It hurts everyday Americans abroad and barely differentiates against real versus nominal income and cost level.

Even if you are entirely overseas? Belgium makes you do it unless you spend more than half your time in the other country.

Yes, even if you are entirely overseas. The US and Eritrea are the only countries in the world that tax all world-wide income. As long as you are a US citizen, you can live anywhere else in the world for however long you want, and you are still taxed in the US and have to file and pay taxes every April.

Not only that, you are required to disclose all of your foreign bank accounts and their balances on a special "FBAR" form to the FinCEN (separate agency from the IRS). Penalties for any "violations" start at $10,000 each (for so-called "non-willful" violations such as using the wrong currency conversion rate or a different bank branch address) and go up to 25% account value for willful violations (everything is conveniently considered "willful" whenever possible to FinCEN in absence of fact, even the aforementioned common mistakes). Many expats get screwed because they simply didn't know about this esoteric form. Hiring a professional to properly prepare your FBAR with their signature on it is necessary as a form of "insurance" (you are welcome to roll the dice and self-prepare), and of course, it is also an expensive proposition.

There is also no clear guidance for what the disclosure requirements are for foreign cryptocurrency exchange accounts or wallets. Anyone living inside or outside the US with a Binance account could get slammed at anytime in the future for not submitting an FBAR.

If before leaving the US, you lived in California, you also have to pay California state taxes on all world-wide income every year, since you are still considered a California "resident."

There is a foreign earned income exemption up to around 100k. This applies to ordinary income only, not capital gains (e.g. cryptocurrency), and you have to meet rather-stringent requirements to qualify. Also, the exempted income still pushes up your capital gains bracket to the highest applicable rate. This exemption does not apply to your California taxes, only your federal taxes.

You almost never hear about how disfavorable the US tax laws are for expats because there are only 8 million of us.

No taxation without representation, right?

Well, to your representation point, you still get to vote, don't you?

Expats aren't represented by any electoral college votes:

https://www.economist.com/democracy-in-america/2016/11/02/am...

If you're still paying to be a resident of California (using your example, would you remain in the district in which you "resided")?

Yes, exactly, so you will be misrepresented.

Thank you for the detailed answer. That really sucks. Do we know what mechanisms the IRS has to confirm the accuracy of what you report?

FACTA and auditing are the main mechanisms.

Foreign banks are required to report information about accounts owned by US citizens to the FinCEN (this is called FACTA). You may remember being asked if you are a US citizen when you opened your foreign account -- this is why. If the banks don't provide this information to the US government, then they are heavily sanctioned. Many criticize FACTA for its world policing, and past attempts at repealing it, spearheaded by none other than Rand Paul, have been struck down by the courts.

If something doesn't match up between what the banks reported about you and what you reported, then this triggers an audit. Then, the IRS will request documentation, and if you do not provide it or if it does not match, then you are criminally charged with tax evasion, facing heavy fines and jail time.

This whole sour experience of being an expat and getting screwed in multiple ways has literally turned me into a tax reform lobbyist. It's quite a different experience than importing your W-2 into Turbo Tax in 30 minutes and getting a refund every year like 99% of Americans.

Yes. Even if you've been gone 10 years and never visit and never plan on returning. Some folks find they technically need to pay tax because their parents are American - even though they've never stepped foot on American soil.

There are exceptions for local taxes, but you still have to file tax returns.

> I believe Germany makes you renounce your old citizenship in most (not all) cases to gain German citizenship, but you have it listed as allowing it?

Same for The Netherlands[1]

[1] https://www.government.nl/topics/dutch-nationality/dual-nati...

You can keep the previous citizenship (and thus have two) if you're a citizen of another EU country or Switzerland. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_nationality_law#Dual_ci...

It doesn't seem that OP takes in such conditions into the dual citizenship data. Would be nice if he did.

Not quite. There are exceptions: I got to keep my British citizenship because my wife is Dutch.

I can confirm this. According to my Netherlands immigration lawyer I can acquire Dutch citizenship because my wife is a Dutch citizen, without needing to renounce my US citizenship.

