8 ms·

Five Cities Beloved by Digital Nomads

53 points by ytNumbers 10y ago

reustle 10y ago
I've never once heard of someone saying that Miami (or Puerto Viejo or Florianópolis) was a good place as a nomad (not even on my radar), and I've been in the "circuit" for almost 2 years now.
- bogomipz 10y ago
  Agreed, putting Miami there is a bit of a joke. I am curious what is and has been on your radar for digital nomads and what you think the list should be.
  - reustle 10y ago
    Pieter does a pretty good job of taking the list with his NomadList website. It's hard to say here are best cities because people have different wants and tastes. Some like beaches, some like cities, etc.
  - officialchicken 10y ago
    Having been in a Miami-based startup... it's fashionable, but not technological. Just about every single tech show has a runway with DJ, and I don't mean finance. The major downside is the investment community is full of retirees who don't really make good VC's. The mayor of Miami is pushing for generating tech and startups, so at least there's a political will.
- scurvy 10y ago
  Brazil is an odd choice considering that a visa costs Americans $100 (last I checked).
  - WildUtah 10y ago
    $130 And your air ticket is going to cost a lot more than that. The painful part is that you have to fly to a city with a Brazilian Embassy (LA, DC) inside the USA and stay there for a week while your visa application process happens.
    - 2a0c40 10y ago
      I've read somewhere Brazil visa requirements are based on reciprocity. Can it be the US demands something similar from brazilians?
      - raverbashing 10y ago
        You are correct https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/visit/visitor.html https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/visit/visitor.html However Brazil does not require an interview in person, so you can do it by mail
      - mixmastamyk 10y ago
        Yes, though because of the Olympics it has been waived this summer.
      - joelrunyon 10y ago
        Yup. That's the deal. Tried to go back when the relationship was a bit more tense (10 years ago) and got denied AND blacklisted for 5 years sad face
        scurvy 10y ago
        I still think the numbers overwhelmingly benefit the US vs Brazil here, considering the huge numbers of Brazilians that come here to vacation (and buy a dozen iPads). Also, did they say why you were blacklisted? Was there a time where Brazilians were denied entry to the US on tourist visas?
    - defen 10y ago
      $160 now actually. There are companies that will expedite the process for you if you don't mind mailing your passport to a third party. Costs about $100 extra which is way less than what you're proposing. Also if you're from the US you can enter Brazil between June 1 2016 and September 18 2016 and stay for up to 90 days with no visa due to the Olympics - no need for Olympics ticket either.
  - DominikR 10y ago
    What really makes Brazil a no go for me is how dangerous it seems to be. I wouldn't even dare going there for vacation let alone live there for an extended period.
    - scurvy 10y ago
      Only the major cities have rampant crime. Get out to the countryside, and it's a wonderful place. Even Florianopolis has much lower crime rates than places like Sao Paulo. As a tourist, you can skip Sao Paulo and not miss much. My wife is a Paulista and we fly in, see some aunties, and then GTFO for Rio or Bahia. SP is where most of the fiber landings are, so if you're in the networking business, you're probably stuck there.
- officialchicken 10y ago
  Same here; I've never ever once heard any of those 3 cities come up once in a conversation. Without mentioning Gran Canaria (and Tenerife) in the Canary Islands, I am suspect of the writer's actual first-hand experience as a nomad. The Canaries are incredible - great food, excellent bandwidth - although 100ms latency to US/AWS does occur every rare now and then -, surprisingly large startup/digital nomad scene, lots of co-working and housing options, etc.
- joelrunyon 10y ago
  I've heard Miami is okay for a base of operations. No state income tax, beach, good flight options and relatively good supply of housing (from what I've heard). Also mojitos. I wouldn't be surprised if Miami moves up the list in the next few years from the tax situation alone.
