Spain's Golden Visa ended in April 2025: what exists now, and what happens to the ones already issued
Plain Spain editorial team · · 8 min read
The Spanish Golden Visa is gone. Not paused, not restricted, not harder to get: the five articles of law that created it were emptied out with effect from 3 April 2025, and there is no longer any application to make. Plenty of pages still describe the property route as though you could file one tomorrow, which is why people keep arriving at it, and why the first thing this page does is say plainly that the door is shut.
What is left is two ordinary residence routes that were always there and that most former Golden Visa readers qualify for on facts they already have. One is the Non-Lucrative Visa, for people whose money arrives without them working for it. The other is the Digital Nomad Visa, for people who work remotely for companies outside Spain. Neither asks you to buy anything.
Key takeawaysLink to this section
- Articles 63 to 67 of Ley 14/2013, the Golden Visa articles, were left without content with effect from 3 April 2025.
- The instrument that did it is Ley Orgánica 1/2025, a justice-system reform, in its twenty-first final provision.
- A permit already granted keeps running for the period it was issued for, and its renewals are decided under the rules that applied when it was first granted.
- An application filed before that date is still decided under the old rules.
- Buying property in Spain is still legal and still ordinary. It just no longer produces a residence permit.
- The two routes that remain turn on income, not on investment, and the money they ask for is a monthly figure rather than a purchase.
Is Spain's Golden Visa still available?Link to this section
No. It stopped existing on 3 April 2025, and the way it stopped is worth seeing, because it explains why no consulate will make an exception.
Spain did not tighten the investor route or raise its threshold. It deleted it. Open the consolidated text of Ley 14/2013, the law that created the investor visa in 2013, and articles 63, 64, 65, 66 and 67 now read sin contenido, without content. Each one carries the same note underneath: left without content, with effect from 3 April 2025, by the twenty-first final provision of Ley Orgánica 1/2025, of 2 January.
That law is not an immigration law. It is a reform of the justice service, and the abolition rides in its final provisions, which is part of why the change was less visible than the programme it ended. The provision itself is one sentence: articles 63, 64, 65, 66 and 67 are left without content.
Article 68, the old entry-and-stay permission for starting a business, was already removed before that, by Ley 28/2022. So the two substitutes people most often reach for, the investor route and the old business-start route, are both off the table, and neither is coming back through a consulate's discretion.
What happens to a Golden Visa I already hold?Link to this section
It keeps working. The same final provision wrote two transitional rules into Ley 14/2013, and both protect what was already in motion.
| Where you were on 3 April 2025 | What the law says happens | Where it says so |
|---|---|---|
| You held a valid investor visa or authorisation | It keeps its validity for the whole period it was issued for | Transitional provision two |
| You want to renew that authorisation | The renewal is processed and decided under the rules in force when the initial authorisation was granted | Transitional provision two |
| You had filed an application, not yet decided | You may still receive the visa or authorisation under the rules in force on the day you filed | Transitional provision one |
Read those together and the shape is clear. The abolition is of the route, not of the permits the route issued. Nobody lost residence on 3 April 2025, and a family part-way through a renewal cycle is not being pushed onto a different permit.
What the transitional rules do not do is give you a way back in. If you sold the property, let the permit lapse, or never filed, the old rules have nothing left to attach to, and you are in the same position as someone reading about the programme for the first time.
What replaced the Golden Visa for someone who was going to buy property?Link to this section
Nothing did, in the sense of a residence permit you can buy. What exists instead are two permits that test what you earn or hold, not what you purchase.
| Non-Lucrative Visa | Digital Nomad Visa | |
|---|---|---|
| Who it is for | People living on income they do not work for: pensions, rent, dividends, savings | People working remotely for employers or clients outside Spain |
| What it measures | €2,400 a month for the main applicant, plus €600 for each family member | €2,849 a month gross for the main applicant, with percentage add-ons per family member |
| Can you work? | No. Not for a Spanish employer, and not remotely for a foreign one | Yes, but only the remote work the permit was granted for |
| Where you apply | The Spanish consulate for the district where you live | From inside Spain to a central unit, or at a consulate |
| Property | Irrelevant to whether you qualify | Irrelevant to whether you qualify |
The gap between those two columns is the whole decision, and it turns on where your money comes from rather than on how much of it there is. The comparison page sets the two side by side in more detail, including how they renew and how each one behaves at the five-year mark.
Which of the two fits a former Golden Visa applicant?Link to this section
It depends on one fact: whether you still work.
If you are retired, living on a pension, on rental income, on dividends or on savings, the Non-Lucrative Visa is the direct equivalent of what you were reading about. It asks for a monthly figure of passive means rather than a purchase, and the arithmetic behind that figure is set out in the 2026 income math.
There is one condition that surprises people arriving from the investor route: the Non-Lucrative Visa forbids work outright. Article 61.1 of the immigration regulation in force since 20 May 2025 puts the holder and their family in Spain sin realizar actividades laborales o profesionales, without carrying out employment or professional activity. Remote work for a company abroad is still work. The old investor permit allowed you to work; this one does not, and the difference catches consultants who intended to keep two or three clients.
If you do still work, and that work is remote and for companies outside Spain, the Digital Nomad Visa is the route, and it is usually faster. It has its own decision-blocking questions. The tax election that comes with it is one, and it is covered in what a Digital Nomad Visa holder actually pays in Spain.
Both routes need health cover that satisfies the consulate before they need anything else, and the policy is where more files stall than on money. What the insurance requirement really asks for is the shortest version.
Does owning a Spanish property help either application?Link to this section
It helps the paperwork. It does not help you qualify.
Neither route counts property as a qualifying asset. The Non-Lucrative Visa tests means: a monthly income or a lump sum that covers the period you are asking to reside for. The Digital Nomad Visa tests a remote working relationship and the income it produces. A deed proves neither.
Where a property does earn its place is in the supporting documents. Consulates ask, in some districts, for evidence of accommodation available in Spain, and owning the home you will live in answers that in one page. It also removes a rental contract from the pile and makes the cost side of your file easier to read. That is a convenience, not a criterion.
One more thing worth saying to anyone still weighing a purchase. The Non-Lucrative Visa's savings route measures money you can show a bank certificate for, and money tied up in a house is not that money. Buying first and applying afterwards can leave an applicant technically poorer, on paper, than they were before.
Does moving to Spain make me a Spanish tax resident?Link to this section
More than 183 days in a calendar year and yes, and days are not the only trigger.
Article 9.1 of Spain's personal income tax law counts anyone who spends more than 183 days of the calendar year in Spanish territory, and it counts sporadic absences against you unless you can prove tax residence somewhere else. It has a second, independent test: Spain being the main base of your activities or economic interests. Either one is enough on its own.
That question used to sit at the end of a Golden Visa conversation, because the investor permit did not require you to live here. Both of the remaining routes assume you do. The Non-Lucrative Visa's renewal has its own presence test on top, and the renewal rules explain how the two 183-day rules differ, since they come from different laws and are decided by different offices.
We prepare visa files, not tax returns. Budget for a Spanish tax adviser in your first year, and have that conversation before you move rather than in the following April.
What should I do next?Link to this section
Work out which of the two routes your own facts point at, before you read another word about either.
The eligibility check asks six questions, wants no email address, and tells you which route your answers point at along with the rule behind the answer. If the outcome is the Non-Lucrative Visa, the income arithmetic and the document list are the next two things to read. If it is the Digital Nomad Visa, the questions to settle are the remote-work evidence and the tax election.
If neither fits, that is worth knowing in an afternoon rather than after a property viewing. The investor route is not coming back, and no adviser can file an application under articles that no longer have any content in them.