My guess is that acquisition-by-marriage falls under a different rules category than vanilla naturalization by time and integration and learning the civics and language, which is the pathway an adult would have to take moving to a place where there was no bloodline binding.

IF you gain Dutch citizenship by descent, you don't have to renounce your first citizenship.

There are loopholes. I am a us-german-uk-other citizen, due to birth in Germany and naturalisation in the us and another country as a child. Acquiring new citizenships as an adult is difficult, but also possible if i obtain a waiver.

You can obtain the German citizenship without renouncing to the Chilean. From what I remember, you can't acquire a third (need to renounce to one). This is also true for other EU passports.

Fortunately most countries don’t/can’t keep track of who the other countries have on their citizenship roster.

Best second passport for an Australian: Germany.

... well, I guess that means I’m a lucky person when it comes to passports. When I reverse search, the best second passport for a German is “Application Error”, and I sure have plenty of those as well :)

It's showing Ivory Coast now. Probably because one will get access to several African nations.

But which African countries sell citizenship?

Pretty much all countries probably will sell citizenship if you're a multi-billionaire.

The UK situation, for example:

>"Officially called a “Tier 1 investor” visa in the UK, the scheme gives individuals residency in exchange for investing £2m in UK bonds or shares through a bank, with applicants eligible for indefinite leave to remain, and even full citizenship, after five years. That is, unless they can stump up more cash: those offering £5m can settle after three years, and those with £10m after just two." (https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jul/04/golden-visa-...)

Now it's the Grauniad so I don't expect it to be completely right but I expect it's close -- [THIS BIT IS WRONG, PROPERTY INVESTMENT IS EXCLUDED: so make a company to buy your small pied-a-terre in London for a few £Million and you get access to citizenship.]

Things have tightened up recently for Russians, not sure about others.

> Things have tightened up recently for Russians

I believe it's for everyone, you basically have to indicate where your money is coming from to a higher degree of detail. It's an anti-money-laundering measure, I think, more than anything. The situation had become shameful, with London being the black-economy capital of the world.

I mean, at competitive prices compared to others like Dominica

I just don't see it being that accessible in Africa.

One thing I noticed: for me (Kiwi/Brit), India is listed as "visa on the border/online" and the USA and Canada are listed as "visa free". But in practice the process is about the same, because the "visa waiver" programmes (ESTA/ETA) now require online registration, and the Indian "e-visa" can now be done online. Admittedly the Indian e-visa is more expensive and requires a bit more information to be supplied, but I wonder if, "visa-free" travel and "visa" travel are converging...

The not-a-visa visa (ESTA) is done to get around international visa waiver agreements and avoid retaliation. Now that the US has gotten away with it other countries are following suit.

The registration for the VWP lasts even after you leave and come back, its not the same as applying for an actual visa online.

As an actual dual citizen, let me tell you the downside:

Keeping two passports up to date is a non trivial amount of work and expenses, and perhaps travel. Depending on the two countries, of course.

Unless you travel a fair amount, it is often not worth the effort. I've given up on keeping my old passport current, and feel good!

Yeah, it's a bit of a bother logistically because of where the embassy is located, and one cannot be sure you get processed that day if the queues are long. So I keep just one of the passports as paper version (the country where I reside) and use that when travelling. For the other one, I have no paper passport; I do have the social security number which I can use when necessary.

Mind you these are two Nordic countries so it is not much of a difference either way.

Even for voting, which the tool misses, is conviently done. I vote in country B elections from country A. They have lists of country B social security number with a name for the eligible votets, I have the paper which they mailed to me from B and present that while I prove myself using passport/driver's license of country A. Then I vote remotely, in advance to the actual voting day.

Voting in EU elections works the same way, but is done for one country only.

Hmmm. I have dual citizenship for Australia and Estonia, both of which offer 10-year passports. It's also possible to moderately easily get the 'other' passport when located in each country. Thinking about it I guess I could be pretty fortunate, and this might not be the case with other combinations.

For what two countries are you a dual citizen? Which one isn't worth the effort to keep up to date?

I'm a dual citizen for the United States and Mexico, and it's fairly easy to update my Mexican passport here in the United States - not sure if that's the case inversely.

