Digital Nomad Visa Costa Rica Requirements: Income, Docs, and Timeline

The minimum income requirement is $3,000 USD per month for a single applicant, or $4,000 per month if you are bringing a spouse or dependents. This income must come entirely from sources outside Costa Rica, meaning clients, employers, or platforms based abroad. Freelancers, remote employees, and business owners all qualify as long as they can document the income consistently. Self-employed applicants typically need to show 12 months of bank statements plus contracts or invoices to satisfy DGME, Costa Rica's immigration authority.

The document list is longer than most applicants expect. You need a valid passport with at least one year of remaining validity, a criminal background check apostilled from every country where you have lived for the past five years, proof of income (bank statements, employment letter, or accountant certification), proof of health insurance valid in Costa Rica, and a completed application form submitted to DGME. All documents not originally in Spanish must be officially translated by a certified translator. Apostilles are required on the criminal record and, depending on origin, on employment or income letters as well.

Applications are filed directly with Costa Rica's DGME, either in person at their San Jose office or through a licensed Costa Rican immigration attorney. Processing currently takes between two and four months from submission of a complete file, though incomplete applications restart the clock. Most applicants hire a local attorney for roughly $500 to $1,500 to manage the filing, since DGME is known for returning documents for minor errors. For a detailed breakdown of what the full process costs end to end, see Digital Nomad Visa Costa Rica: What It Costs, Who Qualifies, and How Long It Takes.

Costa Rica operates on a territorial tax system, meaning income earned from foreign sources is not taxed by Costa Rica at all. For a digital nomad earning exclusively from overseas clients or employers, the practical Costa Rican income tax liability is zero. You do not become a tax resident in the traditional sense under the digital nomad category, though staying beyond 183 days in a calendar year can technically trigger residency status under general rules. Most nomads using this visa pair it with a careful home-country exit strategy to avoid dual taxation.

Applicants must show proof of health coverage valid in Costa Rica for the full duration of the visa. The most common option is enrolling in Costa Rica's public Caja Costarricense de Seguro Social (CCSS), which costs roughly 5 to 7 percent of declared income per month, or purchasing a qualifying private international health insurance policy. Private options from providers like Cigna Global or SafetyWing are accepted if they cover medical treatment inside Costa Rica with adequate coverage limits. DGME does not publish an exact minimum coverage amount, so using a policy with at least $50,000 in medical coverage is the safe baseline most attorneys recommend.

The digital nomad visa is renewable once for an additional two years, giving a maximum stay of four years under this category. After that, you must either exit and reapply or transition to a different residency category such as Rentista or Pensionado permanent residency. The digital nomad period does not automatically count toward naturalization timelines in the same way that permanent residency does, so applicants with long-term Costa Rica plans should map out a residency ladder from the start rather than treating this as a permanent solution.