World’s most powerful passport: Surprise European nation takes second spot

Singapore has retained its place at the top of a ranking of the world’s strongest passports, previously knocking Spain off the top spot.

But there's a surprising new entry onto the podium that has taken second place as of December 2024.

Finland has soared up the rankings, rising from 13th place in 2023 and 7th place at the start of 2024, and has squeezed in just ahead of Spain.

VisaGuide.World’s ranking is seen as one of the most reliable within the travel industry, along with the Henley Passport Index. 

The company evaluates 199 countries and territories globally and bases its results on factors including visa-free access, eVisas, and global mobility. 

It then uses its own Destination Significance Score (DSS) to assign a unique value to each passport, although the DSS is not revealed in the ranking. 

With this system, VisaGuide.World has found that the Singaporean passport is officially the strongest passport in the entire world - with a score of 91.27 out of a possible 100 as of December 2024. 

Finland is in second place, with a score of 90.88 is closely followed by Spain, whose score is 90.87. 

Next up are the Danish and Italian passports, which come in with scores of 90.63 and 90.58 respectively.

It’s good news for Europe overall, with only one other country not on the continent, Japan, in the top 20. Japan takes 8th place, up from 15th in September last year.

Malta, France, Austria and Hungary round out the top 10 ranking. 

How does VisaGuide.World rank passports?

Released four times a year, VisaGuide.World’s passport ranking examines the number of destinations passport holders can access without a visa. Henley, usually thought of as the authority, takes a similar approach but has yet to release its ranking for this quarter. 

VisaGuide.World takes other factors into consideration, creating its DSS for each travel destination.

That score factors in the type of entry policy each country enforces on an individual passport. That encompasses visa-free entry, Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA), visa on arrival, e-Visas embassy approved visas, passport-free travel or banned entry. 

This means the next ranking could look very different as Schengen countries introduce the Entry/Exit System (EES) and ETIAS visa waiver for some non-EU countries and the UK rolls out its ETA. 

The DSS also assigns points for the country’s GDP, global power and tourism development. 

Not all of its criteria are considered equal, though. Visa-free access to a country with a high DSS earns a passport more points in the index than entry to a country with a low score.

The fact that VisaGuide.World does not specify the DSS of each country means that other factors may also affect the outcome of the index.

Why has Finland risen in the passport ranking?

Finland managed to bump Spain from the second spot thanks to passport holders being able to travel passport-free to a higher number of destinations - 45 compared to 43.

All the European countries in the top 20 have a high number of passport-free travel destinations, unlike Singapore and Japan, thanks to the existence of the European Union and the Schengen zone. 

For these citizens, travelling with just an ID card is possible, making freedom of movement simple.

Spanish passport holders have also seen a reduction in the places they can travel to visa-free, from 160 countries and territories to just 107.

It appears to be a drop across the board, though. Singaporean passport holders could previously visit 164 places without a visa but today, that only applies to 160. 

While the ranking doesn’t explicitly say why this is the case, it is a regularly-changing figure due to shifting diplomatic ties, mutual visa policies, and the political and economic stability of countries and territories globally.