Every UN Country Ranked by How Easy They Are to Visit

One of my lifelong goals is to visit every country in the world. For more seasoned world travelers this is the holy grail of travel and a lifelong accomplishment that takes serious dedication to successfully complete it. There are different definitions of completing this milestone. Multiple organizations have created their own criteria of “seeing the world”. However, most of these organizations generally agree that visiting all 193 United Nations (UN) Member States equates to visiting every country in the world. My current UN Member State count is 34.

The State Department ranks countries based on safety for their travel advisories. Level 1: Exercise Normal Precautions is the State Department's lowest advisory level and generally means travelers should take only normal safety precautions when visiting a country. Countries like Canada and Iceland are in Level 1. Level 4: Do Not Travel includes countries like Russia and North Korea and is the harshest designation. When I originally found this list during college I was surprised by the strictness in standards limiting many countries from being in Level 1 that I would generally consider safe and easy to travel as a tourist. France, Spain, and Italy are listed under Level 2: Exercise Increased Caution. Although the State Department is not recommending Americans to not visit these places, it was ironic to me that some of the biggest tourism hotspots do not fall into the Level 1 category.

Factors like safety, political stability, crime, and terrorism are how the State Department creates their classifications. These factors are important, but I believe they lead us to generalize safety and ease of travel to different places. In April of 2026 I went to Guatemala to hike the Acatenango Volcano and stay in Antigua. The hike was an awesome experience and we got to see the Volcán de Fuego erupt which was one of the coolest travel experiences. Antigua is a very safe place to visit, and there are so many tourists and backpackers in the area. I never felt unsafe walking around at night and had no trouble independently planning my accommodations, activities, and transportation. However, the State Department lists Guatemala in Level 3: Reconsider Travel. For some travelers, seeing this categorization may lead them to reconsider a trip they planned or not plan the trip in the first place.

Watching Volcán de Fuego erupt during my hike on Acatenango in Guatemala. Despite Guatemala's Level 3 U.S. travel advisory, I found Antigua to be easy to visit independently and full of travelers.

I am a meticulous planner and pride myself in keeping my life in check through lists that I get to check off once the task is completed. Applying this habit to my travel planning led me to develop a ranking of all 193 UN Member States based on their ease of travel from my perspective. Unlike the State Department, I do not have a plethora of data supporting my ranking or analysts to constantly monitor the status and security of every country. My intention of this list was to categorize countries based on the level of effort needed to plan a trip to the nation. This includes flight availability, tourism infrastructure, safety, and ability to independently plan a trip to the country. Taking this information into account I created a chart with every UN country ranked into four different categories. Using this information I hope to challenge misconceptions regarding travel and encourage visits to more locations that we have been taught to only see as dangerous or not welcoming towards tourists. I have a degree in International Relations, have spent years researching destinations around the world, and most importantly, can successfully name all 193 UN member states on Sporcle. However, there are places in the world I am not as familiar with and this bias probably led me to being harsher on certain nations versus others. 

For my ranking, Tier 1 means I can easily plan a trip to this country independently and there is a lot of flight availability to the country or is located close to an airport with many flights from the U.S. It also includes places that are geographically close to the U.S. and I would not need to spend as much time (or PTO days) to visit. Tier 2 means I can plan a trip but it is not as easy as Tier 1. This may be due to its proximity far from the U.S. or being very difficult to reach (e.g. requiring 3+ connecting flights). I would still feel comfortable planning a trip to these places myself. Tier 3 represents increased difficulties in visiting the country. For most countries in this tier, I would seek a company to schedule a tour through if I were to visit due to a lack of tourism infrastructure or limited opportunities for independent travel experiences. There are several countries in this tier that are considered very safe, but booking a flight is either ridiculously expensive or requires an extended trip duration due to the remoteness of the destination. Tier 4 is for countries that need significant political changes before visiting. Although I would not totally write off visiting countries on this list, I would absolutely have a guide with me the entire trip and would need significant time and monetary resources to feel comfortable visiting. 

Factors I considered for country rankings:

• Ability to independently plan a trip to the country

• Flight Availability from the U.S.