For many you either need to do it in the issuing country or at an embassy. Example: https://ottawa.mfa.gov.hu/eng/page/utlevel-igenylese

I live in vancouver so my choices include a 4.5 hrs flight to Toronto, paying very close attention when they travel to Vancouver (which is effin rare, see https://ottawa.mfa.gov.hu/eng/page/kihelyezett-uegyfelfogada... -- right now if you try to get an appointment you simply get a 'no appointments available' error) or just renew my passport in Hungary. For me, that's relatively easy since I am back there at least twice a year so that's OK. But the bastards just changed the procedures so the valid date is your last birthday so when I recently renewed I got 9 years and 1.5 months instead of ten years. And, if all goes by plan in a few years I won't travel to Hungary ever again so this will become a major hassle but as long as the idiot government doesn't pull a Huxit it's still worth it because it gives me free movement in the EU.

For my European country, you can renew at the consulate in San Francisco 1-2 times a year, but the slots sell out as fast as Burning Man. The passport costs ~$200, and I think it's only valid for 5 years, not 10, when you're not a resident.

I have been hit with $150-200 visa fees 2-3 times with my US passport that my European one would have avoided, but in hindsight it was a good deal.

I've wondered about becoming a 'citizen of the world': what is the combination of passports that grants citizenship to the most nations? For example, this immigration attorney cites a client who held 8 concurrent citizenships[1]:

Cape Verde (through economic citizenship)

Belize (though economic citizenship)

Dominica (through economic citizenship)

Grenada (through economic citizenship)

Saint Kitts and Nevis (through economic citizenship)

Ireland (island) (through lineage)

Canada (through naturalization)

The United Kingdom (through naturalization in a British Overseas Territory)

[1] https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-greatest-number-of-citizen...

To me this represents more of a risk than a benefit. If you enter on a Venezuelan passport and that government decides it wants something from you, the host country might be obligated to hand you over regardless of your interesting variety of passports.

You could always get help from the embassies of your other passports' countries.

most embassies are unable to help if you are in the country of your other citizenship. e.g. i won't get "help" from the UK if I'm in trouble in NZ (UK/NZ national)

> Ireland (island)

Curious why you added (island)?

He probably used it as a shorthand for "Republic of", to distinguish it from Northern Ireland.

Northen Irish passport is the UK one mentioned later :) As an Irish passport holder (human) I found it funny.

It just tells me "Application error". What's the difference between that and https://www.passportindex.org/comparebyPassport.php?

It's down so I can't see, but I assume this is doing a calculation I tried to do using passportindex and had trouble with:

Most passport rankings are by total number of places you can go. But given I already have one passport, what value do I get from a second passport? For example, Canada, USA, Uk, etc have fairly similar sets of countries you can go to. But maybe there's a passport that gets me access to the various middle Eastern and African countries I don't have access to. So maybe something lower overall rated is better as my 2nd passport.

Check the tab "Improve" on the passportindex.

It'll show you what you get out of a second, third etc passport.

Iran? Pakistan?

It's back up, but thanks for sharing the link for the passport index. I never knew about that site.

Down again

As a dual UK & Australian citizen I'd be keen to see 'Brexit Mode' - I imagine that other EU passports suddenly become more desirable...

One thing that may have been good to add, is the length of time / financial requirements to get citizenship.

For example, I'm personally planning to move to Ireland relatively soon; in part because it's one of the easiest to get dual citizenship (5 of the last 9 years)[1].

[1] https://www.quora.com/Which-EU-country-has-the-easiest-citiz...

Same, though not solely for EU citizenship, but also because I love Ireland. My issue is just getting a job, so it's likely going to be back to school for me, which will push off the counter for years, but give me more networking opportunities.

Something I'm still trying to figure out is if I can have a remote job. There are plenty of jobs that are remote.

The thing that's difficult in Ireland is internet access if you're living outside of Dublin. We looked at moving to Dingle for a bit, but we couldn't find anything available (from America) that had high speed internet. Granted, it was out in the countryside, so I completely understand, but it was a non-starter as far as going there for a remote job was. It's just something you have to keep in mind that if you're coming from an American city you may not think about.