  - SwellJoe 10y ago
    > relatively good supply of extremely expensive housing FTFY By US major city standards it isn't completely off-the-wall expensive (I mean, there are at least a dozen more expensive major cities in the US). But, the nomads I know tend to want to save money so they can work less. While I don't set out to find the cheapest place to park my RV, I also don't end up staying in places like Miami for long (when there are similarly nice cities for less than half the price).
    - joelrunyon 10y ago
      If you're based in Miami, you could easily save $$ on the tax situation - even if you're not there FT. I'm curious on these other similar nice cities to Miami you speak of.
      - SwellJoe 10y ago
        "If you're based in Miami, you could easily save $$ on the tax situation - even if you're not there FT." Lots of states offer no income tax. Favorites among full-time RVers in addition to Florida are South Dakota and Texas (I'm legally a Texas resident). But, yes, Florida is a great state to call home, if you travel full-time. But, Miami is an expensive city to do it in. If I were gonna live in Florida for more than a few weeks out of the year, I'd probably pick St. Pete. It's maybe the best balance of "decent city, decent prices, near the ocean" in Florida. Cheaper options exist inland, but it's still much cheaper than Miami. But, if we open it up to every state, there are tons of great cities that are cheaper than Miami. They're always smaller, and rarely on the ocean, but still provide excellent quality of life very affordably.
bogomipz 10y ago
This link doesn't work, despite not being in the UK, I get: "We're sorry but this site is not accessible from the UK as it is part of our international service and is not funded by the licence fee. "
corv 10y ago
https://nomadlist.com/ https://nomadlist.com/
- sjclemmy 10y ago
  This is a great link!
  - userulluipeste 10y ago
    That is an awful link! I might expected to see some bad points for Bucharest because of, I don't know, air maybe!? (...considering it's a capital with traffic and all.) But no - it scores badly for fun! This is the city that has furbished its entire central district for fun only! People from all around the Europe and western part of Asia fly in here to party because the local authorities made it easy to party 24/7 all around the year! No fun? ...really!? Those score points are arbitrary as hell!
- pythonscheme 10y ago
  How do they compute the favoribility of a city? Yekaterinburg, Russia: English Speaking: bad Free WiFi: bad Friendly to Foreigners: bad Racial Tolerance: bad Gay Friendly: bad New Orleans, USA: The only bad thing is the absence of free WiFi in the city. Yet, Ekaterinburg is apparently 12% better than New Orleans. How so?
  - manmal 10y ago
    Must be the low living and coworking costs.
- drfuchs 10y ago
  SanFrancisco.GayFriendly != Great???
geomark 10y ago
Good luck with Thailand. The military junta is close to instituting MITM on all internet communications.[1] They don't even care that it will break online banking and every other business that relies on secure communication. I guess digital nomads will be fine as long as they don't mind that they won't be able to connect securely to their bank, server, AWS, etc. [1] http://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/993937/internet-laws-a-time-bomb http://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/993937/internet-l...
- Canada 10y ago
  Upvoted because it's good to bring attention to this idiocy, but I don't think the Thai government is going to try breaking the internet. Everyone is hooked on foreign services. Even supporters of the powers that be will go nuts if stuff like Google, Facebook or Tinder stopped working. It's not China, Thailand cannot hope to force everyone to use some local service instead.
- hackerboos 10y ago
  Plus you can't work on a tourist visa and getting a work permit costs a lot of money.
djscram 10y ago
Medellin is a really great place for Digital Nomads.
teh_klev 10y ago
Linky for those of in the UK and not allowed to see this: http://archive.is/uNaEf http://archive.is/uNaEf
