Belgium · Europe
Moving to Antwerp
Antwerp quick facts
Belgium at a glance
Europe & Central Asia
Economy
World Bank · 2025Religion
% of populationCIA World Factbook / national censuses
Cost of living in Antwerp
Can you move to Belgium?
Pick your passport to see whether you can enter Belgium — and what it takes to stay.
Entry rules come from github.com/imorte/passport-index-data, updated 17 February 2026. They change without notice — confirm with the official immigration service before booking.
Getting set up in Belgium
The Flemish single permit, the police visit, and a compulsory integration path
One permit, three levels of government. Your employer lodges a single permit with the Flemish government, which decides the work half against Flemish salary floors and a Flemish shortage list, while the Immigration Office decides the residence half. On arrival you report to the city, get a Bijlage 15, and wait for a neighbourhood police officer to verify you live at the address. Then, unlike in Brussels, most non-EU newcomers pick up a compulsory Flemish civic integration obligation, which in Antwerp is run by the city's own agency.
Read the full step-by-step guideExchanging a licence, Belgium's first low emission zone, and a ring under construction
EU and EEA licences remain valid and can be exchanged at the city. A non-EU licence can only be exchanged if the issuing country is on the FPS Mobility recognition list, and you have roughly 185 days from registration to do it — after that, the Belgian theory and practical exams. Driving here then means two Antwerp-specific facts: the country's first low emission zone, whose planned 2026 tightening the Flemish Government postponed in September 2025, and the Oosterweel works, which will be reshaping the Ring for years.
Read the full step-by-step guideOpening an account, activating itsme, and the right to a basic account
Belgian banks want your national register number and an eID, which puts the city registration first in the queue. Most Belgian current accounts carry an annual fee, which surprises arrivals from free-banking markets. The thing that actually determines how painless your first months are is itsme, the national digital identity app that unlocks tax filing, government portals and bank logins — and which normally needs a Belgian eID or a Belgian bank card to activate.
Read the full step-by-step guideJoining a ziekenfonds, the GP file that pays for itself, and hospital supplements
Belgian healthcare is fast and good, and works by reimbursement rather than free-at-point-of-use: you pay the doctor and get most of it back, usually automatically within days. Cover is compulsory but enrolment is not automatic — you choose a ziekenfonds and join. Two decisions then set what you actually pay: registering a global medical file with one GP, and checking whether the doctors you see have signed the national fee agreement.
Read the full step-by-step guideA SIM you must register, a coax city, and the six-month exit rule
Every SIM in Belgium, prepaid included, must be registered to an identified person under the 2017 anti-terrorism rules. Mobile pricing is high by EU standards and the smaller operators reselling on the same networks are dramatically cheaper. For fixed internet, Antwerp is largely served by the Flemish coax network alongside Proximus copper and an accelerating fibre rollout — what your building actually has is a question to ask before signing the lease.
Read the full step-by-step guide50% at €48,000, a 7% city surcharge, and the expat regime that changed twice
Belgium taxes employment income about as heavily as any country in the OECD: four brackets rising to 50%, employee social security of 13.07% off the top, and a communal surcharge on the tax you owe — 7.0% in Antwerp for assessment year 2026. The two things that most change a newcomer's position are the inbound taxpayer regime, which replaced the pre-2022 expat status and was rewritten again for income from 2025, and the fact that most employees now receive a proposed simplified return they still have to check.
Read the full step-by-step guideEach guide has verified costs, timelines, required documents, and the non-obvious gotchas — sourced from official government pages. Last verified August 2026.
Essential Dutch phrases
Reading a list isn’t learning it. Globe Quest turns these into a trainer — hear each phrase spoken, drill them with spaced repetition, and get scored as you say them out loud.
What to know before you go
Your work permit is a Flemish file, and the Flemish rules changed on 1 January 2026
CriticalBelgium's single permit is decided by the region where the job sits, so an Antwerp job is judged by Flanders and not by the federal state or by Brussels. Flanders states its 2026 salary floors annually — €48,912 gross for a highly skilled worker, reduced to €39,129.60 for workers under thirty on a local contract, €63,586 for an EU Blue Card — where Brussels states monthly figures. From 1 January 2026 Flanders also tightened the rest: level-2 low-skilled roles are no longer eligible at all, the mid-level shortage list lost fourteen functions, level 3–4 roles need a VDAB/EURES vacancy published for nine weeks beforehand, and the authorities can demand proof that your diploma is authentic. Advice written for Brussels is wrong here in both directions.
Register at your commune within eight working days — and be findable for the police visit
CriticalThird-country nationals on a long-stay visa must report to the city's foreigners' desk within eight working days of arriving. You receive a Bijlage 15, then a neighbourhood officer calls at the address to confirm you live there. Until that report is positive there is no national register number, and without the number there is no eID, no bank account, no ziekenfonds and no phone contract. Put your name on the letterbox and the doorbell the day you get the keys — a failed check restarts the whole sequence.
Civic integration in Flanders is compulsory, and Antwerp runs its own agency for it
CriticalNon-EU newcomers aged eighteen or over with a residence permit of more than three months, registered in a Flemish municipality, are obliged to follow the inburgering path: social orientation in a language you understand, Dutch tuition to at least A2, and career or education guidance, with an attendance requirement of 80%. EU, EEA and Swiss nationals and their family members are exempt, as are several other categories. Antwerp does not use the regional agency — the city runs its own service, Atlas, which is where you will be referred. This is a real obligation with real consequences, not a welcome pack.
