Living and Working in Monaco

The Monegasque government states the position plainly: foreign nationals wishing to stay in the Principality for less than three months require a passport, and in some cases a visa, which are necessary to enter French territory. Monaco is not an EU member state, and its own tax administration describes the Principality as a third state with regard to the European Union, but for a traveller the practical consequence is that the requirement to check is the requirement for entering France and the Schengen area. Three bands follow. Nationals of the European Economic Area and associated states do not require a visa to enter Monegasque territory and need only carry a passport or a valid identity card. Two Monegasque pages publish two different lists under two different headings. The short-stay page, dated 3 March 2023, heads its list European Economic Area and associated States: it sets out the European Economic Area together with Andorra, San Marino, Switzerland and Vatican City, names the United Kingdom with England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and Gibraltar, and does not name Croatia. The residence page, dated 26 May 2025, heads its list European Economic Area and third countries: it names Croatia and Gibraltar separately, does not name the United Kingdom, and has routed British nationals through the third-country procedure since 1 January 2021. For a short visit the outcome is the same either way, because British nationals sit in the next band. Visa-exempt third-country nationals, those in Annex II to Regulation (EU) 2018/1806, among them the United States, the United Kingdom, which that Annex names excluding the British nationals referred to in its Part 3, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, South Korea and Brazil, need no visa for stays of no more than 90 days in any 180-day period. The same Annex names those British nationals in its own Part 3, headed British nationals who are not British citizens, which lists British nationals (Overseas), British overseas territories citizens, British overseas citizens, British protected persons and British subjects. Visa-required third-country nationals, those in Annex I to the same regulation, among them India, China, Nigeria, South Africa, Turkey, Vietnam and the Philippines, need a Schengen C visa even for a short visit; the Monegasque government directs the application to the embassy of the Schengen state that will be the point of entry for the stay in Europe, and states that once a Schengen visa has been obtained a visit to the Principality can be made with no additional formalities.

Two things hold in every band. A short stay carries no right to work: private employment in Monaco requires a work permit, which is a separate authorisation described below, and residing for more than three months in a year, or setting up home in the Principality, requires a Monegasque residence permit, which is not issued to minors under 16. And the border formality itself has changed. The European Commission states that the Entry/Exit System became fully operational on 10 April 2026, after a progressive start of operations launched on 12 October 2025, and that as of that date it replaces the stamping of passports, so entries and exits of non-EU nationals travelling for a short stay are recorded electronically at the external border rather than stamped in the passport. France notifies two border crossing points located in the Principality, Monaco-Héliport and Monaco-Port de la Condamine, in the list published in the Official Journal of the European Union, C/2026/3899 of 16 July 2026. ETIAS, the travel authorisation announced for visa-exempt nationals, is not in force; it has been announced for the last quarter of 2026 without a date. Neither the Entry/Exit System nor ETIAS applies to Monegasque nationals.

The threshold is set by the Monegasque authorities: anyone who is at least 16 years of age and wishes to reside in Monaco for more than three months in a year, or to set up home in the Principality, must apply for a residence permit. Permits are not issued to minors under 16; a Document de Circulation pour Étranger Mineur, a travel document for a foreign minor, may be issued to make travel abroad easier. The route to the application differs by nationality, and this is the point at which passing through France is Monaco’s own rule rather than an assumption. A national of a country on the residence page’s own published list, which it heads European Economic Area and third countries and on which Andorra, San Marino, Switzerland, Vatican City and Gibraltar sit beside the European Economic Area states, applies directly to the Monegasque authorities and supplies no document at the visa stage. A national of a country that is not on that list must first apply for a settlement visa, a visa d’établissement of type D, for Monaco through the French consulate closest to their last domicile. The page heads that route as being for nationals of countries outside the European Economic Area, and the Monegasque instructions are explicit that a visa is required in order to apply for a residence permit; the government’s own English version renders that instrument as a long-stay visa. Someone established in France for more than a year applies instead for a transfer of residency from the French Embassy in Monaco. Exceptionally, a foreign national already in the Principality who has accommodation there may ask the Department of the Interior for permission to carry out those steps directly with the French Embassy in Monaco, under article 5 of the Franco-Monegasque neighbourhood convention. British nationals have followed the route for nationals outside that list since 1 January 2021, and the Monegasque instructions add that there is no derogatory status for the blood relatives or the relatives by marriage of a British national holding a valid Monegasque residence permit, who are also subject to the settlement-visa procedure.