• Visa requirements

• Political stability

• Safety for tourists

• Tourism infrastructure

• Flight costs in reaching the destination

• Expected transportation, accommodation, and tour costs

As I shared before, my goal is to visit all 193 UN Member States. You are probably asking how I will accomplish that when I list countries in a category that says I will not visit until they are easier to access for tourists. My answer is that we are just getting started at 34 UN countries visited, so that will be a problem for future me to conquer. Creating this list and criteria was mainly a personal project to quell the travel bug that constantly buzzes inside of me, but I thought it would be interesting to share. Through my travel guides I aim to inform travelers on political, cultural, and socioeconomic information before planning a visiting a country. News coverage often emphasizes conflict and instability while overlooking how accessible many destinations have become for independent travelers. Just because I listed a country in Tier 2 or 3 does not mean I do not want to travel there. It just represents an increased challenge in my planning that I am more than willing to take on. I hope for this ranking to help inspire new trips and for you to see just how lucky we are to be able to jump on a plane and experience cultures and destinations that feel so different from our own.

Key

• ✅ Visited - Self explanatory

• 🟢 Tier 1 - Easy, Comfortable planning independently with good flight access and established tourism infrastructure

• 🟡 Tier 2 - Medium, Takes some mild planning but not that bad, would feel comfortable planning my own trip here

• 🟠 Tier 3 - Hard, More extensive planning, would want to have a guide during the trip or a company to book the trip through

• 🔴 Tier 4 - Would need major government changes or war to stop in order to feel totally safe visiting

Disclaimer: This list is personal and should not replace official travel advisories, visa research, common sense, or safety considerations.

No ranking system is perfect, and every traveler has a different comfort level. This is simply the framework I created to prioritize my own future trips.

Visited	Tier 1	Tier 2	Tier 3	Tier 4
Andorra	Australia	Antigua and Barbuda	Algeria	Afghanistan
Argentina	Albania	Armenia	Angola	Belarus
Austria	Belgium	Azerbaijan	Benin	Central African Republic
Bahamas	Belize	Bahrain	Bhutan	Democratic Republic of the Congo
Brazil	Bolivia	Bangladesh	Brunei	Eritrea
Cambodia	Bosnia and Herzegovina	Barbados	Burkina Faso	Haiti
Canada	Bulgaria	Botswana	Burundi	Iran
Chile	Cyprus	Cabo Verde	Chad	Libya
Colombia	Dominica	Cameroon	Djibouti	Mali
Costa Rica	El Salvador	China	Equatorial Guinea	Myanmar
Croatia	Estonia	Comoros	Eswatini	North Korea
Cuba	Finland	Egypt	Gabon	Russia
Czech Republic	Greece	Ethiopia	Gambia	Somalia
Denmark	Grenada	Fiji	Guinea	South Sudan
Dominican Republic	Iceland	Georgia	Guinea Bissau	Sudan
Ecuador	Indonesia	Ghana	Iraq	Syria
France	Ireland	Guyana	Kiribati	Ukraine
Germany	Israel	Honduras	Lebanon	Venezuela
Guatemala	Jamaica	India	Lesotho	Yemen
Hungary	Japan	Ivory Coast	Liberia
Italy	Kuwait	Jordan	Malawi
Mexico	Latvia	Kazakhstan	Marshall Islands
Montenegro	Liechtenstein	Kenya	Mauritania
Morocco	Lithuania	Kyrgyzstan	Mauritius
Netherlands	Luxembourg	Laos	Micronesia
Peru	Macedonia	Madagascar	Mozambique
Portugal	Malaysia	Maldives	Nauru
Slovakia	Malta	Mongolia	Niger
Spain	Moldova	Namibia	Palau
Switzerland	Monaco	Nepal	Papua New Guinea
United Kingdom	New Zealand	Nicaragua	Republic of the Congo
United States of America	Norway	Nigeria	Samoa
Uruguay	Panama	Oman	Sao Tome and Principe
Vietnam	Paraguay	Pakistan	Sierra Leone
	Philippines	Rwanda	Solomon Islands
	Poland	Saint Lucia	Sri Lanka
	Qatar	Saint Vincent and the Grenadines	Tajikistan
	Romania	Senegal	Timor-Leste
	Saint Kitts and Nevis	Seychelles	Togo
	San Marino	South Africa	Tonga
	Saudi Arabia	Suriname	Turkmenistan
	Serbia	Tanzania	Tuvalu
	Singapore	Trinidad and Tobago	Uganda
	Slovenia	Tunisia	Vanuatu
	South Korea	Uzbekistan	Zambia
	Sweden		Zimbabwe
	Thailand
	Turkey
	United Arab Emirates
34/193	49/193	46/193	46/193	19/193
*Iraq’s ranking takes into account the ease of visiting Kurdistan for Americans but counts as visiting Iraq

Last updated: July 2026. This ranking will continue to evolve as I visit more countries and as global travel conditions change.