Visas & residency
Find the right way to live in Spain
Retiring, working remotely, studying, joining family or already living here? Start with your situation and we'll show you the route.
Which one are you?
Pick the sentence that sounds like your life.
Each one leads to the route that answers it, and to what that route actually involves.
Before you pick a route
Who needs a visa, and who doesn't
Citizenship decides this before anything else does. EU, EEA and Swiss citizens have free movement and do not apply for a visa — they register instead, under a different set of rules. Everyone else needs a long-stay route to be in Spain beyond the 90-in-180 visitor allowance, and the point at which you stop being a visitor is a question of what you are doing here, not only of how long you have been.
The families of long-stay route
The route names are less important than the families they sit in, because the family is what decides the evidence. Broadly: living on your own means without working in Spain; working remotely for people outside Spain; studying; joining or bringing family; and the European framework, which is not a visa at all. Several names you will meet in forums are not routes — they are documents, statuses or schemes that closed.
How people actually choose
Almost nobody chooses from a list. They start from what they will be doing — working, not working, studying, joining someone — and the route follows from that. Where two routes genuinely compete it is usually the non-lucrative and the digital nomad visa, and the thing that separates them is how your work is structured rather than how much you earn.
Family and dependants
"Family visa" means four different things in Spain, and which one applies to you depends on your sponsor's status, not on your relationship. Getting that wrong is the commonest reason a family application is built on the wrong framework from the start.
The health-cover condition
Most routes attach a health-cover condition, and what satisfies it is a narrower question than what you would actually want for yourself. Spain runs a public system and a large private sector side by side; which one you can use, when, and what you need before you are entitled to it, are three separate questions.
Residency, renewals and the long term
A visa is not residency, residency is not a card, and neither is tax residency — five things get called "residency" and they are not the same. What matters once you are here is the ladder: the first authorisation, its renewals, and what becomes available after five years.
The paperwork after you arrive
The NIE is a number you keep for life. The TIE is a card that evidences a non-EU national's authorisation to be here. They are constantly confused, they expire differently, and only one of them is a residence right.
The documents everyone gets confused about
Go deeper
By where you're coming from
The route is the same. The admin is not.
The healthcare condition
Most routes ask for cover. What satisfies the condition is a narrower question than what you would actually want.
Questions
Questions people actually ask
Do I need a visa if I am an EU citizen?
No. EU, EEA and Swiss citizens have free movement; the obligation is registration rather than a visa application, and it runs under a different set of rules.
Can I just stay for 90 days at a time and keep returning?
The 90-in-180 allowance is for visiting. The question is not only how long you have been here but what you are doing — there is a point at which you stop being a visitor, and it does not wait for day 91.
Is a visa the same as residency?
No. Five different things get called "residency" in everyday use, and a visa, a residence authorisation, a residence card and tax residency are four of them.
Which route do most people end up on?
Most non-EU readers choose between the non-lucrative and the digital nomad visa, and the thing that separates them is how your work is structured rather than how much you earn.
Which route fits your situation?
The moving guide works through the decision route by route, with the question that usually settles it.