The Monegasque file goes to the Residency Section of the Administrative Police Division of the Police Department, at 9 rue Suffren-Reymond in Monaco, through the dedicated online service, in person at the Residency Section, or by post to the same address; on the in-person route an individual appointment is fixed only on presentation of a complete file. On the online route, an admissible file leads to an individual interview appointment at which the complete file is produced in original, and then, after an investigation and if the application is accepted, the Residency Section arranges a second appointment for enrolment and issue of the card. The Monegasque instructions state that in every case three things have to be shown. Accommodation in Monaco of a size adapted to the needs of those living there, as owner of a dwelling, as director or shareholder of a company that owns a dwelling, as tenant, or accommodated by a close relative, your spouse or the person you live with as a couple; the supporting documents include a tenancy agreement registered with the Department of Tax Services or a certificate of free accommodation signed by the person providing it. Sufficient financial means, through a salary, through professional income from an independent commercial activity or through a company, through sufficient savings, the sufficient amount being determined by the Monaco bank that supplies the attestation, or through an undertaking of support given by a relative, your spouse or the person you live with as a couple; in other cases the instructions accept a compliant bank reference from a Monaco establishment, less than a month old, stating that you have the means to reside in Monaco. And good character, through an extract from the criminal record, or its equivalent, less than three months old, issued by the authorities of the countries of residence in the five years before arrival in Monaco; the instructions name Italian, German, British and United States equivalents by way of example and leave the list open. The document lists are open too: any other supporting document may be required by the Residency Section, and an applicant whose situation is not among those set out, or who cannot supply one of the documents for a compelling reason, is directed to the Residency Section for analysis. Where the applicant is to be an employee, the file includes a certificate from the Employment Office authorising employment in Monaco, which takes the form, according to the case, of a promise of employment, an application for authorisation to hire, or the work permit together with the latest payslip, the instructions closing that enumeration with an ellipsis rather than exhausting it; the Monegasque instructions note that the issuing of those documents is subject to compliance with the legal provisions on recruitment, of which Act 629 of 17 July 1957 on the conditions of recruitment and dismissal is the instance they cite, the statute set out in the next section. Documents not in French, English or Italian are accompanied by a sworn translation.

Four categories of permit exist for foreign nationals over 16, and the conditions differ from one to another. The temporary permit may be issued with no condition of prior residence, is valid for one year, and costs EUR 80 on first issue and EUR 40 on renewal; it is the card issued to first-time residents. The ordinary permit may be issued to persons totalling three years of residence in Monaco, is valid for three years, and costs EUR 100 on first issue and EUR 50 on renewal. The privilege permit may be issued to persons totalling ten years of residence and whose presence on Monegasque territory is effective, is valid for ten years, and costs EUR 160 on first issue and EUR 80 on renewal, the ten-year length of residence being reducible to one year in special cases; the reduction attaches to the length of residence and not to the effective-presence condition. The permit for the spouse of a Monegasque national may be issued to any foreign national who is the spouse of a person of Monegasque nationality and has resided in the Principality for at least one year, is valid for five years, and costs EUR 80 on first issue and EUR 40 on renewal. Three further fees apply to every residence permit, whatever its category: EUR 50 for a late renewal, EUR 80 for a duplicate, and EUR 30 following a change of civil status, family circumstances or address. One consequence matters to third-country nationals in particular: the Monegasque residence permit allows a holder who is a non-EEA national and holds a valid passport to enter, leave and travel within the Schengen area without applying for a short-stay visa. On leaving the Principality, a foreign national returns the permit eight days before departure, and the Police Department issues a certificate evidencing the stay in Monaco, in a single copy, a request for a duplicate being possible by email; the Monegasque instructions state that the certificate may be useful for customs, banking, consular or administrative formalities.

