Bernculture & etiquette

At 1 June 2025 the City of Bern had 351 empty dwellings out of a stock of 79,797, a vacancy rate of 0.44% against a Swiss national figure of 1.00%. That is not a tight market, it is barely a market. Viewings are group appointments, dossiers are compared side by side, and a complete file with a Betreibungsregisterauszug and a reference beats a higher offer. Arrange something temporary and search from inside the city.

The 14-day deadline is federal and everything hangs off it: your permit card, the three-month health-insurance clock and the twelve-month driving-licence window. What is easier here than in most Swiss cities is the mechanism — Swiss and EU/EFTA nationals can register the move online through the eUmzugCH portal rather than at a counter. Third-country nationals still go through the cantonal migration service in person.

Basic cover is compulsory, bought individually per person, and is never an employer benefit. Canton Bern is one of only five cantons — with Graubünden, Lucerne, St. Gallen and Zurich — whose communes are divided into three premium regions, so two addresses twenty minutes apart can carry different bills for the same policy. The 2026 national average adult premium is CHF 465.30 a month, up 4.1%. Compare on the federal calculator before you sign a lease, not after.

The federal administration is Bern's dominant employer and the standard assumption is that a foreigner cannot work for it. That is wrong. Article 23 of the Bundespersonalverordnung allows access to be limited to Swiss citizens only where a sovereign task requires it, and lists exactly where: the justice and police department for policing and prosecution, the defence department for national defence and the intelligence service, the foreign ministry for staff posted abroad, the finance department for the Border Guard Corps, and departments for staff representing Switzerland in international negotiations. Any such restriction must be stated in the job advertisement — so read the ad rather than ruling yourself out.

201,800 people work in the city against 147,012 who live in it. A large share of your colleagues will commute in from Thun, Biel, Fribourg, Solothurn or Burgdorf, all inside an hour by train. Two consequences: the after-work social life is thinner than in Zurich because half the office is on a train by 18:00, and living outside the city is completely normal here rather than a compromise — though it means a different commune, a different tax multiplier and possibly a different health-premium region.

The river loops around the Old Town and from June the whole city gets in it after work. It is also cold, fast and unforgiving: the exits are specific points with handrails, and if you miss one you are carried to the next. Go with someone who knows the route the first time, get in above the Eichholz or the Marzili and know which steps you are aiming for before you get in. This is standard local advice, not squeamishness.