Antwerp's communal tax surcharge is 7.0%, well above the City of Brussels' 4.9%
ImportantBelgium's additional communal tax is a percentage added to the income tax you already owe, voted by each municipality and published by FPS Finance. For assessment year 2026 Antwerp charges 7.0%. The City of Brussels charges 4.9% and Schaerbeek 5.0%, while nationally the range runs from 0% in Knokke-Heist to 9.0% in Mesen. It is worth knowing the number rather than assuming the whole country is the same, and it is your registered address on 1 January that fixes which rate you pay.
The old Belgian expat tax regime was abolished in 2022, and rewritten again for 2025
CriticalThe special regime for foreign executives ended on 1 January 2022, replaced by the inbound taxpayer regime (BBIB) and its researcher variant (BBIO). Most of what is still online describes the abolished version. For remuneration from 1 January 2025 the tax-free expense allowance rose from 30% to 35% of gross, the €90,000 annual cap on it was abolished, and the minimum gross salary condition fell from €75,000 to €70,000, with no salary minimum for researchers. Belgian social security did not follow — for contributions the 30% and €90,000 limits still apply. The employer applies for it within a short window after you start, and there is no second chance.
Dutch matters here in a way it does not in Brussels
ImportantAntwerp is thoroughly at ease in English and you can live a professional life without Dutch. Administration is a different matter: Flemish language legislation makes Dutch the language of the municipality, so official correspondence, forms, school communications and the inburgering path itself run in Dutch. Add that A2 Dutch is a condition of the integration obligation and that Dutch materially widens the local job market beyond the international employers, and the case for learning it is stronger here than the everyday experience of the city suggests.
Top industries & employers
Port, shipping & logistics
Port of Antwerp-Bruges, MSC, Katoen Natie, DP World, PSA Antwerp
Europe's second-largest port after Rotterdam, and the single biggest employer in the region — the port complex stretches more than twenty kilometres north of the city toward the Dutch border.
Chemicals & petrochemicals
BASF Antwerpen, INEOS, TotalEnergies, Covestro, Evonik, Borealis
The largest integrated chemical cluster in Europe and the second largest in the world after Houston. BASF's Antwerp site is the company's biggest anywhere outside Ludwigshafen.
Diamonds & precious stones
Antwerp World Diamond Centre, hundreds of trading houses around Hoveniersstraat
The historic centre of the global rough diamond trade, and a sector under real pressure: after the G7 and EU ban on Russian stones took effect on 1 January 2024, rough imports fell about 35% and total trade dropped roughly a quarter to $24.4 billion, easing only through the second half of 2025.
Fashion & design
MoMu, the Royal Academy of Fine Arts, Dries Van Noten, Ann Demeulemeester, Essentiel
The Antwerp Six put the Royal Academy's fashion department on the map in the 1980s, and the school still draws applicants globally — its graduation show is a fixture of the international fashion calendar.
Life sciences & pharma
Janssen Pharmaceutica (Beerse), Agfa, University of Antwerp research groups
Janssen's original site at Beerse, half an hour east, is one of Belgium's largest pharmaceutical research operations, and the university's vaccine and tropical medicine work is internationally significant.
Retail, trade & creative services
Ackermans & van Haaren, Colruyt and Delhaize supply operations, agencies and studios in Het Zuid
Antwerp has punched above its weight commercially since the sixteenth century, and the Meir remains one of the busiest shopping streets in Europe by footfall.
Where to go in Antwerp
Antwerpen-Centraal station
Landmark · Centre
A 1905 railway cathedral of marble, gilt and glass, rebuilt internally into four levels of platforms without touching the shell.
Local tip: Go down to level -2 and look back up. The 2007 reconstruction dug the station out beneath the original hall so through-trains could run north, and the vertical view through all four levels is the best thing about it. The diamond district begins directly outside the side entrance.
Het Zuid
Neighborhood · South of the centre
Wide nineteenth-century boulevards built on the old citadel, now the city's museum and restaurant quarter.
Local tip: The KMSKA reopened in 2022 after eleven years of works with a startling white intervention inside the old building; go for the Ensors. The streets around Marnixplaats have the best terrace density in the city and locals eat far later here than Belgian stereotypes suggest.
The diamond district
Culture · Immediately east of Centraal station
Four streets of trading offices, bourses and security doors that have handled the world's rough diamonds for a century.
Local tip: There is nothing to see from the street and that is the point — the trade happens behind unmarked doors. What is visible is the extraordinary social mix: Orthodox Jewish and Indian Jain families have run this business side by side for decades, and the surrounding kosher and vegetarian restaurants are excellent and entirely unbothered by visitors.
Eilandje & the MAS
Neighborhood · Old docklands, north of the centre
Nineteenth-century docks converted into flats, with a red sandstone museum tower at the centre of it.
Local tip: The MAS escalators up to the tenth-floor roof terrace are free and open late — the best panorama of the port, the Scheldt and the city, at no cost. Go at dusk when the terminal lights come on to the north.
Zurenborg & Cogels-Osylei
Neighborhood · East, beside Berchem station
A single extraordinary district of 1900s art nouveau, neoclassical and neo-Renaissance townhouses built in competitive excess.
Local tip: Cogels-Osylei was nearly demolished for flats in the 1960s and saved by residents. Walk it and then sit in Dageraadplaats, which is where the neighbourhood actually lives — a square of cafés with almost no visitors, five minutes from a street architects travel to see.
Sint-Annatunnel
Hidden gemLandmark · Under the Scheldt, from Sint-Jansvliet
A 572-metre pedestrian tunnel from 1933 running beneath the river to the left bank, with its original wooden escalators still in service.
Local tip: The wooden-tread escalators are among the last working examples in Europe and the descent is worth the trip on its own. Come out on Linkeroever for the classic postcard view of the Antwerp skyline across the water — which you cannot get from the city side — and walk back through, or take the bike lane.
Emergency numbers in Antwerp
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