Disclaimer: this article also contains links to some YouTube videos I made while in Croatia. If you don’t want to read the article but just watch the videos, you can go here.
Two weeks ago, I published this article about Croatia:
There, I went through things I learned about the country, after having found and deep-dived it during my research of top spots for online-earning people like myself.
The (quick) background:
I went remote with my career a couple of years ago, after I started:
Then, I started assessing if my base in Switzerland made any sense:
You can roughly track my thought process through this archive
But in general: first, I struggled in finding a good alternative while having to work on my business
Then, I started researching if it might actually make sense to just stay in Switzerland (since finding an alternative is so hard)
Finally: I kind of ‘formalised’ my setup in this Swiss-based Euro-trifecta
The Swiss-based trifecta allows/’imposes’ further exploration:
Some months of the year need to be abroad to reduce cost of living
Visiting places that have potential for remote workers fits my and my audience’s interest
As my business income stabilised…
I started gravitating more towards places with better lifestyle than onsite career opportunities:
Cyprus was an ‘old lover’ of mine: I had visited it in the past and liked it. Since it also has low/mid taxes, I deep-dived it and visited again. Unfortunately, there were some key issues with it that made me pivot my interest elsewhere. See full research here and this summary.
Yet, Cyprus had something good that I really liked when I visited. So I wondered: is there any solid alternative that kinda gives what Cyprus gives but without the issues?
Getting more and more tired with Switzerland with the time passing and with its cost of living (especially looking at a long-term solution where I stay in the country most of the year)
Then, Remote GOATs Relocation Advisor suggested me a few countries - including Croatia.
Fun fact: actually in the past I already had it under my radar, as you can see from this article of the top 4 countries in Europe for remote workers.
I’ve now recently come back from visit of Croatia.
Originally, I actually had a trip planned to Dubai.
But… As you might have guessed: the flight was cancelled due to the situation in Iran.
The situation in Iran made me look away from Cyprus and the Middle East in general (including Dubai).
So I decided: let me visit Croatia instead!
Here’s what I found:
1. History / Geopolitics
Few nights before leaving, I watched some Yugoslavia’s documentaries, to understand a bit more the history of the region, and also get a better understanding of its geopolitical situation.
People grossly underestimate geopolitics IMO. If you’re a young nomad guy: that’s fine. But if you’re planning and building a family, I think stability is valued and having a check on the geopolitics and various plan B options is valuable.
I also published a separate research on how living in Croatia with Uruguay as a plan B would be a solid and diversified set-up, geopolitics-wise. You can check it out here.
2. Saw some momentum online / in the stats
3. Safe / culturally homogeneous
Which I actually don’t mind at all. Even if it comes at the cost of having to learn the culture and the language, in order to fully integrate.
Which is also one of the reasons I like Poland.
For me going around at night or day and frequently encountering degenerates in weird/altered state doing shady stuff and potentially being dangerous is a huge lifestyle downgrade and I strongly prefer being in places where that is rare.
And it’s not just that, it’s also about being in a country that still feels like a country with a culture and cohesive society, rather than a shopping mall of individuals.
4. Vibes, people and food
I just loved all of it. Quite a bit better than I expected.
You can check some pics on my IG profile, or just keep reading (I’ll put some here too).
5. The capital city (Zagreb)
What a great city. So underrated!
You should watch my YouTube videos recorded there:
Here’s a few words on it from an X post:
Disclaimer: we all have different taste (the fact I liked it doesn’t mean you’ll like it too)
6. The coast and Split
That was a banger too!
Which made me wonder if Croatia really is the perfect country 😂
I wrapped up with a video review on Split vs Zagreb:
7. Nature
Another find that I find top tier in Croatia too:
That’s enough for today!
To learn more about Croatia and other countries for online entrepreneurs and remote workers, stay tuned and subscribe!
This article is brought to you by:
Euro Top Tech - The #1 SaaS for top-paying tech careers in Europe:
2000+ top paying tech jobs in Europe from big tech companies, HFT firms and high-paying scale-ups.
1000+ jobs from 100+ fully-remote companies paying $100-600k per year.
Private guides - like this one - to help you land these jobs.
Remote GOATs - The operating system for high-earning remote workers:
Curated job board with thousands of six-figure remote tech roles (Europe-remote, global-remote, NA, LATAM, APAC).
Career Lab: practical guides + AI tools to land and negotiate top remote roles.
AI Relocation Software: decide where to live using data, not vibes.
Real-world data from remote workers on income, taxes, cost of living, and overall life satisfaction.
Private network of location-independent operators building borderless lives.Full access to paid content, deep dives, and the Remote GOATs community.
Six Figure Euro Engineer - Maxx your pay and lifestyle as a tech worker in Europe:
Work 1:1 with me (Nicola Amadio, author of this newsletter), and join the other engineers who were able to 2x/3x they pay and freedom in the past few months!