Was that a while ago? Dingle town (and many other small towns in Kerry) have fibre: https://fibrerollout.ie/rollout-map/ .

Lots of houses have been connected in the last 2-3 years.

Yeah, it was a few years ago. That's amazing, though. I'm going to have to show my wife this map!

Good luck! It's one of the easier european ones. Three years should you happen to find yourself with an Irish spouse btw.

Already married and kids :) so no going back now! Lol

Passports.io is a good resource for that.

https://passports.io

I would be wary about having a dual citizenship if you are intending to do security clearance government work in the states.

I was actually going to work for the US government during my junior to senior year at school. I had 3 internships lined up. One in Germany, one with a REU doing gold nanoparticle fabrication at an IVY league school, and one with the government. But at the last moment got burned because I wasn't able to gain security clearance. I even did drug tests etc and the process took me several months, I accepted the position many months prior before summer started

They never gave me a valid reason but I was grilled on the fact a few weeks prior that I recently renewed my 10 year contract with my birthplace's citizenship.

I live in America. The government treats it as a moral gray area for you to work in high secure areas while having a dual citizenship, especially if its recently renewed (which was the case for me, my 10 yr dual citizenship was going to expire around same time I was going to work for US government). The other citizenship I had was a 1st world country as well with very good relations to USA, so it was kind of weird.

This is interesting.

It could include better information for dual citizenship. For example, I searched for China, which does not allow dual citizenship at all, and the search results showed the results for the reciprocal relationship country. Because of the complexity of countries reciprocal relationships, I guess this would need to be a 1-1 mapping country to country.

I liked you used the term 'Select your current passport:' and avoided the term 'country' because some passports are for territories.

So I checked a territory, Hong Kong. There wasn't an option whether this is the modern HKSAR or the old British National (Overseas), or could it be British Overseas Citizenship? These are all edge cases, cumulatively edge-cases for 10s of millions of people, but perhaps they're better solved by local services rather than a general solution.

The main problem of dual-citizenship I've seen is when one embassy says they can't deal with a problem, so go to the other embassy. The other embassy says the same. A bit of a no-man's-land.

Cool! With my 2nd citizenship (italian) I get +Brazil, Iran, and Venezuela.. wait.

That said, always been planning on using my 2nd citizenship to live in Europe for an extended period of time. My wife is British, and pretty soon, might need the connection through me to have EU benefits...

You can actually figure out what your best 3rd citizenship is by passing the parameters into the URL e.g.,

https://multinational.io/best_passport/the%20United%20Kingdo...

The blue SJ territory between Greenland and Russia is Svalbard, part of Norway. (not a bug in the map!)

It's not part of the Schengen zone, so will allow people to enter visa free but presumably you need visitor rights to the country you're coming from (compare Andorra).

Maybe I'm out of the loop but I feel like the utility would be greatly increased with a sentence or two. I have no idea what the values in the table mean, let alone why I'd want or need a second passport. (Also, what "HDI" is)

FYI: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Development_Index

I think it's funny that HDI doesn't have a tooltip hover, but the other 4 spelled-out headings do.

Can't be a dual chinese / american citizen. Would be nice for my family.

I know several people that are dual citizens of China and US. China doesn't recognise the second citizenship, but that doesn't prevent you having it. If China finds out, though, they'll apparently strip you of your Chinese citizenship.

Travel between US/CN will be a hassle for those people because the border control officials of China won't let you board the flight if you show your CN passport doesn't have US visa. One loophole is that you can use Hong Kong as the middle hop since you don't need passport to visit HK.

The dual citizen status is actually very common. If a child's parents are Chinese citizen working/studying in US with a temporary visa (H1b, F1) and the child was born in US, the child is eligible to be a Chinese citizen, thus a dual citizenship.

I believe they will force you to pick one of the two.

Worth noting that Brexit spiked Rep of Ireland passport applications given that everyone in Northern Ireland is eligible.

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/brexit-ai...

This says that Denmark does not have dual citizenship. It seems [1] that may be not true.