- e40 10y ago
  Why would bbc.com be off limits to those in the UK? I've never heard this.
  - scholia 10y ago
    The BBC says: We're sorry but this site is not accessible from the UK as it is part of our international service and is not funded by the licence fee. It is run commercially by BBC Worldwide, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the BBC, the profits made from it go back to BBC programme-makers to help fund great new BBC programmes. You can find out more about BBC Worldwide and its digital activities at www.bbcworldwide.com.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
codecamper 10y ago
I've been to Puerto Viejo & I can tell you... There is nothing there. Well. there were a lot of mosquitos. And very cheap cocaine (i'm not so into that stuff). I guess $6 cocaine might make you very productive?
mixmastamyk 10y ago
I've only been to Floripa from this list---took a surfing class on the north part of the island. It is lovely, but was just a bit too sparse for my taste. You'll want a car unless you enjoy 30 minute bus rides among the multiple neighborhoods.
joelrunyon 10y ago
This is a good idea for a post, but I'm suprised at the list. Suprised they left out: -Ho Chi Minh City (huge number of nomads here) -Bangkok (same thing) -Prague (the thailand of europe) -Bali (the original eat, pray, love) -Medellin (every nomad in South America is here)
- smcl 10y ago
  Why is Prague the Thailand of Europe?
  - joelrunyon 10y ago
    Tongue in cheek. Seems like a lot of DN head there eventually when they turn to Europe. Cheap COL, good food, cheap beer, good internet.
    - scholia 10y ago
      It's also known for its porn industry and has, or used to have, a big sex exhibition, Erotica Sex. Sadly, I don't speak from experience on this....
- CuriouslyC 10y ago
  Prague is no longer cheap, and the food isn't so good there. Budapest is cheaper, fewer tourists and better food. The only thing Prague still has going for it is super cheap high quality beer.
  - joelrunyon 10y ago
    By any western standard, Prague is cheap.
- reustle 10y ago
  I did January in HCMC this year and was pretty underwhelmed with the nomad scene. There didn't seem to be much going on at all.
- 10y ago
trentmb 10y ago
What do these folks do for things that require an address? Do hey just have a PO box they check infrequently?
- joelrunyon 10y ago
  EarthClassMail.com
  - trentmb 10y ago
    Thanks!
superuser2 10y ago
Where do digital nomads sleep? I can't imagine that they're signing year-long leases, or that apartments are happy about transient foreign sub-letters dropping in and out. So you have to be rich enough to sleep in hotels every night? I guess there's AieBnb now, but what did they do before that?
- icebraining 10y ago
  I can't say I know any digital nomad, but as a landlord myself, I wouldn't mind as long as they paid upfront and a bit over market price. Considering the difference in purchasing power, this should be affordable.
- bogomipz 10y ago
  I don't think so, I think once your on the ground you can generally find short term leases.
- reustle 10y ago
  Generally airbnbs and hotels. You can negotiate off airbnb in most cases for a lower rate, closer to what the market rate is. For example in the center of Bangkok I negotiated down from nearly $1k/mo on airbnb to $447 cash (16,000 bhat).
- ttam 10y ago
  actually most places (costa rica, thailand, bali, etc) are fine with renting short term; the "no short-term" renting is very american most of these places have a mid-long stay tourism tradition prior to DNs
IIAOPSW 10y ago
"digital nomad" is my dream lifestyle. But one of the major drawbacks longterm is rent vs mortgage. Most societies are structured in a way that wants you to settle down. While monthly rent v. monthly mortgage payments might be similar in cost, and both fix the "where do I sleep" problem, after 30 years one leaves you with equity and the other does not. I wish there was something similar to a co-op where owning part of a company entitled me to a room just not any particular room. E.g owning type A stock lets me use a type A room in any city I happen to be in.
torkable 10y ago
"digital nomad" lol

