The Greek passport has jumped up two places and is now the 5th most powerful in the world, according to the latest Henley Passport Index.
This year saw a strong reshuffle in the list, announced annually by the London-based migration consultancy, who use IATA data to rank the passports of all countries from the most powerful to the least.
This year’s passport index differs from last year in that Japan is not the sole occupier of the top place, but instead is joined by five other countries.
Matching Japan in the top spot are France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Singapore, whose citizens benefit from visa-free or visa-on-demand access to 194 destinations worldwide. This represents a record number, because the record last year held by Japan was 193.
There is also a tie for second place between Sweden, Finland and South Korea, with citizens carrying these passports having easy access to 193 countries, while Austria, Ireland, the Netherlands and Denmark have easy access to 192 countries.
Greek Passport is Fifth Most Powerful in the World
Greece has come in fifth place, rising two positions since last year, where it was ranked number seven. The country is joined in fifth place by Malta and Switzerland, and fourth place is occupied by Belgium, Luxembourg, Norway and Portugal.
Greece placed eighth in 2022.
At number 6 are Australia and New Zealand, joined by the Czech Republic and Poland, while the number seven space is filled by the US, Canada and Hungary, which have easy access to 188 countries.
The most notable increase for this year is the United Arab Emirates, having added 106 countries to its list over the last 10 years, putting it now at number 11.
Coming in at number eight are Estonia and Lithuania, number nine are Latvia, Slovakia and Slovenia, and number 10 is Iceland.
In last year’s list, of the countries sat in the top 10, the US had seen the smallest increase in its score on the Henley Passport Index over the past decade, securing visa-free access to just 12 additional destinations between 2013 and 2023.
By comparison, Singapore increased its score by 25, pushing it five places up the ranking over the 10 years from 2013 to 2023.
Henley & Partners has also published a new index called the Henley Openness Index, which looks into the relationship between a country’s openness to foreigners and its own citizens’ travel freedom.
The top 20 “most open” countries on this Index are all small island nations or African states, with the exception of Cambodia.
There are 12 completely open countries that offer visa-free or visa-on-arrival entry to all 198 other passports in the world which are: Burundi, Comoro Islands, Djibouti, Guinea-Bissau, Maldives, Micronesia, Mozambique, Rwanda, Samoa, Seychelles, Timor-Leste, and Tuvalu.