Cyprus

Salary in IT

$ 70 556 – $ 103 558

Median

$ 81 936

Visa speed

The department publishes the processing time separately for each ground, and the spread is wide. Work under the single procedure — four months; outside the single procedure — three months; seasonal work and intra-corporate transfer — 90 days; family reunification — NINE months, but 90 days if it is the family of an intra-corporate transferee or of a researcher; the family of a Cypriot citizen — four months. Study and research are faster: an entry permit for a student, a school pupil, a trainee, a volunteer and a researcher — one month, a residence permit for a researcher — three months. The digital nomad — 5–7 weeks. Long-term resident status — from six months to a year. Permits for victims are processed in about a WEEK, international protection in three months. The department qualifies every term in the same way: they are counted only for fully completed applications.

Degree required

no

Language at work

No ground for arrival demands a language exam — neither the work permits, nor the study ones, nor the immigration permit. There is exactly one exception, and an unexpected one: DOMESTIC workers do face a language requirement — a basic knowledge of Greek or English, lifted only if the employer is themselves a foreigner with permanent residence in Cyprus and speaks the same language as the worker. Greek is asked about at naturalisation, but that is citizenship, not stay. In everyday life English is widely spoken, while the official languages are Greek and Turkish.

Changing employer

The permit is tied to the employer, but the way out of it is described in detail. The contract may be terminated by mutual consent in the presence of witnesses, and the release document signed on that occasion gives 30 DAYS to find a new employer and apply for renewal. Someone who leaves the country with a valid contract may come back to a different employer only after three months abroad — or with the former employer's consent. Domestic workers may change employer no more than twice (three employers in all), unless the new one is a relative up to the second degree or a person over 75; the employer's death, their move into a care home, their departure from the country, a crime against the worker and a decision of the Department of Labour Relations in the worker's favour do not count as a change. A pub worker may not change employer at all during the first three months after arrival, and afterwards only having worked at least six months for one. Spouses and parents of minor Cypriot citizens have free access to the labour market, self-employment included.

Visa types: The single procedure (GEN) — ordinary employment, up to three years in a row, with four years the maximum a foreigner may work · Outside the single procedure (NSP) — work of up to three months, of three to six and of up to twelve; representatives of tourist firms and journalists · Special occupations inside the single procedure: athletes and coaches, ministers of religion, fishermen, trainee accountants, pub workers, contractors of the Sovereign Base Areas · Domestic workers and seasonal workers — with their own rules, quotas and maximum terms · Companies of foreign interests, Cypriot companies with a high turnover, intra-corporate transfer, the EU Blue Card, the start-up visa · The digital nomad — a residence permit based on income from abroad · Study and research under directive 2016/801: students, school pupils, researchers, trainees, volunteers; after a master's degree — a year to look for work · Family: reunification with a lawfully resident foreigner, families of Cypriot citizens, families of immigration permit holders · An immigration permit (permanent residence) in six categories, from A to F, and long-term resident status after five years · Protection and help for victims — free of charge: the humanitarian residence permit, victims of human trafficking, victims of domestic violence, beneficiaries of international protection