53 points by ytNumbers 10y ago

I've never once heard of someone saying that Miami (or Puerto Viejo or Florianópolis) was a good place as a nomad (not even on my radar), and I've been in the "circuit" for almost 2 years now.

bogomipz 10y ago
Agreed, putting Miami there is a bit of a joke. I am curious what is and has been on your radar for digital nomads and what you think the list should be.
- reustle 10y ago
  Pieter does a pretty good job of taking the list with his NomadList website. It's hard to say here are best cities because people have different wants and tastes. Some like beaches, some like cities, etc.
- officialchicken 10y ago
  Having been in a Miami-based startup... it's fashionable, but not technological. Just about every single tech show has a runway with DJ, and I don't mean finance. The major downside is the investment community is full of retirees who don't really make good VC's. The mayor of Miami is pushing for generating tech and startups, so at least there's a political will.
scurvy 10y ago
Brazil is an odd choice considering that a visa costs Americans $100 (last I checked).
- WildUtah 10y ago
  $130 And your air ticket is going to cost a lot more than that. The painful part is that you have to fly to a city with a Brazilian Embassy (LA, DC) inside the USA and stay there for a week while your visa application process happens.
  - 2a0c40 10y ago
    I've read somewhere Brazil visa requirements are based on reciprocity. Can it be the US demands something similar from brazilians?
    - raverbashing 10y ago
      You are correct https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/visit/visitor.html https://travel.state.gov/content/visas/en/visit/visitor.html However Brazil does not require an interview in person, so you can do it by mail
    - mixmastamyk 10y ago
      Yes, though because of the Olympics it has been waived this summer.
    - joelrunyon 10y ago
      Yup. That's the deal. Tried to go back when the relationship was a bit more tense (10 years ago) and got denied AND blacklisted for 5 years sad face
      - scurvy 10y ago
        I still think the numbers overwhelmingly benefit the US vs Brazil here, considering the huge numbers of Brazilians that come here to vacation (and buy a dozen iPads). Also, did they say why you were blacklisted? Was there a time where Brazilians were denied entry to the US on tourist visas?
  - defen 10y ago
    $160 now actually. There are companies that will expedite the process for you if you don't mind mailing your passport to a third party. Costs about $100 extra which is way less than what you're proposing. Also if you're from the US you can enter Brazil between June 1 2016 and September 18 2016 and stay for up to 90 days with no visa due to the Olympics - no need for Olympics ticket either.
- DominikR 10y ago
  What really makes Brazil a no go for me is how dangerous it seems to be. I wouldn't even dare going there for vacation let alone live there for an extended period.
  - scurvy 10y ago
    Only the major cities have rampant crime. Get out to the countryside, and it's a wonderful place. Even Florianopolis has much lower crime rates than places like Sao Paulo. As a tourist, you can skip Sao Paulo and not miss much. My wife is a Paulista and we fly in, see some aunties, and then GTFO for Rio or Bahia. SP is where most of the fiber landings are, so if you're in the networking business, you're probably stuck there.
officialchicken 10y ago
Same here; I've never ever once heard any of those 3 cities come up once in a conversation. Without mentioning Gran Canaria (and Tenerife) in the Canary Islands, I am suspect of the writer's actual first-hand experience as a nomad. The Canaries are incredible - great food, excellent bandwidth - although 100ms latency to US/AWS does occur every rare now and then -, surprisingly large startup/digital nomad scene, lots of co-working and housing options, etc.
joelrunyon 10y ago
I've heard Miami is okay for a base of operations. No state income tax, beach, good flight options and relatively good supply of housing (from what I've heard). Also mojitos. I wouldn't be surprised if Miami moves up the list in the next few years from the tax situation alone.
- SwellJoe 10y ago
  > relatively good supply of extremely expensive housing FTFY By US major city standards it isn't completely off-the-wall expensive (I mean, there are at least a dozen more expensive major cities in the US). But, the nomads I know tend to want to save money so they can work less. While I don't set out to find the cheapest place to park my RV, I also don't end up staying in places like Miami for long (when there are similarly nice cities for less than half the price).
  - joelrunyon 10y ago
    If you're based in Miami, you could easily save $$ on the tax situation - even if you're not there FT. I'm curious on these other similar nice cities to Miami you speak of.
    - SwellJoe 10y ago
      "If you're based in Miami, you could easily save $$ on the tax situation - even if you're not there FT." Lots of states offer no income tax. Favorites among full-time RVers in addition to Florida are South Dakota and Texas (I'm legally a Texas resident). But, yes, Florida is a great state to call home, if you travel full-time. But, Miami is an expensive city to do it in. If I were gonna live in Florida for more than a few weeks out of the year, I'd probably pick St. Pete. It's maybe the best balance of "decent city, decent prices, near the ocean" in Florida. Cheaper options exist inland, but it's still much cheaper than Miami. But, if we open it up to every state, there are tons of great cities that are cheaper than Miami. They're always smaller, and rarely on the ocean, but still provide excellent quality of life very affordably.

bogomipz 10y ago

This link doesn't work, despite not being in the UK, I get: "We're sorry but this site is not accessible from the UK as it is part of our international service and is not funded by the licence fee. "

corv 10y ago

https://nomadlist.com/ https://nomadlist.com/

sjclemmy 10y ago
This is a great link!
- userulluipeste 10y ago
  That is an awful link! I might expected to see some bad points for Bucharest because of, I don't know, air maybe!? (...considering it's a capital with traffic and all.) But no - it scores badly for fun! This is the city that has furbished its entire central district for fun only! People from all around the Europe and western part of Asia fly in here to party because the local authorities made it easy to party 24/7 all around the year! No fun? ...really!? Those score points are arbitrary as hell!
pythonscheme 10y ago
How do they compute the favoribility of a city? Yekaterinburg, Russia: English Speaking: bad Free WiFi: bad Friendly to Foreigners: bad Racial Tolerance: bad Gay Friendly: bad New Orleans, USA: The only bad thing is the absence of free WiFi in the city. Yet, Ekaterinburg is apparently 12% better than New Orleans. How so?
- manmal 10y ago
  Must be the low living and coworking costs.
drfuchs 10y ago
SanFrancisco.GayFriendly != Great???

geomark 10y ago

Good luck with Thailand. The military junta is close to instituting MITM on all internet communications.[1] They don't even care that it will break online banking and every other business that relies on secure communication. I guess digital nomads will be fine as long as they don't mind that they won't be able to connect securely to their bank, server, AWS, etc. [1] http://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/993937/internet-laws-a-time-bomb http://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/993937/internet-l...