[1] https://www.thelocal.dk/20141218/denmark-passes-dual-citizen...

I can confirm this isn't true. Danish/US dual-national right here. Denmark is fully aware of my US citizenship.

How did you become a dual national?

Born in Denmark to a Danish father and American mother. When you're born on foreign soil to an American parent that parent declares your birth to the United States and you receive a Consular Report of Birth Abroad: your US birth certificate.

I know for a fact the Danish state allows for dual-nationals because I just renewed my Danish passport and because of new biometrics requires dual-nationals to give a copy of this Report.

There's one big downside to all this, since Denmark now knows very clearly I am two people. Should the state decide to revoke this law I will most likely be forced to choose. Which would be unfortunate, since I can't imagine living in just one or the other country.

Could you include years of residency to obtain the second passport in your calculation?

Is there something like this that takes into account long term stays?

I.e. if I'm a US Citizen, it would probably be more advantageous to have an EU Nation 2nd Passport so I have unrestricted access to all EU member countries

American abroad here:

My utility function optimizes for having a secondary citizenship in a stable place should the U.S. go down the toilet even more than it has. Switzerland it is for me. (it’s self-standingly awesome enough to want citizenship here outside of the aforementioned).

Also: maybe I want to slum it a bit more elsewhere in Europe without having to have a specialized visa to permit my working somewhere without a well-paying job, which is basically a requirement for Americans in Europe.

Also also: the old world is really nice place to raise a child and is family friendly.

How do you calculate the score for best second citizenship in detail? You should probably add a page for that.

I.e. I get told that the best second nationality I could get is Serbian... Why though?

With a Serbian passport you can travel visa-free for instance to Russia, Cuba, China.

That’s due to agreements between non-aligned counties signed by Jugoslavia that Serbia inherited.

You cannot still enter those countries without a visa with an EU passport, thus making a Serbian passport quite advantageous if you are a EU citizen.

A nitpick: none of the countries you listed were in the non-aligned movement.

Thanks for pointing this out!

I should have said that Jugoslavia had different friends that most other European countries, and Serbia inherited some of those agreements.

So did I! Although my country, Ireland, isn't explicitly listed.

Looks like it takes "territory" (+40%) as a major input. Russia, China and Mongolia are big countries by land area which have a good understanding with Serbia, but nothing special with EU states. Guessing most Europeans will also hit Serbia. What's the actual most useful second passport to an Irish person? Probably American.

I have to think American citizenship would be a pretty bad choice for a second passport, since America taxes its citizens on income earned abroad. You'd be approximately doubling your taxes if you are already taxed on income while abroad.

(FWIW I'm an American)

Right, does this site take into account the obligations, along with the additional freedoms a second citizenship grants? The US' overreaching expat tax laws are a great example, what about the countries that have a mandatory year or two of civil/military service?

America will let you deduct your foreign taxes, so if you live and pay taxes in a high tax country then you in theory won't actually owe anything to the US, but instead you'll owe your accountant for helping you file.

Don't forget about FATCA, the penalties are incredibly stiff (failure to report yields penalties that are a significant fraction of the amount of money on deposit). Being a US citizen has great benefits, but it comes with large obligations.

Oh yeah, and good luck getting a foreign bank account if you don't already have one. Heck, if you have an American bank account, I've heard European banks don't want to deal with you even if you're a solely European citizen living in Europe.

Interesting. I was not aware. Wouldn't you still owe the IRS money if the foreign taxes are deducted?

As far as I understand tax deductions work like: Initial Income - Deduction = Adjusted Income. Then, you owe full taxes on the Adjusted Income.

Let's say European Tax Rate is 40%, American Tax Rate is 20% (hypothetically!)

Foreign income is 100k USD equivalent.

You pay 40k taxes in Europe and are left with 60K.

You deduct 40K from Initial Income, leaving you with adjusted income of 60K. You then pay 20% of that (12K) to the IRS, leaving you with 48K.

So you’re in this hypothetical tax range taxed at less than US+European tax, but still have an effective tax rate much greater than not having US citizenship.