Employers: BrainRocket, Exness, Welltech, Tango.me, Taonga

Collected on 31 August 2026 from the catalogue of the Civil Registry and Migration Department under the Deputy Ministry of Migration and International Protection. That catalogue holds about a hundred and fifty documents and is laid out in sections: temporary stay (work, study and research, family, special categories, visitors, international protection), companies and investors with permanent residence, Union citizens and Britons after Brexit. Cyprus has, in essence, TWO PROCEDURES for work permits, and the difference between them sets both the term and the price. **The single procedure (GEN)** — ordinary employment: the permit is granted for up to three years in a row, is processed in four months and costs 120 euros for an entry permit with a residence permit and 130 for the issue or renewal. **Outside the single procedure (NSP)** — short and special cases: up to three months, from three to six and up to twelve; one may not live on it longer than a year, processing takes three months, and each of the three cases costs the same — 50 euros. On top of either, 70 euros is charged for the FIRST registration in the aliens' registry; that seventy is added to almost every ground and stands as a separate line on the pages. Employment has a **maximum term of four years** — but not for everyone. The department lists the exceptions by name: athletes and coaches, workers in farming and agriculture, Syrians of Cretan origin and Kurds from the interior ministry's list, repatriates and specialist cooks. Separately exempt from the maximum term are highly qualified employees of Cypriot companies with a high turnover. Inside the single procedure the department keeps a whole set of occupations with rules of their own: athletes and coaches, trainee accountants (the quota is 15 percent of the number of Cypriot trainees and no more than five people), pub workers (approval of the Technical Committee, one at a time), ministers of religion, fishermen (approved by the Department of Fisheries, not by the Department of Labour) and contractors in the British Sovereign Base Areas. Outside the single procedure stand representatives of tourist firms and journalists — they enter on a tourist visa and arrange the permit once here, and they have no maximum term of stay. **Permanent residence is called an immigration permit here, and it comes in six categories, from A to F.** A, B and C are self-employment with a capital threshold: about 430,000 euros in agriculture, 350,000 in mining, 260,000 in trade or a craft (the text names the sums in old Cypriot pounds as well, and the Immigration Control Board may accept a smaller one). D is self-employment in a profession or in science: there is no money threshold, but the country must NEED that profession. E is permanent employment that will not create excessive local competition. F is life on a secured income from abroad without working in Cyprus: no less than 9,568 euros a year for the applicant and 4,613 more for each dependant. The application costs 500 euros for ALL the persons included in it. The right of residence has no expiry, but the card is replaced every ten years, and the permit itself lapses if one does not settle in Cyprus within a year of approval or is absent from the country for two years. The second permanent status is the **long-term resident**, and it is the cheapest thing in the catalogue: 30 euros. The condition is five years of lawful continuous life in the government-controlled areas; absences do not break the term if each is shorter than six months and together they come to no more than ten within the five years. Who does NOT count into those five years the department states plainly: students and those who came for vocational training, beneficiaries of subsidiary protection and asylum seekers, people living here temporarily (unpaid domestic and seasonal workers are named), workers of cross-border service providers and diplomats. Processing takes from six months to a year. Study, research and traineeship run under EU directive 2016/801, transposed by law 7(I)/2019, and all these grounds share one tariff: 70 euros for an entry permit with a residence permit, 140 for the same with an alien registration certificate, 55 for the issue or renewal. There is one exception — trainees, for whom it is dearer: 115, 185 and 100. A researcher does not arrive on their own but through a research organisation approved in advance by the Research and Innovation Foundation, and if the organisation's approval is withdrawn, the residence permits of ALL its researchers are cancelled. After a master's degree or higher one may stay twelve months to look for work or start a business. Standing apart is the **pilot scheme “Visitor for Course Enrolment”**, launched on 20 October 2025 for maritime and aviation training schools: 200 permits in the first year, a hundred per authority, on a first-come basis. One may not work on it, there is no access to the state health system, it grants no right of movement within the Union, and the status cannot be changed after the programme — one has to leave and come back from abroad by a different procedure. Protection and help for victims are arranged FREE OF CHARGE, and each of the four grounds says so in plain words: the special residence permit on humanitarian grounds (a year, and it begins not with a form but with an open letter to the department), the permit for a victim of human trafficking for the reflection period (a month, two for a minor, no work allowed), the permit for the same person for the duration of criminal proceedings (a year) and the permit for a victim of domestic violence (a year, with FREE access to the labour market). For beneficiaries of international protection the term depends on its kind: three years for a refugee, renewable for three, and a year for a beneficiary of subsidiary protection, renewable for two. What was not collected and why. The registration of Union citizens and their families (MEU1, MEU2, MEU3) is the right of free movement, not a permit. Britons and their families after Brexit (UKW1, UKW2, UKW3) — rules for those who lived in Cyprus before the withdrawal. The “Drilling Companies” page is not a ground: it is an index of four procedures already recorded — work of up to three months, of three to six, of longer than six and work of at least two years in a company of foreign interests. Repatriation and the return of bank guarantees are not grounds for arrival either. And one more warning from the catalogue itself: applying for an immigration permit does NOT IN ITSELF give the right to enter the country or to stay in it without a visa or a residence permit. The IP Box gives companies an effective rate of ~2.5% on software income — part of the saving goes into salaries, which is why the level is close to Berlin and Amsterdam. Salary and price benchmarks are taken from Zeno Legal (2026), Investropa, Numbeo and levels.fyi.

Permanent residence after

5 years

Citizenship after

5 years

Language

Greek at A2 (or B1 for the fast track)

Dual citizenship

allowed

Absence limits: For permanent residence: no more than 6 months at a time and 10 months over 5 years. In the last 12 months before a citizenship application: a maximum of 90 days outside the country, and exceeding this resets the period.

Highly skilled fast track: 5 years with Greek at A2, 4 years with B1. The standard route is 7-8 years. Highly skilled applications take 8 months to process, others 2-3 years.