The document lists and the appointment arrangements are administrative and are published by the Monegasque government’s own service portal, MonServicePublic, with the online application hosted on the government’s MonGuichet estate. MonServicePublic is the reference for the current file requirements.

Article 1 of Law no. 629 of 17 July 1957 on the conditions of recruitment and dismissal in the Principality is categorical: no foreign national may hold private employment in Monaco without a work permit, and may not hold employment in an occupation other than the one the permit names. The obligation is independent of the form and duration of the contract and of the amount and nature of the pay. Any change of employer, trade or occupation requires a fresh application for a work permit, and the application states, where relevant, that teleworking is carried out and the places where it is carried out; starting or ending teleworking during a contract is the subject of an application to modify the permit. Under article 2 the permit is issued only after the opinion of the Director of Public Security and the opinion of the Director of the Occupational Medicine Office. On the employer’s side, article 3 has every job offer declared to the labour and employment directorate, which sends the employer one or more candidates within four clear days of the declaration, and article 4 has an employer intending to hire or re-hire a foreign worker obtain written authorisation before that worker starts. The same article 4 has an employer hiring a worker of Monegasque nationality make a written declaration instead, as soon as the worker starts.

Article 5 then sets the order that governs who receives the authorisation, and it is the rule that most shapes a foreign candidate’s prospects. Monegasque workers come first: the ranking applies to candidates who have the aptitudes necessary for the post and only in the absence of Monegasque workers. In that case the authorisation is issued in this order: first, foreign nationals married to a person of Monegasque nationality who has retained it and who are not legally separated, together with foreign nationals born of or adopted by a Monegasque parent; second, foreign nationals living in a free union but bound by a cohabitation contract, a contrat de vie commune, with a Monegasque who has retained that nationality; third, foreign nationals who are the father or mother of a child of Monegasque nationality born of or adopted by a Monegasque parent; fourth, foreign nationals domiciled in Monaco; fifth, foreign nationals domiciled in the neighbouring communes who are authorised to work there and who have already carried on a professional activity in Monaco. Where the employer has retained no candidate of Monegasque nationality and none from those categories, the authorisation may also be issued to foreign nationals outside the ranking. Registration with the Employment Office is a separate step, and the statute sets its reach: the second paragraph of article 5 opens registration to Monegasque nationals and to the categories of the first paragraph, that is to the five ranks just set out, with the modalities fixed by ministerial order. The Employment Office’s own page publishes its own four-category list: Monegasque nationality, being the child or spouse of a Monegasque national, being domiciled in the Principality, or being domiciled in one of the neighbouring communes, which it names as Cap d’Ail, La Turbie, Beausoleil and Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, and having previously held a job in Monaco. The same statute runs the ladder in reverse for redundancies: where a post is cut or headcount reduced within a given occupational category, dismissals follow the order foreign nationals domiciled outside Monaco and the neighbouring communes, then those domiciled in the neighbouring communes, then those domiciled in Monaco, and so on up the ranking, with seniority in the business taken into account within each category and, for an employee who has worked there for at least two years, a seniority uplift of one year per dependent child, capped at five years, and, under article 7, a six-month re-hiring priority for the worker dismissed where the employer recruits staff in the same occupational category, re-hirings taking place in the reverse order of the dismissals.

The shape of the labour market follows from the geography. Monaco Statistics recorded 65,117 salaried employees in 2025, of whom 5,393 in the public sector; the private sector counted 3,698 employers, excluding employers of domestic staff, and the same institute’s Employment Observatory 2025 counted 59,724 private-sector employees in December 2025, down 1.2% over a year. 87.4% of all salaried employees, public and private, do not live in Monaco. Across all salaried employees, public and private, nationalities were 62.5% French, 14.0% Italian, 6.4% Portuguese, 3.5% Monegasque and 1.8% Romanian; for the private sector alone, the same institute’s Monaco en chiffres 2026 gives 61.6% French, 15.0% Italian, 6.8% Portuguese, 1.9% Romanian and 1.7% Monegasque. Services account for 86.4% of private-sector employment, against 13.6% for industry and construction and under 0.1% for the primary sector. French is the official language of the State under article 8 of the Monegasque Constitution, and it is the dominant language of work; English is standard in international finance, wealth management and yachting; Italian is widely present. For pay by sector and district, see the Key sectors and salaries section.

