Index 1 of 3 · 0–100 · 185 countries

WTE Openness Index

Answers one question: how easy is it, on paper, to obtain a legal status in this country? It weighs the breadth of open routes (30%), financial accessibility of work-route thresholds (25%), the share of routes that need no job offer (20%), the share open to all nationalities (15%) and coverage of the five macro-purposes — work, study, invest, family, retire (10%). It measures documentary accessibility only — not attractiveness, salaries or quality of life. That is why Canada ranks #77, the UAE #67, the United States #122 and Australia #141: strong destinations whose routes demand job offers, points systems or high salary thresholds.

#	Country	Score	Open routes	Purposes	Median work threshold €/yr	No job offer	Open to all	Macro-purposes /5
1	Czechia CZE	85.4	34	17	2,267	68%	59%	4
2	Portugal PRT	79.9	55	21	11,040	69%	86%	5
3	Chile CHL	78.8	28	20	—	86%	61%	5
3	Colombia COL	78.8	30	18	11,508	79%	67%	5
5	Brazil BRA	78.4	33	16	9,882	76%	76%	5
5	Italy ITA	78.4	48	18	16,200	68%	94%	5
7	Ecuador ECU	77.7	19	15	13,842	79%	90%	5
8	Fiji FJI	77.2	20	12	6,984	75%	95%	5
9	Panama PAN	76.7	56	17	15,696	56%	98%	5
10	Rwanda RWA	76.1	27	11	2,267	56%	96%	3
11	Peru PER	75.8	25	18	6,168	46%	60%	5
12	Albania ALB	75.6	17	13	12,660	94%	77%	5
13	Bahamas BHS	75.4	15	11	2,267	87%	93%	4
14	Philippines PHL	75.0	21	11	3,666	78%	57%	5
15	Greece GRC	74.9	38	17	14,400	46%	95%	5
16	Cape Verde CPV	74.4	15	13	—	80%	87%	5
17	Slovenia SVN	74.3	29	14	6,084	46%	97%	4
18	Spain ESP	73.5	42	18	36,000	77%	88%	5
19	Dominican Republic DOM	73.4	15	12	—	79%	93%	5
20	Austria AUT	73.2	64	19	15,696	56%	75%	5

Median work threshold is winsorized at the global [P05, P95] band of €2,267–€69,264/year before taking the country median; "—" means no work route has a known threshold (the component falls back to a neutral 0.5 with a declared shrinkage flag). Czechia #1 is real, not a bug: 7 work routes with official subsistence-level thresholds, 17 distinct purposes, 34 open routes.

Index 2 of 3 · years, lower = faster · 123 countries

WTE Naturalisation Speed Index

The median of years_to_citizenship across a country's open routes that lead to citizenship, excluding ancestry and birthright routes (they measure inheritance, not naturalisation speed). Published in plain years — no opaque 0–100 rescaling. Dual-citizenship policy never adds or subtracts fictional years; it is only used to break ties in the rank.

#	Country	Median years	Routes used	Spread (min–max yrs)	Dual citizenship
1	El Salvador SLV	1.5	4	1–5	not allowed
2	Dominican Republic DOM	2.0	10	1–7	allowed
2	Egypt EGY	2.0	3	1–10	allowed
4	Argentina ARG	2.0	5	2–2	allowed
4	Liberia LBR	2.0	1	2–2	allowed
4	Mexico MEX	2.0	5	2–5	allowed
4	Peru PER	2.0	4	2–5	allowed
8	Cuba CUB	2.0	3	2–5	not allowed
8	Spain ESP	2.0	8	2–10	not allowed
8	Singapore SGP	2.0	1	2–2	not allowed
11	Brazil BRA	2.5	6	1–15	allowed
11	Ecuador ECU	2.5	4	1–3	allowed
13	Bolivia BOL	2.5	4	2–3	allowed
14	Armenia ARM	3.0	11	1–3	allowed
14	Canada CAN	3.0	14	1–3	allowed
16	France FRA	3.0	8	2–10	allowed
17	Benin BEN	3.0	8	3–3	allowed
17	Poland POL	3.0	4	3–3	allowed
19	Azerbaijan AZE	3.0	6	3–5	not allowed
19	Honduras HND	3.0	2	3–3	not allowed
19	Serbia SRB	3.0	1	3–3	not allowed

Read this carefully: the median is taken over distinct legal routes, not over the typical applicant. Spain shows 2.0 years because it has many fast-track categories (Ibero-Americans, marriage, Sephardic descent); an ordinary third-country applicant faces 10 years — which is why we publish the spread and the number of routes used next to every median. Medians built on a single route (Liberia, Singapore, Serbia) are fragile by construction and flagged by their n.

