Vanuatu Passport 2026: Cost, Timeline, Visa-Free Countries, and CBI Rules.
The Vanuatu passport is the fastest serious citizenship by investment in the world, and it lost Schengen visa-free access in December 2024. Both of those are true, and an honest guide states them together. This is the plain-English breakdown: what it costs, how long it takes, where it travels, and who it is and is not for.
What is a Vanuatu passport?
A Vanuatu passport is the travel document of a citizen of the Republic of Vanuatu, a sovereign island nation in the South Pacific, a Commonwealth member, and a member of the Pacific Islands Forum. It is issued only after citizenship is granted; the citizenship is the asset, and the passport is the physical instrument of it. Vanuatu citizenship is hereditary and permanent under the Citizenship Act, Cap. 112, which means it passes to your children and theirs, and it is not a residence permit or a visa that a government can revoke at will.
For most of the people who reach this page, the relevant fact is that Vanuatu citizenship can be obtained lawfully through investment, on a defined timeline, without first living in the country. That is the program this page explains.
Can you obtain one through citizenship by investment?
Yes. Citizenship by investment (CBI) is the legal pathway by which a sovereign nation grants citizenship in exchange for a government-approved contribution. Vanuatu runs two such tracks under the Citizenship Act, Cap. 112: the Development Support Programme (DSP), a direct donation route, and the Capital Investment Immigration Plan (CIIP), an investment route that folds a redeemable fund subscription into the file. Both are screened by the Vanuatu Financial Intelligence Unit (VFIU) and granted by the Vanuatu Citizenship Commission. Choosing between the DSP and the CIIP is the only "which one" decision the program actually asks of you.
No residency is required, no language test, no interview, and there is no annual cap. The one mandatory in-person step is a single biometric enrolment, covered below.
The whole program, on one line.
From about $145,000, single applicant, all-in.
On the DSP donation route, a single applicant pays a $130,000 government contribution plus a flat 5% advisory fee ($6,500), due diligence and VFIU screening ($5,000), birth registration and national ID ($2,500), and passport enrolment ($1,000). That is $145,000 all-in, every line published rather than quoted after a call. Family pricing scales the government contribution; the full ladder, in USD and sats with a live Bitcoin calculator, is on the pricing page, and the dedicated Vanuatu passport cost breakdown covers couples, families, and dependents line by line.
The CIIP investment route is structured differently: $110,000 government contribution plus a $50,000 redeemable Cocoa Sustainable Fund subscription, $174,000 all-in gross, approximately $124,000 net after the four-year fund redemption. Returns are not guaranteed.
30 to 60 days from a clean file.
Government processing runs 30 to 60 days from a complete submission; the VFIU reports within approximately one week of completed screening. From first engagement, including document preparation and the source-of-funds file, plan on roughly two to four months. The surrounding timeline depends mostly on how quickly documents come together on your side, which is the one variable you control. The detailed seven-stage walkthrough is on the process page.
87 destinations, weighted toward Asia.
The Vanuatu passport opens 87 destinations visa-free or with visa-on-arrival, concentrated in the Asia-Pacific corridor: Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia, the Philippines, and the Pacific Islands Forum bloc. The full inventory, filterable by region and access type, is on the visa-free map. What remains after the 2024 changes is direct, fast, structural reach to the financial capitals of Asia, which for many holders is the access that actually matters.
Schengen and the UK are gone.
The European Union permanently revoked Vanuatu's Schengen visa-free access in December 2024, effective February 2025, and the United Kingdom now requires a Standard Visitor visa. If reliable European access is the center of your plan, Vanuatu cannot provide it, and no amount of speed or tax efficiency changes that. We state this on the first screen because a buyer who later feels misled is a liability, and a buyer who sees the trade-off up front and still chooses Vanuatu is the right client. The dedicated Vanuatu passport Schengen access page covers exactly what changed and why.
Zero personal income tax. But a passport is not tax residency.
Vanuatu levies zero personal income tax, zero capital gains tax, zero inheritance tax, and zero corporate income tax; the only material tax is a 15% Value Added Tax on local consumption. Its tax-exempt International Business Company framework has been in force since 1993. That is the structure, and it is genuinely clean.
What it is not is an automatic change to what you owe. A second passport does not, by itself, change your tax residency, which is separate, deliberate planning, and for a US person it interacts with citizenship-based taxation that a passport alone does not touch. Vanuatu also participates in the Common Reporting Standard (CRS), so a Vanuatu bank account reports to your country of tax residence like any other. Self-custodied Bitcoin is usually not a financial-institution account by itself, but tax, asset, and reporting obligations can still apply. Consult a qualified tax advisor regarding your specific situation.
