Visas in Split

Good to Know

• The 90-day allowance is shared across the whole Schengen Area — time spent in Italy, Germany, etc. in the same 180-day window counts against your Croatia days too, so track your total Schengen days, not just days in Croatia.
• A 90-day tourist/visa-free stay cannot be converted into a digital nomad residence permit after the fact — if you want to stay longer than 90 days, apply for the residence permit before you arrive or well before your visa-free time runs out.
• Since October 2025 Croatia has been phasing in the EU's Entry/Exit System (EES), which fingerprints and photographs first-time entrants instead of stamping passports — expect possible longer queues at the border during the rollout.
• From late 2026, visa-exempt travelers will likely need to pre-register online via ETIAS before flying in — it's not a visa, but it is a required step, so check status before booking if traveling after that date.
• The income threshold rises every year (it's pegged to 2.5x the prior year's average Croatian net salary), so check the MUP's digital nomad page for the exact current figure before budgeting or applying.
• Documentation got stricter in 2025: you now need six months of bank statements or payslips (previously three), and a single month dipping below the threshold within that window can cause a rejection.
• This is a one-shot stay: once your permit period ends (max 18 months), you must physically leave Croatia and wait a full 6 months before you can reapply — there's no in-country renewal into a second consecutive term.
• Time spent on this permit does not count toward the years needed for Croatian permanent residency or citizenship, so it's a genuinely temporary arrangement rather than an immigration pathway.
• The tax exemption only covers Croatian tax — it does nothing to change your home country's tax residency rules or reporting obligations (this is especially relevant for US citizens with citizenship-based taxation).
• Croatia is in the Eurozone and Schengen, so the permit also gives Schengen-wide travel rights, but trips to other Schengen countries still count against the separate 90/180-day short-stay allowance outside Croatia.