Index 3 of 3 · 0–100 · v0 baseline · 185 countries

WTE Route Stability Score v0 — routes at observed risk

Declared limitation, not small print: this is a v0 baseline. Our policy-event ledger spans only ~27 days (2026-06-09 → 2026-07-06) with 7 documented programme closures across 5 countries. Countries we monitor most intensively are the only ones with observed closures, so the top of this ranking reflects absence of evidence, not proven stability — and we deliberately do not publish it. The useful signal today is the bottom: countries with real, documented route churn. Every row carries a signal_strength flag in its stored components.

#	Country	Score	Routes tracked	Closed / discontinued routes	Documented closure events	Signal
185	Australia AUS	54.0	70	3	3	observed churn
184	Singapore SGP	73.8	22	1	1	observed churn
183	Norway NOR	75.4	30	1	1	observed churn
182	Denmark DNK	78.9	46	1	1	observed churn
181	United Kingdom GBR	79.0	49	1	1	observed churn

These are the only five countries in the release with signal_strength = observed_churn. Each documented closure is listed with its official source in the change log below. The score penalises the share of closed routes (weight 0.5), documented closure events (0.3) and data staleness (0.2); it improves mechanically as the ledger accumulates history.

WTE TERMINAL

Screen 2,500+ routes from the same database yourself — filter by capital, timeline to PR and citizenship, language and job-offer requirement. Every figure links to an official source.

OPEN THE TERMINAL →

Methodology, in brief — including what these indices cannot tell you

All three indices derive by deterministic SQL from wte_v2, our verified database of 2,500+ immigration routes in 190+ countries, plus our policy-event ledger. No third-party rankings, no editorial scoring. Each published row stores its formula components, so any value can be audited down to the underlying routes.

Common rules

Eligibility: a country needs at least 3 verified routes to be scored. 185 of 215 countries with routes qualify; 29 are excluded rather than scored zero.
"Open" route: quiz-relevant and not discontinued, closed to new applicants, or closed.
Transparency: weights, winsorization bands, shrinkage factors and per-country component values are stored with every row.

Declared limitations

Openness measures paper accessibility of routes, not destination quality. A low rank (US #122, Australia #141) means demanding entry requirements, not a bad country to live in.
Naturalisation Speed is a median over legal routes, not the experience of the typical applicant — fast-track categories pull medians down. The spread and route count are published beside every value so you can judge the dispersion yourself.
Route Stability is a v0 baseline on ~27 days of event history with surveillance bias towards heavily monitored countries. We publish only the observed-risk end of the table; the "most stable" end is statistically meaningless today and we refuse to headline it.

Questions about the numbers? See our general methodology and data sources, or write to us — corrections are published in the errata log.

Recent policy changes we verified

The live proof behind the Stability score: the most recent entries in our policy-event ledger — all 7 programme closures on record, each linked to the official government source, plus the 8 most recent field verifications from our review pipeline.

Date	Country	Route	What changed	Source
2026-07-06	Kosovo XK	Qëndrim i përkohshëm me qëllim të arsimit të lartë dhe kërkimit shkencor	verified savings requirement confirmed not applicable	—
2026-07-06	Kosovo XK	Qëndrim i përkohshëm me qëllim të arsimit parauniversitar	verified savings requirement confirmed not applicable	—
2026-07-06	Bosnia and Herzegovina BA	Temporary Residence of Experts, Professors and Lecturers	verified education requirement confirmed not applicable	—
2026-07-06	Bosnia and Herzegovina BA	Temporary Residence of Members of International Scientific Missions	verified education requirement confirmed not applicable	—
2026-07-06	Hungary HU	The residence of the researcher and his/her family member	verified education requirement confirmed not applicable	—
2026-07-06	Czechia CZ	Long-Term Residence — Scientific Research (Directive 2016/801/EU)	verified education requirement confirmed not applicable	—
2026-07-06	Slovenia SI	Research activities within the framework of higher vocational colleges and higher education institutions	verified education requirement confirmed not applicable	—
2026-07-06	Finland FI	Internship	verified savings requirement confirmed not applicable	—
2026-07-01	Norway NO	Au pair	closed programme discontinued	udi.no ↗
2026-07-01	United Kingdom GB	Ukraine Family Scheme visa	closed programme discontinued	gov.uk ↗
2026-07-01	Australia AU	Subclass 124 — Distinguished Talent (offshore) visa	closed programme discontinued	homeaffairs.gov.au ↗
2026-07-01	Australia AU	Skilled – Recognised Graduate visa (subclass 476)	closed programme discontinued	homeaffairs.gov.au ↗
2026-07-01	Denmark DK	Greencard	closed programme discontinued	nyidanmark.dk ↗
2026-06-14	Australia AU	Business Innovation and Investment (Permanent) visa (subclass 888)	closed closed to new applicants	homeaffairs.gov.au ↗
2026-06-09	Singapore SG	Work Permit for performing artiste	closed programme discontinued	mom.gov.sg ↗

The full event tape — including threshold and data changes — is live in the WTE Terminal under the TAPE tab.

WTE Indices — how open, fast and stable is each country's immigration system?