Simple formula I think:

Effective Tax = Income x EuropeanTaxRate + (Income-Income x EuropeanTaxRate) x AmericanTaxRate

Factor out income etc. I’m on my phone :-)

You don't pay taxes on on your first like 118k in income [1]. Because this lowers your AGI even if you make more than that you still start at the bottom of the tax bracket. Rough example you make 125k thus 125k-118k - 7k in taxable income thus in 10% bracket. There are obviously other rules for non W-2 income and property taxes.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_earned_income_exclusio...

It's not a deduction, it's a credit so it effectively reduces the amount you pay in taxes to the US by the amount you paid to the foreign country.

Also, you do get an additional separate exemption/deduction (i.e. NOT a credit) up to around the first 100k of foreign earned income, if you meet some rather stringent qualifications.

There are ways to structure things using a foreign corporation to reduce your tax liability. This is changing though with the new 2017 Trump Tax "Cuts" and Jobs Act, which now requires expat business owners to report even their leftover business income as their own personal income (GILTI).

Many expat small business owners stand to be financially devastated because the law even taxes previous business income from the last 30 years in a so-called "transition tax." Ouch.

American citizenship is probably the next choice, if just for extra State Department freebies.

It's normal for troublesome countries to give more more security to journalists and other American citizens, and the US government rescues idiots stuck North Korea all the time. Most other countries wouldn't lift a finger for their citizens if that would have a significant monetary cost.

The best passports are ones that lets you work, live and travel in a major economy without restrictions.

As you already have the EU covered, US, China or Japan would be good ones. I think Japan does not allow for dual citizenship though.

Agreed, those are good second passports to have.

> I think Japan does not allow for dual citizenship though.

Like Japan, China and the US also do not allow a second citizenship through naturalization. The US oath of allegiance requires you to "renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty". The loophole is that most countries don't allow you to renounce your citizenship just by informing some foreign flunky, so just saying it doesn't make it so. For naturalization, none of China, Japan or the US require documentary evidence that you are no longer a citizen of another state.

"For naturalization, none of China, Japan or the US require documentary evidence that you are no longer a citizen of another state."

That's because international law doesn't allow for states to make citizens stateless. E.g. in The Netherlands, a condition of getting citizenship is that you promise to renounce other citizenships within x time, and your Dutch one will be taken away if you don't. Not saying that any of the countries you listed have similar requirements, I don't know about that, I'm just adding some nationality law pedantry.

Australia is probably the best second passport for EU citizens, since that makes you eligible for E-3 visa to the US as well as the APEC card to China and Russia.

> Although my country, Ireland, isn't explicitly listed.

It's listed as the Republic of Ireland, afaict.

It’s under “Republic of Ireland”

Thanks. I found it there - otherwise, I couldn't have given the details above - but that's the name of the country's soccer team. The country's name is Ireland and that's what appears on my passport and in any official documents produced in any country in the world.

Apparently "Republic of Ireland" is officially the description but not the name of the state: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_the_Irish_state

I guess it's similar to Germany being the "Federal Republic of Germany", or China being either the "People's Republic of China" (mainland) or the "Republic of China" (Taiwan).

It's a total of differently weighted values for all the extra visa free countries, land, population and hdi/freedom of press of the target country. So we're aiming at a country that'd give you access to the most new countries/land/population while being relatively developed and not too totalitarian.

Hmm… Interesting… Just throwing this out there, would any lady from Serbia be interested in marrying me?

The maps on the comparative pages could use a different (ideally equal area) projection. At present, the free-for-all status of Svalbard is extremely prominent :-)

TIL my shiny new Dutch passport gets me into Iran (British one did not). That’s pretty cool.

Very cool. It'd be nice to be able to type in the select box because scrolling hundreds of countries is not fun.

Also some countries are hard to find even in alphabetical order. e.g. South Korea == Korea, South == Republic of Korea == Korea, Republic of

You are missing working holiday schemes - typically one of the easier ways to get a chance of moving abroad. Caveat is they are mostly under 30-yo type of deal, but its quite feasible to gain citizenships before that.

Can I ask how you made the world map that is interactive and color-coded?

