Visa Limits & Long Term Travel:
Most travelers, including myself, travel on Visitor Visas, and every countries' visa has a time limit; a maximum stay length for visitors to be in the country.
If you hope to travel for extended lengths of time you need to do some extra planning so you don’t get caught off guard by additional regulations and deadlines. The average allowable Visa stay is 90 days, but some are less and a handful allow up to 180 days. You don't have to go home after the 90 days (or whatever each your countries limit is) but you will have to move on to your next destination and likely have to be away a set amount of time before you can return the original country. Some countries are stricter about enforcing these regulations than others but even with those that are lax I never recommend ‘just hoping they don’t notice’ - the consequences of overstaying a visa can be severe, including being permanently  banned from reentry into the country - so always do your research and follow the local regulations.
The Schengen Zone
By far, the most complicated place to travel long term is Europe. Similar to the EU agreement,  many of the countries also have a unified set of traveling regulations governing non European visitors. These countries are called the Schengen Countries (named for Schengen, Luxembourg, the city where the terms were agreed on.) The Schengen zone is considered one entity in terms of travel, not separate countries. The result is that their 90 day limit doesn’t mean you can spend 90 days in France and then 90 days in Germany right after - it means you can only spend 90 days total in any of the participating Schengen countries combined - So if you spend 45 days in France you can only spend 45 additional days in Germany or any other combination of Schengen countries.
Traveling in Europe longer than 3 months?
You need to know about the Schengen Zone and how to make the 180 sliding rule work for you.
How the Schengen Zone Works...
​​​​​The basic rule for the Zone is you can only spend 90 days inside the Schengen Zone in a 180 day period. Sounds simple, but in practice it can actually be a bit confusing, because that 180 days does not ‘reset’ to zero twice a year into neat 180 day segments. A better way of expressing it would be on any particular day you can not have been in the Schengen Zone more than 90 days total in the previous 180 days.
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It works like a backwards sliding scale, and you need to be on top of your ‘day count’ of the previous 180 days all the time. The simplest version of this is that if you spend the full 90 days inside the Schengen zone you will need to spend a full 90 days outside the Schengen Zone before you can reenter. But if you spend a few weeks in the Schengen zone, and then few weeks out and then go back in, you will need to be keeping track your total day count. ​​​
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New Visa Rules - Until recently may countries didn’t need a Visa to travel to / between European nations. That has now been
amended and all travelers have to go through an online UK - ETA and/ or EU - ETIAS process.
Countries in The Schengen Zone...
Most of Europe is part of the Schengen Zone, but not all. As of 2024 the below countries are in the Zone, (but countries are still being added so be sure to double check your destinations status before you make any travel plans.)​​
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Austria Belgium Bulgaria Cyprus* Croatia Czechia Denmark
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Estonia Finland France Germany Greece Hungary Iceland
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Italy Kosovo Latvia Liechtenstein Lithuania Luxembourg
Malta Netherlands Norway Poland Portugal Romania
Slovakia Slovenia Spain Sweden Switzerland
*in the process of joining as of 2024
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Additionally, the microstates Monaco, San Marino, & Vatican City are, for Visa purposes, considered members of the Schengen Area.
Calculating your Days...
There are Schengen Calculators 🔗 online you can use - but personally I keep track of my days in a simple numbers file (for mac users) or Excel chart. I create a calendar table of my travel plans, with each day being a line in the table. I color code Schengen Country cells then literally create a 180 day ‘scale column’ that lines up to the right of the calendar and slide it down as I add on to my plans. At any time the table can calculate for me how many days inside that 180 slide scale are in a Schengen country.
It’s a bit of work up front but it helps me visualize real time changes as my travel plans evolve and lets me maximize the number of days I can spend in every country I want to visit. I have found it absolutely essential for planning.
What to do When your Time is Up...
If you aren't planning to go home, where do you go when your 90 days are up? What countries in Europe can you ‘escape to’ until your allowed back in to the Zone? You’d be surprised, there are actually quite a few countries still outside the Zone, some hidden gems that you may not have thought to visit otherwise. By bouncing back and forth between Schengen and Non Schengen countries you can manage to stay in Europe for significantly longer than the 90 days in one stretch.
Countries Outside the Schengen Zone...
As of 2024 the European countries below are independent of the Schengen Zone:
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Albania Andora Armenia Azerbaijan Belarus Bosnia & Herzegovina
England (UK) Georgia Ireland Macedonia Moldova Montenegro
Nrth. Ireland (UK) Russia Serbia Scotland (UK) Ukraine Wales (UK)​​
Non European Countries Near By...
There are also many Countries bordering Europe that are worth a visit when you need to pop out of the Schengen Zone:
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Algeria Egypt Greenland Israel Jordan Morocco Turkey ​​​
