Which Visa Route Fits Your Move to Spain

Reviewed September 2026. Every other decision in a move to Spain hangs off this one. The route you qualify for determines which documents you gather, which consulate appointment you book, whether you may work, how you are taxed, and whether your family comes with you. Choose it first and everything downstream stops being guesswork.

This page sets out the routes Americans actually use, the test each one applies, and where the rules are published. It does not tell you which one you qualify for. Nobody can do that from a web page, and anybody who offers to is selling something.

The routes, compared

Route	Who it is built for	May you work?	The binding constraint
Non-lucrative residence	People living on savings, pensions or passive income	No. No work, employed or self-employed	Proving income that does not come from working
Digital nomad (international teleworking)	Remote employees and contractors working for companies outside Spain	Yes, remotely, for non-Spanish clients or employers	Evidencing a genuine pre-existing relationship with a foreign employer or clients
Student	Enrolled students, including language-school programmes	Yes, up to 30 hours a week where compatible with the studies	Acceptance at an authorised institution, and the fact that a course ends
Work permit	People with a Spanish employer sponsoring them	Yes	The employer applies, and the ordinary route must pass a labour market test
Family of an EU citizen	Spouses and dependants of a citizen of another EU member state, not of a Spanish national	Yes	Proving the qualifying relationship

How far each row is documented. This page covers the first two routes in detail, against sources listed at the end. The family-of-an-EU-citizen row is now documented on its own page, sourced to Real Decreto 240/2007 and the Policía Nacional. Every row now has its own sourced page: the student route, the EU family route and the employer-sponsored routes. The table is a comparison; each page carries the conditions and where they are published.

One line above is worth re-reading. If you or your spouse holds citizenship of any EU member state — and Irish, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and German descent are common in the United States — the family route is a different and far lighter process than anything else on this page. You apply in Spain for a residence card rather than at a consulate for a visa. Check the family tree before you start assembling a non-lucrative file, and read how the EU family route works.

One exclusion matters here. Real Decreto 240/2007 covers family of a citizen of another EU member state. By its own terms it does not cover family members of Spanish nationals, so being married to a Spaniard does not put you on this route. Take advice on which regime applies instead of assuming.

The non-lucrative route: the money test

The requirement is not written as a euro figure. It is written as a percentage of the IPREM, Spain’s public income reference index, which is why the number moves without the rule changing.

Here is the part almost nobody explains. The IPREM is set each year in the General State Budget. Spain has not passed a 2026 budget, so under Article 134.4 of the Constitution the previous budget is automatically extended, and the IPREM is extended with it, still at the level fixed by Ley 31/2022.

Figure	Per month	Per year
IPREM	€600	€7,200
Main applicant, at 400% of the IPREM	€2,400	€28,800
Each additional family member, at 100%	€600	€7,200

Three things catch applicants out, none of them in the arithmetic:

• The twelve-payment basis. The IPREM is quoted two ways, on twelve payments and on fourteen, and the two produce different targets. The consulates settle it themselves: they state €600 a month and €7,200 a year, which is twelve.
• Income that is not work. The route forbids working, so income from employment undermines the application it is meant to support. Savings, pensions, rental and investment income are the shapes that fit.
• Consulates ask for margin. Meeting the minimum exactly is the weakest version of an application. Where income is irregular or paid outside Spain, offices commonly want to see more than the floor.

The digital nomad route

Created by Ley 28/2022, the start-ups law, for people who work remotely for companies located outside Spain. Its income test is commonly described as a multiple of the salario mínimo interprofesional, the statutory minimum wage, which is set by royal decree each year — for 2026 by Real Decreto 126/2026 of 18 February. We have sourced the decree that fixes the wage. We have not verified the multiplier against the law text, so treat the link between the two as something to confirm rather than as established here.

We are not printing a euro figure for this one. The minimum wage is revised annually and we have not verified the 2026 amount against the decree text itself. Open the royal decree or the official route page and read the current number rather than trusting any secondary summary, this page included.

What the figure will not tell you is where applications actually fail: the relationship with the foreign employer or clients has to be genuine and pre-existing. A contract signed the month before applying, a company owned by the applicant, or a client list assembled for the purpose all invite scrutiny. This route is also administered differently from the consular routes, so the procedure is not interchangeable with the non-lucrative one.

What every route asks for

Whatever route you take, the same four items appear, and three of them have long lead times:

1. A criminal record certificate, apostilled and sworn-translated. The slowest item in the whole move. See the FBI check, apostille and translation chain.
2. Private health insurance meeting the wording the consulate requires. Not travel insurance, and not a policy with co-payments where the office asks for none.
3. A medical certificate in the form the consulate specifies.
4. Proof of means in the shape the route defines.

Order these in the sequence set out in the move timeline. The background check leads, because it is the slowest item and everything else waits on it.

The checklist that governs is your consulate’s

If you take one thing from this page, take this. Requirements, accepted document formats, appointment systems and the interpretation of “sufficient means” vary between Spanish consulates in the United States. A checklist from a forum, a law firm, or a friend who applied through a different office is a lead, not an instruction.

Consular jurisdiction follows your legal US address, not the nearest airport or the office with the soonest appointment. Find the office that governs your file in the consulate finder by state, then work from its own published list and nothing else.

Before you commit to a route

• Check whether anyone in the household holds, or could claim, EU citizenship.
• Establish whether your income is work income, and therefore whether the non-lucrative route is closed to you.
• Read your own consulate’s page for the exact route, not a general one.
• Model the tax position in both countries before changing employment or company arrangements. See US taxes after moving to Spain.
• Price the first year, including the professional help this will need, in the cost calculator.

Where these figures come from

All consulted on 29 September 2026. The indices behind these numbers move, and the rules on top of them are amended, so treat anything here as a pointer to the live page rather than a substitute for it.

• Ley 31/2022, de Presupuestos Generales del Estado para 2023: the IPREM figure currently in force, extended into 2026 because no 2026 budget has been passed.
• Ley 28/2022, de fomento del ecosistema de las empresas emergentes: the law that created the international teleworking residence.
• Spanish consulates in the United States — non-lucrative residence visa: the 400% and 100% percentages and the 2026 euro amounts, monthly and annual.
• Real Decreto 126/2026: the minimum wage for 2026, which the international teleworking income test is expressed against.

We describe the routes and point at where their rules live. Whether you qualify is a question for the consulate handling your file, and nothing here is immigration advice.

Common questions

Which Spanish visa should I apply for?

It depends on whether your income is work income. The non-lucrative route suits people living on savings, pensions or passive income and forbids working. The international teleworking route suits people working remotely for companies outside Spain.

How much money do I need for the Spanish non-lucrative visa?

Spanish consulates state 2,400 euros a month for the main applicant and 600 euros a month for each family member in 2026, being 400 per cent of the IPREM plus 100 per cent per dependant.

Why has the IPREM not changed for 2026?

Because Spain has not passed a 2026 budget. Under Article 134.4 of the Constitution the previous budget is automatically extended, and the IPREM is extended with it at the level fixed by Ley 31/2022.

Can I work remotely on a Spanish non-lucrative visa?

No. The route forbids work of any kind, employed or self-employed. Remote work for a foreign employer is what the international teleworking route exists for.

Is there a faster route if my spouse is an EU citizen?

If your spouse is a citizen of another EU member state, yes: you apply in Spain for a residence card rather than at a consulate for a visa. It does not apply if your spouse is Spanish, which the decree excludes by its own terms.