Why some passports are more powerful than others

Every day, millions of people cross borders with their passports in hand. For many others, their travel documents offer no such freedom.

In January, Henley & Partners and Arton Capital each released their annual Passport Indexes, rankings that assess the relative strength of passports based on how far they can take you without the stamp of a visa.

The results, as they do every year, reignited a familiar debate: Why do some passports function as keys to the world, while others are more like locked gates?

Singaporean and Japanese passports, for example, grant access to over 190 countries without much red tape. At the other end of the spectrum, citizens of Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, and Pakistan find that their travel documents are often met with scepticism, requiring visas for most destinations.

Burak Demirel, a representative of Henley & Partners in Istanbul, tells TRT World that the data for these rankings comes from the International Air Transport Authority (IATA) and is supplemented with in-house research and open-source information, including media reports.

But for many travellers—particularly those from the Global South—the rankings don’t answer a fundamental question: Why do some passports open more doors than others?

Unfortunately, there’s no clear answer except for navigating a labyrinthine landscape of clues.

Fate lies in numbers

A passport’s ranking hinges on the number of destinations its holder can access without needing prior approval. Though electronic and on-arrival visas do count; the most coveted status is visa-free entry.

Experts who study mobility and migration have pieced together a few determinants that may impact the passport power. Economic stability, the volume of bilateral trade, population size, and even visa-overstay statistics all play a role.

“If you look at the data, nations with higher GDP on the average also have higher visa scores, and they’re also viewed more favourably by other countries for visa liberalisation because there’s a lower risk of unwanted migration,” says Ugur Altundal, a migration scholar and author of the upcoming book The Right to Travel: Toward an Ethics of Short-Term Mobility.

Over the past decade, many countries have moved towards loosening visa restrictions, or generally leaned towards eliminating visa requirements to make international travel more seamless.

But for much of the world’s population—particularly those from low- and middle-income nations—this shift has had little effect.

A visa requirement isn’t just a bureaucratic inconvenience; it can be a roadblock to economic and social mobility from the Global South, experts say.

What one can do on the global stage often depends on a single, immutable fact: the passport they hold.

For instance, a Nigerian computer engineer might land a job with a French firm, but there’s no guarantee that he’ll secure a visa to actually work there.

In 2023, between 41 and 50 percent of Schengen visa applications from Bangladesh, Ghana, Mali, Pakistan, and Senegal were denied.

“The variation in Schengen rejection rates between regions and nationalities extends beyond purely economic factors,” says Demirel. “It points to the fact that discrimination policies based on identity and culture may well explain the high rejection rate.”

Political instability or infighting also deal a severe blow to a passport’s standing.

“If there’s political instability or civil conflict in a country and its population size is high, then the number of people who could seek asylum or become unauthorised migrants can increase,” Altundal says.

Yet the logic behind passport rankings isn’t always consistent.

Pakistan, for example, sits at the 96th place on the Henley Index—a position it has occupied for years. But its GDP per capita, Human Development Index (HDI) ranking, and internal security situation are better than those of Burkina Faso, Chad, Sierra Leone, or Sudan. Still, those countries’ passports allow visa-free travel to more destinations.

That’s because Burkina Faso and Chad have trade, diplomatic and visa-free agreements with other countries in their immediate neighbourhood in the African continent.

“They have more visa travel flexibility and openness within Africa,” Altundal says.

Pakistan, on the other hand, has strained relations with its immediate neighbours.

“Unfortunately, Pakistan’s relations with its neighbours, including Afghanistan, Iran and India, aren’t very good,” says Shamshad Ahmed Khan, Pakistan’s former foreign secretary.

Diplomatic and trade pacts can dramatically affect passport strength, experts say.

The UAE, for example, had visa-free arrangements with just 35 countries in 2006. Today, Emirati citizens can travel to 182 destinations without a prior visa.

“The passports that have seen the most success in rising up the ranking belong to countries that have actively pursued increased access through international relations and diplomacy like the UAE,” says Demirel of Henley and Partners.

A leaf from history

The modern passport emerged in the early 20th century, shaped by World War I-era security concerns.

“The passport we carry today is really a product of the First World War, when concerns about sabotage and espionage in international conflicts were very much present,” says Patrick Bixby, author of License to Travel: A Cultural History of the Passport.

The document was meant to fortify national borders and monitor who came and went. “So, the taint of wartime conflict remains with the passport today,” Bixby says.

In times of war, travel restrictions tighten.

In the summer of 1917, a Russian man named Konstantin Petrovich Ivanov stepped off a train in Finland carrying a passport bearing his assumed identity.

In reality, he was Vladimir Lenin, travelling undercover to evade Russia’s Provisional Government, which was hunting down Bolshevik leaders. Lenin had shaved his iconic beard, and worn a wig for the passport photograph to slip through border controls.

Today, such disguises would be nearly impossible to pull off given the biometric security, face scans, and digital databases that are installed at overt and covert points at an airport.

But even in an era of advanced travel technology, geopolitics dictates who can move freely.

Not all travellers are equal

Conflicts in Syria, Yemen, Afghanistan, and Venezuela have driven millions from their homes, fuelling the rise of anti-immigrant sentiment worldwide. But not all refugees are treated equally.

Consider Ukraine.

Since the Russian invasion in 2022, more than 6.8 million Ukrainians have fled, mostly to EU countries. Yet, despite this mass displacement, Ukraine’s passport remains strong, allowing visa-free access to 147 destinations.

Syrians, by contrast, face intense travel restrictions.

“We see racism in Ukraine’s case,” says Altundal. “I think cultural proximity (to Europe), including race, religion, geographical proximity and political importance, are the determined factors that can explain why Ukrainian citizens are treated differently from Syrians and Afghans.”

The same logic applies to Venezuela.

Over 7.7 million Venezuelans have left their country due to economic collapse, many seeking refuge in South America or the United States. But unlike Syrian refugees, Venezuelans have a significant advantage: shared language and cultural ties.

Altundal says that’s because Venezuelans speak Spanish, and they have a cultural and religious affinity with Spain. Madrid had pushed the EU to give Venezuela a visa waiver.

“Syrians were also forced out of their homes. There was also the problem of the legitimacy of the Syrian government (Bashar al-Assad’s regime). Most countries cancelled visa agreements with Syria, but they didn’t do that with Venezuela,” Altundal says.

Passport, a stamp of fate?

The rise of far-right parties in Europe and an intensifying anti-immigration climate in the West have driven up visa rejection rates in recent years.

In the US, the crackdown on illegal immigration by the Trump administration has also taken centre stage. At the same time, Australia has made it tough for foreign students to get admission to universities, and Spain introduced limits on its citizenship investment programme.

“In the age of global travel and migration, a passport is tied very closely to the fate of individuals for where they want to go to pursue their careers and lifestyles or connecting with family and friends,” says Bixby.

“What one can do on the global stage is largely defined by what passport you hold.”