Who Vanuatu is for, and who it is not.
Speed and structure.
You want the fastest serious second citizenship in its class; your travel is Asia-Pacific weighted; you value a zero-personal-income-tax jurisdiction and legal redundancy; you fund from Bitcoin and want an on-chain source-of-funds process treated as normal; and you can fund the $130,000 contribution.
Europe, or a magic fix.
You need frequent Schengen, UK, or EU access; you want a passport that erases your existing tax obligations; your funds cannot be documented; or the $130,000 contribution is ahead of where you are. If a sub-$130,000 budget is the only blocker, São Tomé & Príncipe starts at $90,000 and is the cheaper way in. Weighing other programs? See Vanuatu vs St Kitts, vs Türkiye, and vs El Salvador.
On-chain history is the starting point, not a red flag.
The single most common reason a Bitcoin-funded file stalls is undocumented provenance. A clean Vanuatu file reconstructs the on-chain story: where the coins came from, the exchange withdrawals with both halves documented, mining or payment income, and a defensible cost basis. We pre-audit that history before anything is submitted, so the VFIU sees a file that answers its questions in advance. The full playbook is on the source of funds page, and selected 21 CBI invoices may be settled in BTC, Lightning, or USDT by prior arrangement after compliance clearance.
The honest answers.
How much does a Vanuatu passport cost?
For a single applicant on the DSP, about $145,000 all-in: a $130,000 government contribution plus a flat 5% advisory fee, due diligence, civil registration, and passport enrolment. The CIIP investment route is $174,000 all-in gross, approximately $124,000 net after the four-year fund redemption. Every line item is on the cost page.
How long does Vanuatu citizenship take?
30 to 60 days from a clean, complete submission to citizenship grant and passport issuance. From first engagement, plan on roughly two to four months including document preparation and due diligence.
Does Vanuatu allow dual citizenship?
Yes. Vanuatu permits dual citizenship, so you keep your existing nationality. The citizenship is hereditary and permanent under the Citizenship Act, Cap. 112. Whether your current country permits dual nationality is a separate question for your own jurisdiction.
Does a Vanuatu passport have Schengen access?
No. Schengen visa-free access was permanently revoked in December 2024, effective February 2025, and the UK now requires a Standard Visitor visa. The current count is 87 destinations, weighted to the Asia-Pacific corridor. The full breakdown is on the Schengen page.
Can I pay in Bitcoin?
Selected 21 CBI advisory and service invoices may be settled in BTC, Lightning, or USDT by prior arrangement and after compliance clearance. Official Vanuatu government payments follow the rules set by the relevant authorities. An on-chain source-of-funds history is treated as the normal starting point of a clean file.
Do I need to visit Vanuatu?
You do not need to travel to Vanuatu itself, but one in-person biometric enrolment is mandatory under the Passport Amendment Act 2025 (ICAO standard, from May 2025). It can be completed at Port Vila, Dubai, Hong Kong, or New Caledonia. The honest framing is remote except for one mandatory in-person biometric visit, which we never paper over.
Where these facts come from.
We cite the law and the data, not the marketing. Verify any line here before you move a single sat.
- Legal basis
- Citizenship Act (Cap. 112), and the Development Support Program established under Order 33 of 2019.
- Passport standard
- Vanuatu Passport (Amendment) Act 2025, which introduced the mandatory biometric enrolment: one in-person visit, from May 2025.
- Screening
- Vanuatu Financial Intelligence Unit, with Interpol and Vanuatu Citizenship Commission checks on every file.
- Mobility
- Henley Passport Index, 2026: 87 destinations. Schengen visa-free access was revoked in December 2024, effective February 2025; the UK the same month.
- Pricing
- Government contribution and the full fee schedule, canonical to 21cbi.io/programs/vanuatu and itemized on the cost page.
Keep reading.
Vanuatu vs St Kitts
Roughly half the cost and a fraction of the wait. The honest value case against the Caribbean benchmark. →
The WorkThree file shapes
Single, couple, family. Composited files that show how a real source-of-funds stitch runs. →
MethodSource of funds, on-chain
How a Bitcoin position becomes a file the FIU can clear, with no forced sale. →
Read the math, then the file.
The Vanuatu Brief is the 16-page field guide: the cost to the line, the source-of-funds playbook, the process, and the honest trade-offs. One email, one PDF, no drip sequence. Or skip ahead and book a confidential file-read with Adam, where the first thirty minutes go straight to the file owner.