The permit to work and the permit to reside are separate instruments handled by offices in two different directorates: employment by the Employment Office, which the Direction du Travail groups together with the labour inspectorate, and residence by the Residency Section of the Police Department. They meet in one place, because a salaried applicant’s residence file includes the Employment Office certificate authorising employment.

The Monegasque tax administration states the principle in one sentence: the lack of income tax dates back to an ordinance by Prince Charles III in 1869. It adds that the only direct tax in the Principality is a tax on the profits of industrial and commercial activities, and that there is no wealth tax, no annual property tax and no council tax. Monegasque nationals and residents of the Principality, with the exception of French nationals governed by the 1963 bilateral convention between France and Monaco, are not liable for income tax. Two qualifications come from the same source and matter more to an international reader than the headline. First, in the French text that governs, the absence of personal income tax concerns only activities or persons effectively and genuinely established in the territory of the Principality. Second, the Monegasque administration states that this state of affairs does not affect the rules laid down by other states.

The French position is the principal nationality-specific carve-out, and it is set out in article 7 of the tax convention between France and Monaco of 18 May 1963. Paragraph 1 makes individuals of French nationality who transfer their domicile or residence to Monaco, or who cannot show five years of habitual residence in Monaco at 13 October 1962, liable in France, in the article’s own words, to personal income tax and to the taxe complémentaire, in the same conditions as if they had their domicile or residence in France. The second limb is historical: the taxe complémentaire was abolished by article 5 of law no. 69-1161 of 24 December 1969 and was last due on 1969 income taxed in 1970, so the paragraph operates today through its first limb alone, and French tax doctrine in force since 2 June 2021 restates it by reference to income tax only. The same article excludes two groups from the rule: persons who are part of, or attached to, the sovereign household, and civil servants, agents and employees of the Principality’s public services who established their habitual residence in Monaco before 13 October 1962. Those two are not the only persons outside paragraph 1. French doctrine places further categories of French national outside it, and BOI-INT-CVB-MCO-10 is the document to read for the detail and the conditions. They include individuals who transferred and permanently maintained their habitual residence in Monaco before 13 October 1957; individuals born in Monaco who have continuously resided there since birth, whatever the date, because they have never transferred their domicile there, as the Conseil d’État held on 11 April 2014; and, under the exchange of letters of 26 May 2003 published by decree no. 2005-1078 of 23 August 2005, individuals married to a Monegasque national, or to a French national themselves outside that scope, who have maintained their habitual residence in the Principality since the marriage and who are not in one of the separate-taxation cases set out in article 6(4) of the French tax code, the derogation ending on dissolution of the marriage unless by the death of the spouse, and individuals married to a foreign national other than Monegasque where the marriage was contracted before 1 January 1986, residence has been maintained since and those same separate-taxation cases do not apply, the French spouse remaining domiciled in France for tax purposes where the marriage was contracted after that date. Paragraph 2 defers first taxation to 1965 income, again to personal income tax and, where applicable, to the taxe complémentaire, for French nationals previously domiciled outside metropolitan France who had been habitually resident in Monaco for less than five years at 13 October 1962. A third paragraph, inserted by article 2 of the Avenant of 26 May 2003, subjects individuals of French nationality who transferred their domicile or residence to Monaco from 1 January 1989 to the French wealth tax from 1 January 2002, in the same conditions as if they had their domicile or residence in France. The tax it named, the impôt de solidarité sur la fortune, was abolished with effect from 1 January 2018 and replaced by the impôt sur la fortune immobilière, whose base is immovable property; the French tax administration states that the paragraph now operates through that tax, on all assets falling within its base whether situated in France or abroad, including in Monaco. Those established in Monaco before 1 January 1989 are liable to it only on assets situated in France, like persons domiciled outside France, and French nationals born in Monaco who have continuously maintained their residence there are likewise treated as domiciled outside France for that tax, on production of a certificat de domicile. None of this disturbs the Monegasque position that the Principality levies no wealth tax of its own. For a reader of any other nationality the significance is structural rather than personal: these are bilateral carve-outs attached to French nationality, and they are the exceptions that make the general Monegasque rule legible.