It uses https://www.chartkick.com/

Where did you get the data?

I have just driven down West Africa, and I can tell you the "visa requirements" are very fluid, and what applies one day does not necessarily apply the very next!

Would love to read a blog post about this when you’ve got the time to spare during your adventure!

About the visas?

[1] is the most I've written.

I documented where you can get every single Visa while on the move, and how much they each cost in my eBook "Overland Travel Essentials: West Africa: Myths, Misconceptions and Misnomers" [2]

[1] - http://theroadchoseme.com/west-african-visas

[2] - https://amzn.to/2O75Uxr

Thank you!

Could you please add options for 3 passports? I actually have US/Canada/Finland and it would be interesting to see, although US v Canada is probably almost identical.

The site actually has this option. Choose two passport to compare, and click on the link “best third passport”, and select your country

It shows that I don't need a visa as a German going to USA.

Is this really true?

I had the impression I can't simply go to USA whenever and as long as I wanted, which sounds like needing a visa to me.

Not needing a visa and not being able to stay for as long as you wanted are two different things, what you're looking for is "free movement". If you hover "ease of travel" on the best second passport page, they show this with "freedom of movement > visa free > visa on the border".

Eg for a lot of asian countries, we european can go at will, without a visa, as long as you stay for 30 days or less. It's not a visa on arrival either, they merely stamp your passport with the entry date. But if you want to stay longer, you need to ask for a visa (and for some countries, you can do that visa on arrival, in the airport).

However for the US, us european still need to apply to the ESTA, which is a visa in anything but in name. I'm not sure why the EU is not forcing the US to drop it for us, or force it back on US citizen coming here, because this seems to be a trickery against the "no visa required" deal.

Tourism economy is why the EU doesn't reciprocate the ESTA policy.

US Can do without tourism (it's actively sacrificed tourism with successive post 9/11 travel restrictions) but the EU countries would suffer greatly.

Have you considered adding the possibility to input multiple passports you already hold?

Like if I already have 2, and am trying to decide on a 3rd, it'd be difficult to compare all 3.

You can do it from the https://multinational.io/compare_passports/ page. (And if'd like to add more than two you can manually add it to the url)

This is a cool site! One minor bug, the “third passport” link in the “see also” section seems to be mistranslated. It says “nacionales” instead of “nationals”.

If I wasn't so lazy, life hacking my way around the world to get multiple citizenships sounds kinda fun. serious. i wonder if anyone has done this...

Have got Belgium, US, and Auzzie citizenship :)

Would really be nice if I could select the region and/or countries I'm more interested in to know what the second best passport would be.

Abkhazia and South Ossetia are not countries though.

They are nevertheless territories with a local government which enforces restrictions on entry. For the purpose of travel restrictions they are very similar to ordinary countries.

This will be more useful after Brexit...

This is awesome. Great idea, it works.

What about actual multinationals?

There's an option for a third best passport for dual-citizens on the best passports page: http://multinational.io/best_passport

I've already got three.

Impressive! You can add the third one to the url manually, e.g. http://multinational.io/best_passport/the%20United%20States+...

Meh, it's not that exciting, but thanks for the tip!

most stupid comparison. the number of visa free countries is completely bullshit. who wants to travel to saudia arabia or sudan. the real benefit of a second passport is whether that passport allows you to live in a country and have decent life or at least give you backup in the future.

this is absolutely brilliant thank you.

I spotted a mistake. Armenia is visa-free for citizens of Belarus.

Too bad it doesnt work ... whats the point of using heroku if you don't even scale your dynos under heavy load

Heroku's standard tier doesn't have auto-scaling. You have to be using the $250/month performance dynos for it. I'd suspect that's not feasible for a little hobby project.

I did not expect it to get any attention, so it was on the free tier dyno when it hit the front page. (And even seem to have held up for some time judging by the logs, before dying from the extreme lack of available ram.) Bumping it to the standard dyno when I noticed the issue was enough to keep it running.

I meant manually scaling them

Comparing Australia and Canada shows they have the same ease of access to US. This is not correct, since Australians have to apply online for an ESTA prior to travel.

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