Document certification

apostille

The country is party to the 1961 Hague Convention: a degree or certificate is authenticated with a single apostille in the country that issued it.

Limit

5

Quarantine

no

Antibody titre test

needed

Preparation

~4 months

Cost per animal

$ 341 – $ 910

About the limit: The EU limit on non-commercial movement is 5 animals per owner.

EU rules: ISO microchip → rabies vaccination → an antibody titre test 30 days later → wait 3 months. Russia is not on the “rabies-free” list, so the test is compulsory. Tapeworm treatment for a dog is not required (only Finland, Ireland, Malta and Norway).

Situation

advisories in place

The south (the Republic of Cyprus, in the EU) is stable. The island has been divided since 1974: the north is controlled by the TRNC with Turkish support, and Nicosia is Europe's last divided capital. Internal tension has been low since 2020. Geographical proximity to the Middle East is a sensitivity; in 2026 tourist numbers fell by 27.6% because of the regional situation, though this did not affect residents. The lowest level of violent crime in the Mediterranean.

Crime: One of the safest places in Europe for violent crime. The main risks are property fraud rather than street crime.

The main risks are heat, drought and wildfires in summer. Seismicity is moderate. Destructive natural disasters practically do not occur.

Type

Mediterranean, hot

Sunny days

~320 a year

A very hot dry summer (up to +40 inland in July and August). A mild winter without snow. There is usually no central heating and people heat with electricity in winter.

Life expectancy

81.8 years

Migration

inflow

Healthcare: GESY is the national health system, with a contribution of 2.65% of salary. A partner's parents are not covered straight away.

Air: Good, but Saharan dust in spring.

Flows: A steady inflow driven by tech and fintech and by relocators from the CIS after 2022. Between 2022 and 2025 more than 3,000 protection applicants were relocated to other EU countries under the solidarity mechanism, which is a separate matter from labour migration.

Bread, 500 g

$ 1,80

Milk, 1 l

$ 1,75

Eggs, 12

$ 4,49

Chicken breast, 1 kg

$ 8,79

Cheese, 1 kg

$ 13,0

Rice, 1 kg

$ 2,50

Potatoes, 1 kg

$ 1,61

Apples, 1 kg

$ 2,91

Coca-Cola / Pepsi, 2 l

$ 2,45

Total

$ 39,3

The same set for every country, so the comparison is fair.

Rent, 1 bedroom

$ 922 a month

Rent, 3 bedrooms

$ 1 701 a month

Utility bills

$ 193 a month

Home internet

$ 31,5 a month

Monthly transport pass

$ 47,0 a month

Single transport ticket

$ 2,22

Petrol, litre

$ 1,65

Cold medicine

$ 8,89 for a week

Country averages. City prices, where collected, are shown above and are more precise.

Life expectancy

81,8 years2024

Homicides

1 per 100k2024

Theft

65,4 per 100k2024

Burglary

101,9 per 100k2024

Robbery

9,6 per 100k2024

Vehicle and vehicle-part theft

13,1 per 100k2024

Road deaths

3,9 per 100k2021

Unemployment

4,9 %2025

Unemployment, ages 15–24

12,7 %2025

Inequality (Gini)

31,82023

Health spending per person

$ 2 899 a year

Air pollution, PM2.5

16,1 µg/m³2023

Access to clean water

99,7 %2024

Internet, fixed line

155,9 Mbit/s2026

Internet, mobile

112,2 Mbit/s2026

Governance

Political stability

above average · 0,4

Control of corruption

above average · 0,5

Rule of law

above average · 0,7

Government effectiveness

above average · 0,9

World Bank estimates on a −2.5 to +2.5 scale, higher is better.

Natural hazards

Earthquakes

6,9 out of 10

River floods

0 out of 10

Coastal floods

2,9 out of 10

Tropical cyclones

0 out of 10

Droughts

2,4 out of 10

Tsunamis

4 out of 10

Policy towards newcomers

Migrant integration, overall score

41 out of 100 · 2019

Family reunification

35 out of 100 · 2019

Permanent residence

50 out of 100 · 2019

Access to citizenship

53 out of 100 · 2019

Access to the labour market

24 out of 100 · 2019

Measures how favourable the law is towards newcomers, not one person's chances of getting a visa.

Each value carries the year it refers to. “Data lags behind” means this country's figure was collected noticeably earlier than the rest. Natural hazards use one 0–10 scale and are meant to be compared against each other.

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