Overall6/10Easier visas than about 55% of cities
Good to know
Good to Know
- Rules for who needs a visa changed in September 2025 — some nationalities that used to be visa-free for short stays now need prior authorization, so check your specific passport against the current list before booking flights to ski season in Valle Nevado.
- Keep your Tourist Card (the small paper/digital slip issued on arrival) safe for your whole trip — you must surrender it on departure, and losing it can genuinely delay you at the airport.
- If you're planning a long stay for a ski season, know that a 90-day tourist stay can be extended once for another 90 days by paying a fee at the immigration office, but after that you need an actual residency visa — you can no longer flip from tourist to resident status from inside Chile except in narrow cases (family reunification, pregnancy).
- Doing repeated short trips across the border just to reset the tourist clock is not a safe long-term strategy — Chilean authorities have flagged this pattern and can refuse re-entry.
- Chile does not have one clearly branded 'digital nomad visa' with fixed published rules — different official-sounding routes (a remote-worker Temporary Residency subcategory and a separate passive-income Rentista visa) are often blurred together under nomad-visa marketing, so verify current requirements directly with SERMIG or a Chilean immigration lawyer before applying.
- The territorial tax exemption on foreign-source income (up to 3 years, extendable to 6) is one of Chile's biggest draws for remote workers — but it only applies to genuinely foreign-source income and requires staying under the residency's local-work restrictions.
- Valle Nevado is a ski resort roughly an hour from Santiago; there are no local visa or tax rules specific to the resort — all of the above is national Chilean immigration and tax policy that applies the same way whether you're based in Santiago or up at the resort.
Visa Free Entry
- Country
- Chile
- Summary
- Chile is the applicable national jurisdiction for Valle Nevado, a ski resort in the Andes about 1.5 hours from Santiago — there is no separate local visa regime for the resort itself. Entry rules are set nationally by Chile's Servicio Nacional de Migraciones (SERMIG) and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
- Who Qualifies
- Most Western and many Latin American nationalities (including the US, Canada, UK, EU member states, Australia, Japan, South Korea, and most of Latin America) enter as tourists without needing to arrange a visa in advance.
- Process On Arrival
- Visa-exempt travelers simply present a valid passport at the border; no ESTA-style pre-authorization exists for these nationalities. On entry you receive a Tourist Card (Tarjeta de Turismo) issued by the Chilean Investigative Police (PDI), which must be kept and surrendered on departure — losing it can delay your exit.
- Border Runs Warning
- Chile's own immigration authorities and legal guides warn that repeatedly leaving and re-entering just to reset the 90-day tourist clock is not treated as a legitimate residency strategy and can draw scrutiny from border officers.
- Funds And Documents
- Immigration officers may ask for proof of sufficient funds (commonly cited around USD $46–50 per day) plus evidence of onward/return travel, though this is not always checked in practice for well-documented travelers.
- Standard Stay Length
- Citizens of over 100 countries can enter Chile visa-free for tourism, receiving a 90-day tourist permit on arrival, though citizens of certain countries, notably some in Asia and the Caribbean, are granted only 30 days.
- Important 2025 Change
- Since a September 2025 decree (Decreto No. 359), nationals of 104 specified countries now require prior authorization or a visa before entering Chile even for short 'Temporary Stay Permit' tourist visits — a change from the older blanket visa-waiver list, enacted under Article 27(2) of Chile's Migration and Foreigners Law for reasons of national interest or reciprocity. Nomads should verify their specific nationality's current status rather than relying on older 'visa-free' lists.
- Converting To Residency
- Since Chile's 2022 immigration law (Ley 21.325), tourists can no longer switch from a tourist permit to a temporary residence visa while inside the country (except for family reunification or pregnancy cases) — any longer-term residence permit must be applied for from abroad, before travel, through SERMIG's online platform.
- Currency Note
- Chile's local currency is the Chilean Peso (CLP). Most cash fees quoted for immigration processes (like the tourist extension) are set in USD but are paid in the peso equivalent at the payment window.
- Official Source Note
- The Chilean government's own migration service (SERMIG) confirms that no prior authorization or visa is required for holders of a 'Permanencia Transitoria' permit (the standard tourist entry), except for nationals of countries subject to special reciprocity/national-interest requirements — travelers should check their specific nationality against the current list before travel.
Extension
- Details
- You can extend your Tourist Card for an additional 90-day period by paying a fee of USD $100 at the Chilean Immigration Office (Servicio de Migraciones), done before the initial 90 days expire. This extension is granted once only and cannot be renewed again after the second 90-day period ends.
- Possible
- Yes
- Extension Fee
- CLP 93,000
- Total Max Tourist Stay
- Up to 180 days per any 12-month period (initial 90 days + one 90-day extension), after which a residency visa is required.
