Expat Insider 2021: Where does Romania stand in the ranking of the best countries for expats?

Romania ranks 32nd out of 59 destinations in the Expat Insider 2021 survey released by InterNations, the world’s largest expat community with around 4 million members. According to the report, expats in Romania enjoy their financial situation but wish for a higher quality of life.

Taiwan tops the list, followed by Mexico, and Costa Rica, while the bottom three countries are Kuwait, Italy, and South Africa. While the top three countries attract expats with their ease of settling in and good personal finances, the last three perform poorly in the Working Abroad Index.

With more than 12,000 respondents, the survey offers in-depth information on expats’ satisfaction with the quality of life, ease of settling in, working life, personal finance, and the cost of living in their respective country of residence. Additionally, the respondents also revealed in this edition of the survey how they have been experiencing the COVID-19 pandemic and how it has impacted their life.

Romania performs best in the Personal Finance Index, where it made it into the top 10 worldwide (8th). Almost three-quarters of expats (74%) are satisfied with their financial situation vs. 64% globally, the survey said.

Romania also performs rather well in the Cost of Living (15th) and the Ease of Settling In (27th) categories, while showing a below-average performance in the Working Abroad Index (37th). According to the survey, most expats are satisfied with their working hours (66% vs. 66% globally) and their work-life balance (71% vs. 66% globally).

On the other hand, Romania ranks among the bottom 10 in the Quality of Life Index (51st). The country even ranks second to last in the Travel & Transport subcategory (58th), only ahead of Kuwait (59th), while also coming among the bottom 10 in the Health & Well-Being subcategory (54th).

However, the majority of expats in Romania (72%) said the pandemic had not affected the duration of their current stay abroad (vs. 63% globally). Meanwhile, 14% of survey respondents in Romania believe the pandemic will affect their family life in the long run (vs. 9% globally).

A total of 12,420 expats representing 174 nationalities and living in 59 countries or territories participated in the Expat Insider survey. Participants were asked to rate up to 37 different aspects of life abroad on a scale of one to seven. The rating process emphasized the respondents' personal satisfaction with these aspects, considering both emotional topics and more factual aspects with equal weight. The respondents' ratings of the individual factors were then bundled in various combinations for a total of 13 subcategories, and their mean values were used to draw up five topical indices: Quality of Life, Ease of Settling In, Working Abroad, Personal Finance, and Cost of Living. The first four of these indices were further averaged together with expats' general satisfaction with their life in order to rank 59 expat destinations around the world.