Around that centre, the Principality operates inside French and European frameworks on several axes at once. Business Profit Tax is due from businesses carrying on an industrial or commercial activity in Monegasque territory whose turnover comes, to the extent of at least 25%, from operations carried out, directly or through an interposed person, outside that territory. That is the first of the two cases article 1 of Sovereign Ordinance no. 3.152 of 19 March 1964 sets out, the ordinance that established the tax. The second case carries no turnover test at all: companies of any kind whose activity in Monaco consists in receiving income from the assignment or licensing of patents, trade marks, manufacturing processes or formulae, or income from literary or artistic property rights. Article 2 of the 1963 convention sets the turnover test at the same threshold of at least 25%, but writes it as operations carried out outside Monaco rather than outside Monegasque territory, and under article 1 of that convention Monaco undertook to institute the tax on profits realised from 1 January 1963. The rate is in article 21 of the same ordinance, as replaced by ordinance no. 7.174 of 24 October 2018: 31% for financial years opened from 1 January 2019, 28% from 1 January 2020, 26.5% from 1 January 2021, and a standard rate of 25% from 1 January 2022. Assessment, collection and litigation are the exclusive competence of the Monegasque administration, and the proceeds accrue entirely to the Princely Treasury. Value added tax is levied on the same basis and at the same rate as in France, and the intra-Community regime has applied since 1 January 1993; in EU law, article 7 of Directive 2006/112/EC provides that Monaco is not regarded as a third country for VAT purposes and that transactions originating in or intended for Monaco are treated as transactions originating in or intended for France. French and Monegasque territory form a customs union under the Customs Convention of 18 May 1963, the French Customs Code applies in the Principality, and Monaco is accordingly inside the customs territory of the Union under article 4(2) of Regulation (EU) No 952/2013, while remaining a third state with regard to the European Union. The currency is the euro: article 1 of the Monetary Agreement between the European Union and the Principality of Monaco entitles Monaco to use the euro as its official currency and to grant legal tender status to euro banknotes and coins, Monaco having been authorised to use the euro since 1 January 1999, and its coins are minted at the Hôtel de la Monnaie de Paris under article 18 of the neighbourhood agreement of 18 May 1963. Inheritance and gift duty reaches property situated in Monaco, or with its situs there, whatever the domicile, residence or nationality of the deceased or the donor, subject to the provisions of the France-Monaco convention of 1 April 1950. That convention covers death duties only and expressly does not apply to lifetime gifts. Where it applies, it allocates the taxing right between the two states asset class by asset class, in its articles 2 to 6: immovable property and real property rights only in the state where they are situated; tangible movable property other than the property covered by the classes that follow, together with banknotes and other currency having legal tender at their place of issue, where it actually is at the date of death; ships and aircraft other than those covered by article 5, in the state where they received their certificate of nationality or in which they were registered; under article 5, movable property, tangible or intangible, invested in a commercial, industrial or other enterprise, including shipping and air transport enterprises, in the state of the permanent establishment, and where the enterprise has a permanent establishment in each of the two states, in each of them to the extent the property is attached to the establishment there, that article excluding investments made by the deceased in joint-stock companies; and shares, units, government stock, bonds, unsecured and secured claims and all other property to which articles 2 to 5 do not apply, only in the state of the deceased’s domicile, an individual of French nationality counting as domiciled in Monaco only after at least five years of actual habitual residence there, with no condition of duration for the sovereign household or for the officials, employees and agents of the Principality’s public services. The Monegasque rates run at 0% in the direct line between parents and children and between spouses, 8% between brothers and sisters, 10% between uncles, aunts, nephews and nieces, 13% between collaterals other than brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts, nephews or nieces, and 16% between persons who are not related. The statutory tariff carries a band the portal’s rate table does not show: under article 21-1 of Law no. 580 of 29 July 1953, created with effect from 27 June 2020 by law no. 1.481 of 17 December 2019, lifetime gratuitous transfers between the partners of a contrat de vie commune bear a proportional duty of 4%. The benefit of that rate is called into question, and the article 18 rate of 16% applied retroactively, where the contract is terminated less than ten years after its conclusion for a reason other than the marriage of the partners or the death of one of them. Registration formalities carry duty at a proportional rate, usually between 0.5% and 7.5%, or at a fixed rate of EUR 10.

