The Wall Street Journal article Some People Worked From Home During Covid. These People Moved to a Tropical Island covers the growing number of Caribbean islands offering digital nomad visas and includes interviews with people taking advantage of these visas.
As the article chart below shows (click to enlarge), 7 Caribbean islands now have special, longer term visas for people choosing to work remotely from these islands (Bermuda isn’t in the Caribbean, but it’s close enough, and tropical enough, to be included in this list).
All of the digital nomad visas are new, so there’s not much data on how many people are taking advantage of them.
But there is some. Key quote from the article: “Aruba says about 13,700 visitors have arrived for ‘workations’ since the extended-stay packages were launched last September. Officials in Barbados say its new 12-Month Barbados Welcome Stamp Visa has drawn almost 5,000 new visitors since last June. And Bermuda says roughly 1,000 people have applied for its Work From Bermuda Certificate since last August.”
Not surprisingly, the people interviewed were all very positive about their experiences living in tropical paradises. Yes, they had a few complaints. Island fever was one, and slow internet connections another. But mostly, they liked island living.
The number of digital nomads has substantially grown during the pandemic. And with many companies allowing employees to permanently work remotely, their numbers will likely increase in the coming years. And many of them are likely to spend time working from tropical islands.
This article was originally published here.