Canada 10y ago
Upvoted because it's good to bring attention to this idiocy, but I don't think the Thai government is going to try breaking the internet. Everyone is hooked on foreign services. Even supporters of the powers that be will go nuts if stuff like Google, Facebook or Tinder stopped working. It's not China, Thailand cannot hope to force everyone to use some local service instead.
hackerboos 10y ago
Plus you can't work on a tourist visa and getting a work permit costs a lot of money.

djscram 10y ago

Medellin is a really great place for Digital Nomads.

teh_klev 10y ago

Linky for those of in the UK and not allowed to see this: http://archive.is/uNaEf http://archive.is/uNaEf

e40 10y ago
Why would bbc.com be off limits to those in the UK? I've never heard this.
- scholia 10y ago
  The BBC says: We're sorry but this site is not accessible from the UK as it is part of our international service and is not funded by the licence fee. It is run commercially by BBC Worldwide, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the BBC, the profits made from it go back to BBC programme-makers to help fund great new BBC programmes. You can find out more about BBC Worldwide and its digital activities at www.bbcworldwide.com.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

codecamper 10y ago

I've been to Puerto Viejo & I can tell you... There is nothing there. Well. there were a lot of mosquitos. And very cheap cocaine (i'm not so into that stuff). I guess $6 cocaine might make you very productive?

mixmastamyk 10y ago

I've only been to Floripa from this list---took a surfing class on the north part of the island. It is lovely, but was just a bit too sparse for my taste. You'll want a car unless you enjoy 30 minute bus rides among the multiple neighborhoods.

joelrunyon 10y ago

This is a good idea for a post, but I'm suprised at the list. Suprised they left out: -Ho Chi Minh City (huge number of nomads here) -Bangkok (same thing) -Prague (the thailand of europe) -Bali (the original eat, pray, love) -Medellin (every nomad in South America is here)

smcl 10y ago
Why is Prague the Thailand of Europe?
- joelrunyon 10y ago
  Tongue in cheek. Seems like a lot of DN head there eventually when they turn to Europe. Cheap COL, good food, cheap beer, good internet.
  - scholia 10y ago
    It's also known for its porn industry and has, or used to have, a big sex exhibition, Erotica Sex. Sadly, I don't speak from experience on this....
CuriouslyC 10y ago
Prague is no longer cheap, and the food isn't so good there. Budapest is cheaper, fewer tourists and better food. The only thing Prague still has going for it is super cheap high quality beer.
- joelrunyon 10y ago
  By any western standard, Prague is cheap.
reustle 10y ago
I did January in HCMC this year and was pretty underwhelmed with the nomad scene. There didn't seem to be much going on at all.
10y ago

trentmb 10y ago

What do these folks do for things that require an address? Do hey just have a PO box they check infrequently?

joelrunyon 10y ago
EarthClassMail.com
- trentmb 10y ago
  Thanks!

superuser2 10y ago

Where do digital nomads sleep? I can't imagine that they're signing year-long leases, or that apartments are happy about transient foreign sub-letters dropping in and out. So you have to be rich enough to sleep in hotels every night? I guess there's AieBnb now, but what did they do before that?

icebraining 10y ago
I can't say I know any digital nomad, but as a landlord myself, I wouldn't mind as long as they paid upfront and a bit over market price. Considering the difference in purchasing power, this should be affordable.
bogomipz 10y ago
I don't think so, I think once your on the ground you can generally find short term leases.
reustle 10y ago
Generally airbnbs and hotels. You can negotiate off airbnb in most cases for a lower rate, closer to what the market rate is. For example in the center of Bangkok I negotiated down from nearly $1k/mo on airbnb to $447 cash (16,000 bhat).
ttam 10y ago
actually most places (costa rica, thailand, bali, etc) are fine with renting short term; the "no short-term" renting is very american most of these places have a mid-long stay tourism tradition prior to DNs

IIAOPSW 10y ago

"digital nomad" is my dream lifestyle. But one of the major drawbacks longterm is rent vs mortgage. Most societies are structured in a way that wants you to settle down. While monthly rent v. monthly mortgage payments might be similar in cost, and both fix the "where do I sleep" problem, after 30 years one leaves you with equity and the other does not. I wish there was something similar to a co-op where owning part of a company entitled me to a room just not any particular room. E.g owning type A stock lets me use a type A room in any city I happen to be in.

torkable 10y ago

"digital nomad" lol