The Principality documents its housing market in its own right, publishing its own figures rather than leaving the question to aggregators. Monaco Statistics released the 2025 edition of its Real Estate Observatory in February 2026, its transaction data built on the Mortgage Division of the Department of Tax Services. Its perimeter is stated twice in the document: the Observatory studies only transactions in private-sector residential premises, and the state-owned housing sector is outside the field of study. It records 493 transactions in 2025, up 5.8% on 2024, for a combined value of EUR 5.9 billion: 64 first sales, off-plan or of property less than five years old, worth EUR 2.6 billion, and 429 resales worth EUR 3.2 billion, which Monaco Statistics reports as a new record for resale value. The amounts are those recorded in the notarial deeds and are, save in particular cases, inclusive of tax; agency fees, notary fees, registration duty and transcription fees are not included in the price. The estimated price per square metre stood at EUR 57,569 in 2025, after EUR 58,402 in 2024, a fall of 1.4%, and reached EUR 71,167 in the Larvotto district. Two methodological points belong with that estimate. The 2025 edition moved to a linear regression model covering sales as well as resales wherever floor area is known, and Monaco Statistics states that the change prevents comparison with the price per square metre published in earlier observatories. And the estimate does not cover the whole territory: Monaco Statistics excludes villas, as strongly atypical and often bought with a new property project in view, and excludes the Monaco-Ville district, whose transaction volume over the period studied is too small to support a reliable estimate. Separately, and on figures it attributes to the Direction de la Prospective, de l’Urbanisme et de la Mobilité rather than to the Mortgage Division, Monaco Statistics counts 1,473 buildings at 31 December 2025, a figure that includes buildings under construction or authorised, for 3.4 million square metres of usable floor space, of which housing, including state-owned housing, accounted for 60.2%.

The consequence is a commuter geography rather than a resident one. Of the 65,117 salaried employees recorded in 2025, 87.4% do not live in Monaco. Monaco Statistics publishes where private-sector employees live, and the figures for 2025 are these: 81.5% lived in France, around 48,000 people, that figure being made up of 59.4% of all private-sector employees in the Alpes-Maritimes outside the neighbouring communes, 21.4% in the neighbouring communes and 0.7% elsewhere in France; 10.1%, close to 6,000 people, lived in Monaco; and 8.3%, near 5,000 workers, lived in Italy. Employees whose place of residence is not stated are excluded from that breakdown. The Employment Office names the neighbouring communes as Cap d’Ail, La Turbie, Beausoleil and Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, and article 5 of Law no. 629 of 17 July 1957 gives residents of those communes who are authorised to work there and who have already carried on a professional activity in Monaco a rank in the hiring order. On indirect taxation, VAT and the duties on beverages and precious metals are levied in Monaco on the same basis and at the same rates as in France. The Monaco Statistics observatory is the Principality’s own published source for property prices.

Monaco holds together a set of arrangements that have to be read as one: entry across French territory and, for a national of a country outside the Monegasque residence page’s published list, a French settlement visa of type D in most cases, or a transfer of residency where the applicant has been established in France for more than a year; a residence permit issued by the Principality in four categories, valid for one, three, five or ten years, the five-year card being the one for the spouse of a Monegasque national; a work permit tied to a single employer and a single occupation; a statutory order of hiring priority; and an absence of personal income tax that carries one nationality-specific exception, attached to French nationals governed by the 1963 convention, and does not displace the rules of the reader’s own country. Each of these frameworks is, for a personal situation, a matter for the competent Monegasque and French authorities and for a qualified professional.