Digital Nomad Visa And Tax
- Visa Name
- No single dedicated 'digital nomad visa' law exists; remote workers instead use a Residencia Temporal (Temporary Residency) subcategory for independent/remote workers, sometimes marketed commercially as a 'Digital Nomad Visa' (Visa de Trabajo Remoto para Nómades Digitales), plus a separate Rentista (passive-income) visa route.
- Renewal Path
- Renewable, typically for further periods; sources disagree on exact renewal length and cap — some describe annual 12-month renewals with no stated cap, others describe the underlying Temporary Residency permit as valid up to 2 years and leading to Permanent Residency (Residencia Definitiva) after roughly 2 years (24 months) of continuous legal residence, after which citizenship can be applied for after 5 years total legal residency.
- Visa Ease Tier
- moderate
- Visa Ease Tier Rationale
- Chile offers a generous 90+90 day visa-free tourist allowance and a genuine remote-worker residency pathway with a valuable 3-6 year foreign-income tax exemption, but there is no single clearly-named/published digital nomad visa with a fixed income threshold, and actual Temporary Residency processing currently runs 6-8 months with apostille/translation document burdens.
- Source Disagreement Summary
- Multiple 2026-dated sources disagree on whether Chile has a formally named Digital Nomad Visa: some describe a program launched in late 2023/2024 with a 1-year renewable permit, while others state flatly that no such category exists and that remote workers use the general Temporary Residency permit's 'independent worker' or 'other lawful activities' subcategory instead.
- Baseline Visa Free Stay Considered
- Most Western passport holders (including US, Canada, EU, UK) can enter Chile visa-free for up to 90 days, extendable once for a further 90 days, for a maximum of roughly 180 days per year — this generous but capped tourist allowance, combined with a real but bureaucratic and slow (6-8 month) residency pathway lacking a single clearly published income threshold, was factored into the tier below.
Tax Notes
- US Specific
- A US-Chile double taxation treaty entered into force in December 2023, and US citizens can typically use the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion and Foreign Tax Credit alongside the treaty to avoid double taxation, though Chilean tax generally isn't owed at all on foreign income during the exemption window.
- Special Regime
- Chile uses a territorial tax logic for new foreign residents: foreign-source income is generally exempt from Chilean income tax for the first 3 years of residency, and this exemption can be extended for a further 3 years (up to 6 years total) via a request to Chile's tax authority, the Servicio de Impuestos Internos (SII).
- After Exemption Ends
- Once the exemption period ends, Chile taxes worldwide income at progressive rates reported to range from 0% up to about 35.5%.
- Tax Residency Trigger
- Under 183 days present in a calendar year, a foreigner generally has no Chilean tax obligations; residents (temporary or permanent) may become Chilean tax residents once they pass 183 days in the country.
Application Path
- Fees
- CLP 97,000
- Route
- Apply through SERMIG (Servicio Nacional de Migraciones) either from abroad or from inside Chile while on a tourist entry, under the 'independent worker' / remunerated-activities subcategory for remote workers, or the Rentista subcategory for passive income.
- Processing Time
- Roughly 6 to 8 months for Temporary Residency applications as of 2026, reflecting backlogs since Chile's 2022 immigration law overhaul; some visa-marketed 'nomad visa' pathways cite faster 15–90 day approval windows, so timelines vary significantly by exact subcategory and source.
- Key Contract Requirement
- For remote contractors/freelancers, a signed service contract (contrato de prestación de servicios) with a foreign client is generally required; a foreign employer with no legal presence in Chile cannot sponsor a standard local employment contract for this route.
Documents Required
- Valid passport (6+ months validity)
- Proof of income: recent bank statements and/or salary slips/service contract (commonly 3-6 months of statements)
- Federally issued criminal background check, apostilled and translated into Spanish where required
- Health insurance covering Chile
- Proof of accommodation in Chile
Income Requirement
- Published Minimum
- No official minimum income figure has been published by Chile's immigration authority (Servicio Nacional de Migraciones, SERMIG).
- Practitioner Recommended Amount
- CLP 1,455,000
- Notes
- Immigration practitioners commonly recommend showing at least USD 1,000–2,000/month in stable recurring income; some sources cite an $18,000 USD savings cushion as an alternative/supplementary proof. For the separate Rentista visa, only passive income (pensions, rental income, dividends) qualifies — freelance/contract income does not qualify for Rentista, but does qualify for the remote-worker Temporary Residency subcategory.
AI-generated estimateData refreshed July 2026
This section has no cited sources.
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Data last updated July 2026 · Verify anything important.