Spain takes advantage of its privileged location, and turns the weather into the main attraction for digital nomads. The group of professionals has skyrocketed after the pandemic and which coastal cities, mainly, but also in the center and north of the country, are trying to attract with programs and services tailored for these valued professionals.
With skilled jobs and salaries that are usually higher than average, digital nomads can work exclusively remotely and therefore live anywhere in the world with only one requirement: internet access.
Hence, many countries, such as Portugal, Mexico, Thailand, Indonesia or Spain, have implemented different strategies to attract these remote workers, such as the implementation of tax advantages or the creation of visas that, in the Spanish case , territory will allow self-employed professionals and foreign employees to enter and reside in the country for a period of up to five years.
Spain does not want to miss out on a phenomenon that is expanding and neither do its cities. From Barcelona to Alicante, Malaga, Las Palmas or Madrid, there are many towns that have created platforms to attract these professionals and make it easier for them to land. The race to seduce the desired digital talents has only just begun.
The Canary Islands is the first Spanish destination
When choosing to install where they are, remote workers take into account aspects such as security, taxation, good transport connections, quality of life and, above all, good weather. In this sense, the Canary Islands stand out as the first Spanish destination for digital nomads.
According to Nomad List, the reference portal for professionals seeking to work remotely, Gran Canaria is the seventh best place in the world for teleworking, behind Bangkok (Thailand), Ericeira (Portugal), Buenos Aires (Argentina), Lisbon (Portugal). ) ) ), Bali (Indonesia) and Chiang Mai (Thailand), and leads the national ranking, followed by two other islands in the archipelago: Fuerteventura and Tenerife.
To win positions in this arena, the Cabildo de Tenerife, through the Work & Play brand, has created a platform “so that those who want to come to work on the island have it easier”, and the Fuerteventura Tourist Board has promoted a campaign to attract teleworkers attracted by the climate, the beaches, the gastronomy and the wide range of active tourism offered by the destination.
The Canary Islands wants to become a “base destination” for Europe for teleworkers from all over the world and for this reason it has been one of the first regions to launch promotional campaigns among this segment of visitors.
Facilities to settle on the Costa del Sol
Also Andalusia, and especially the Costa del Sol, has become a preferred destination for digital nomads and the Andalusian administrations have spared no effort to reinforce this position, making the destination known in international markets.
The Board launched at the end of last year a campaign to attract foreign professionals, especially senior managers and managers with high purchasing power linked to the online world, and town halls such as those of Malaga or Seville have designed their own attraction actions.
Through ‘La Fábrica de Sevilla’, the Seville town hall has launched itself into the race to attract emerging technology companies and these professionals, for which it is planning promotional campaigns and has created an office that helps them with administrative procedures.
A similar project has been launched by the capital of the Costa del Sol with ‘Málaga WorkBay’, a platform that seeks to attract national and international teleworkers, offering them all the information they need to be able to work or undertake, such as services, transport or accommodation.
The call from Malaga seems to have had an answer: since it was launched, in February 2021, and until December 2022, the ‘Málaga WorkBay’ website has received 162,061 visits, corresponding to 47,747 different users.
Alicante and Valencia climb positions
In the Valencian Community, the province of Alicante has climbed almost 200 places worldwide in the Nomad List classification and the Alicante capital has been positioning itself as one of the preferred destinations for this group for two years, according to what Pablo Torres, from the Consultant Torres Consulting.
The digital nomads who arrive in the capital of the Costa Blanca, indicates Torres, are usually professionals from the US or central and northern European countries, with higher education, most of them men, with an average age of around 33-35. years and an average stay of three months.
Alicante is one of the cheapest cities in Spain for digital nomads, since they only need 1,625 euros a month to cover their needs, and it also has the Digital District of the Valencian Community, destined to be a pole of attraction for technology companies.
In the city of Valencia, although there are no official data from public institutions, according to
Among other measures, the council has promoted the ‘Vlc tech City’ model as an engine for economic growth and the generation and retention of talent, and services such as ‘Invest in València’, to attract local and international talent, also aimed at digital nomads.
Since its launch, this office has attracted 14 companies to the Valencian capital, generating an investment of 5.46 million euros and 673 jobs.
In Barcelona, the second city in the country, neither the Generalitat nor the main technological entities of reference have indicative data on how many digital nomads are settled in the city, although they all assume that it is one of the Spanish towns with the most presence of this type of profiles.
According to a study by Barcelona Digital Talent, an initiative of the Mobile World Capital Barcelona Foundation, in 2021 the city attracted more than 4,700 foreign digital professionals, such that they represent more than 30% of employees in the sector in the Catalan capital, which has a large presence of shared work spaces. Along the same lines, an analysis by Acción, an agency of the Generalitat, indicates that 23% of the workers of emerging companies in Barcelona are foreigners.
Private associations such as Barcelona Global claim that the city is positioned as one of the main destinations for digital nomads in Europe, and to this end the Turisme de Barcelona consortium launched a campaign in 2021 to facilitate the establishment of these professionals in the city.
The center and the north also claim their place
They are not on the shores of the Mediterranean nor do they have such temperate climates, but in this struggle to attract digital talent, the cities of central and northern Spain are also claiming to be the ideal place to telework.
Last year, Airbnb and the Madrid City Council created a program to attract start-up entrepreneurs and remote workers. Not surprisingly, the Spanish capital is among the fifteen most sought after in the world for a long-term stay through this accommodation platform.
Good Wi-Fi and transport connections, a great cultural, leisure and gastronomic offer, history and a wide network of co-working spaces are some of Madrid’s assets as a destination for digital nomads.
On the Cantabrian shores, regions such as Asturias or Cantabria have also launched planes to attract digital nomads and place themselves on the world map of teleworking, where everyone wants to be.
