Vanuatu Visa-Free Countries in 2026

A Vanuatu passport opens 85 to 88 destinations without a visa arranged in advance, depending on the index you read. The Henley Passport Index for October 2026 counts 85 and places the passport 60th, while the Timatic-based tally on Wikipedia reaches about 88. Hong Kong (90 days), Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, Fiji, Russia and most of the Caribbean are open. The Schengen Area has required a visa since 4 February 2023 and the United Kingdom since 19 July 2023. So have the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and China.

Many sites still advertise "130+ countries including Schengen and the UK". That figure describes the passport as it was before 2023, and anyone who relies on it for Europe or the UK will need a visa they may not have. Below is the position as it stands in November 2026, region by region, followed by the ranking and what changed it.

The Destinations People Ask About Most

Vanuatu Passport Visa-Free Countries List, by Region

The lists below combine two kinds of admission that require nothing before departure. "Visa-free" means you show the passport and are admitted. "On arrival" means a visa or entry permit is issued at the border, usually for a fee and sometimes after you show an onward ticket or accommodation. Permitted stays follow the airline Timatic data as compiled on Wikipedia. The headline rank in Wikipedia's introduction lags behind Henley's own data, so the ranking further down uses Henley's October 2026 figures directly. Some of the Wikipedia entries are several years old, so each destination is worth confirming with its immigration authority before you travel.

Asia and the Pacific

The 90-day stay in Hong Kong is confirmed on the visa-free list of the Hong Kong Immigration Department; figures of "14 days" that circulate online are wrong.

The Americas and the Caribbean

Africa

Europe, the Caucasus and the Middle East

Overseas territories

Timatic also lists a group of territories as open to Vanuatu passport holders, among them Anguilla (3 months), the Cook Islands (31 days), Niue (30 days), Wallis and Futuna (3 months), Bermuda, the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, Gibraltar, Montserrat and several French territories such as New Caledonia, French Polynesia, Réunion and the French West Indies. Henley classifies some of the French territories differently, which is one reason the published totals do not agree.

e-Visa destinations: not visa-free

Another large group, including India, the United Arab Emirates, Vietnam, Georgia, Albania, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Colombia, Ethiopia, Nigeria and Kenya (electronic travel authorization), lets Vanuatu citizens apply online before departure. That is convenient, but it is still a prior application that can be refused, so neither Henley nor Wikipedia counts an e-Visa as visa-free. Lists that add these countries are how some agents arrive at "over 100".

Is the Vanuatu Passport Visa-Free for Europe or the UK?

No. The European Union first suspended visa-free travel in March 2022 for passports issued from 25 May 2015, then suspended it for every Vanuatu national from 4 February 2023. Regulation (EU) 2025/11 made the change permanent by moving Vanuatu to the list of countries whose citizens need a visa, applicable from 3 February 2025. In its December 2024 announcement the Council of the EU tied the decision to the risks it saw in Vanuatu's investor citizenship schemes. Vanuatu citizens are also outside ETIAS, because ETIAS is only for visa-exempt nationals. A trip to Paris, Berlin or Rome therefore starts with a Schengen visa application.

The United Kingdom acted on its own. Since 19 July 2023 Vanuatu has appeared on the visa national list in Appendix Visitor of the Immigration Rules, so every visit needs a visa. Non-Schengen Balkan states are more open: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro and Moldova admit Vanuatu passport holders without a visa, while Albania requires an e-Visa.

Vanuatu Passport Ranking: 60th in the October 2026 Henley Index

The Henley Passport Index is a private ranking published by Henley & Partners from IATA data. It gives one point for each of 227 destinations that a passport can enter visa-free, with a visa on arrival, a visitor's permit or an electronic travel authority, and no point for a visa or an e-Visa obtained in advance. In the October 2026 edition the Vanuatu passport scores 85: 52 visa-free, 27 visa on arrival and 6 ETA destinations, which puts it 60th.

The drop in 2023 is the Schengen decision: each Schengen state is a separate destination in the index, so one EU measure removed a whole block of points, and the UK visa took away another. Ranks also move when other passports gain or lose access, which is why the position shifted slightly in 2024 and 2025 even though Vanuatu's own access barely changed.

Against other passports in the same October 2026 edition, Vanuatu sits just below Fiji (59th, 87) and well behind Samoa (40th, 128) and Solomon Islands (36th, 134). The five Caribbean investment-program passports score between 143 and 157, mainly because they keep Schengen access; our comparison of the Caribbean passports on price and access looks at them in detail. For a comparison with any other passport, for example India's, use the same edition of the index so that the figures are measured the same way.

Why you see 85, 88 or "130+"

Henley counts ETAs but not e-Visas. Wikipedia counts visa-free and visa-on-arrival entries and lists territories separately. Marketing pages add e-Visa countries, or simply repeat figures from before 2023. When you compare totals, check the publisher and the edition date. More useful than the total is whether the places you actually travel to are on the list.

Practical Checks Before You Fly

• Passport validity. Vanuatu passports issued since July 2019 are valid for 10 years; older books were issued for 5. Many destinations expect several months of validity beyond your stay.
• Airline checks. Carriers verify entry documents before boarding and refuse passengers whose papers are not in order, so a visa problem usually surfaces at the departure airport.
• Supporting documents. On-arrival destinations commonly ask for a return ticket, accommodation details and the fee in cash or by card.
• Counting the stay. Most limits are per visit; Russia's 90 days are counted per calendar year and Moldova's within any 180 days.
• Rules change. Admission is always the destination's decision. Confirm the current rule with its immigration authority before booking.

Where the Passport Fits in a Citizenship Decision

For people whose travel centers on Asia, the Pacific, the Caribbean, Russia or Africa, the Vanuatu passport covers a great deal at a lower entry price than the Caribbean programs. For people who need regular visa-free trips to Europe or the UK, it does not, and no agent can change that. The passport is one of several benefits of the citizenship; we weigh them against the limits in our article on what Vanuatu citizenship gives and what it does not.

If you tell us where you actually travel, the free assessment shows whether this passport serves you before you commit to anything. When it does, we help you obtain Vanuatu citizenship and then the passport for each family member: documents prepared to the Citizenship Office's standard, lodging through a government-designated agent as Vanuatu law requires, and support through FIU due diligence, the Commission's decision and the oath. The passport itself is issued by Vanuatu's Immigration and Passport Services, not by the Citizenship Office. Our guide to each stage from the document pack to the passport sets out the full sequence.