| 💵 Nomad Cost™ | $1,242 / month IDR 17,890,097 / month |
| 💵 Cost of living for expat | $825 / month IDR 11,884,661 / month |
| 💵 Cost of living for family | $1,900 / month IDR 27,370,423 / month |
| 💵 Cost of living for local | $543 / month IDR 7,820,121 / month |
| 🏠 1br studio rent in center | $417 / month IDR 6,000,000 / month |
| 🏢 Coworking | $254 / month IDR 3,665,750 / month |
| 🏨 Hotel | $509 / month IDR 7,326,429 / month |
| 🏨 Hotel | $24 / night IDR 343,158 / night |
| 🏠 Airbnb (1,001 listings) | $1,190 / month IDR 17,135,546 / month |
| 🏠 Airbnb | $39 / night IDR 561,821 / night |
| 🍝 Dinner | $2.35 IDR 33880.00 |
| 🍹 Coca-Cola (0.3L) | $0.35 IDR 5000.00 |
| 🍺 Beer (0.5L) | $2.08 IDR 30000.00 |
| ☕️ Coffee | $1.74 IDR 25000.00 |
Based on Ubud's cost of living, here's selected remote jobs that would cover your costs:
What started out as a fishing village with just a few shacks on the beach became a surfer's hotspot around 2005. Surfers would stay in Seminyak and drive north to Canggu's Echo Beach to catch waves. Around 2008, there was the first remote working nomads arriving. Mostly Eastern European and Russian programmers who'd work from Canggu's then few cafes. After the digital nomad explosion of 2014, many nomads sprawled to Bali and settled down in Ubud. Meanwhile in Canggu, the first coworking space there opened called Salty Volt. It didn't manage to attract many people though and finally closed down. Canggu just wasn't ready yet, with only a few cafes and restaurants, and well, people. It took 2 years for Canggu to get back on the radar and when Ubud's coworking spaces and cafes started getting crowded in 2016, people started mentioning Canggu again. In those 2 years, the Salty Volt had now become Dojo, had a new owner, there was now lots of hip cafes, restaurants with European chefs, and the vibe in Canggu was now a more ambitious and fashionable version of Ubud. Where Ubud was for hippies, Canggu was for hipsters. From 2016 on, every year more and more people started to move to Canggu. In late 2017, it became so popular with nomads that for the first time Dojo had to deny new memberships. At the same time, it started becoming a hotspot for Instagrammers, who'd rent luxury villas with flamingo floats and snap pictures. In turn, this started attracting more tourists and have now made Canggu the most popular spot in Bali for nomads. For now, at least.
What started out as a fishing village with just a few shacks on the beach became a surfer's hotspot around 2005. Surfers would stay in Seminyak and drive north to Canggu's Echo Beach to catch waves. Around 2008, there was the first remote working nomads arriving. Mostly Eastern European and Russian programmers who'd work from Canggu's then few cafes. After the digital nomad explosion of 2014, many nomads sprawled to Bali and settled down in Ubud. Meanwhile in Canggu, the first coworking space there opened called Salty Volt. It didn't manage to attract many people though and finally closed down. Canggu just wasn't ready yet, with only a few cafes and restaurants, and well, people. It took 2 years for Canggu to get back on the radar and when Ubud's coworking spaces and cafes started getting crowded in 2016, people started mentioning Canggu again. In those 2 years, the Salty Volt had now become Dojo, had a new owner, there was now lots of hip cafes, restaurants with European chefs, and the vibe in Canggu was now a more ambitious and fashionable version of Ubud. Where Ubud was for hippies, Canggu was for hipsters. From 2016 on, every year more and more people started to move to Canggu. In late 2017, it became so popular with nomads that for the first time Dojo had to deny new memberships. At the same time, it started becoming a hotspot for Instagrammers, who'd rent luxury villas with flamingo floats and snap pictures. In turn, this started attracting more tourists and have now made Canggu the most popular spot in Bali for nomads. For now, at least.
Nomad-ed here for a month. A totally ok place if you have the budget for it. Coworking spaces are good, 4g everywhere, transportation is effective. Lots of things to do. I was able to find friends. Lots of international people, very few digital nomads. If you're there, consider not renting in the center (as it gets expensive fast) and being creative with places to eat to find cheap options. Be prepared to use cash unless you live in a luxury.
It’s hard to love Kuala Lumpur. Because everything here is average. Malaysia’s food is marketed as a mix of all cultures’ cuisines, that’s nice and all but that mix of the same cultures is tastier in any food court in Singapore. Because in KL the food is average. Malaysians are also far behind in cafes, you’ll see Starbucks rated 5 stars, while arisanal boutique cafes are rated 2 stars on Foursquare. Why? Because they have a prehistoric obsession with big brands and consumerism. The coffee in the few artisanal cafes is outstanding. Everywhere else? Average. A day in KL means you’ll be going from mall to mall. Chinatown still has some remnants of local street authenticity, but even that’s starting to be bulldozed by malls its edge. Admittedly Kuala Lumpur has come far since a decade ago, its citizens are getting close to middle class (that is if you're not one of the millions of illegal immigrants). But where Kuala Lumpur now thrives in money, it still lacks in class. And that makes it, well, average.
Bangkok’s digital nomad community has grown rapidly due to its comparatively low cost of living and position as a bustling metropolitan city with great co-working spaces and high-speed internet. As it is popular with tourists and has a large expat crowd, foreigners are welcome and most people speak at least some English.
It's no surprise that Chiang Mai is currently the top city for digital nomads to live and work in. It has the far lowest cost of living in comparison to other cities, including low rent for decent apartments. With a variety of great co-working spaces on the rise, not to mention the number of coffee shops with decent Wi-Fi, you'll be spoilt for choice.
Nomaded here for a month Aug-Sep 2018. It's perfectly ready for digital nomads. I won't go into details about why Tokyo is a great place to travel to, you know that. For nomads: there are many coworking spaces, especially in Ginza area (personally I recommend Ginza Hub or Co-Edu or Yahoo Lodge which is actually a free coworking space). Almost every place I've checked has daily membership options too. Starbucks is almost everywhere and locals work in cafes all the time. You can also get a very decent 4g sim as a foreigner from Mobal. The prices are okay-ish, Paris or Singapore level. Many people don't speak English, but that wasn't a problem for me at all: people are friendly and trying to help even when I didn't ask them. If you're feeling lonely, there are numerous international meetups happening every single day. I didn't notice any hostility from locals towards me, only curiosity; made some friends. The situation is different if you want to immigrate to Japan, but we're not talking about it here, right? I'd definitely recommend Tokyo for digital nomads!
What started out as a fishing village with just a few shacks on the beach became a surfer's hotspot around 2005. Surfers would stay in Seminyak and drive north to Canggu's Echo Beach to catch waves. Around 2008, there was the first remote working nomads arriving. Mostly Eastern European and Russian programmers who'd work from Canggu's then few cafes. After the digital nomad explosion of 2014, many nomads sprawled to Bali and settled down in Ubud. Meanwhile in Canggu, the first coworking space there opened called Salty Volt. It didn't manage to attract many people though and finally closed down. Canggu just wasn't ready yet, with only a few cafes and restaurants, and well, people. It took 2 years for Canggu to get back on the radar and when Ubud's coworking spaces and cafes started getting crowded in 2016, people started mentioning Canggu again. In those 2 years, the Salty Volt had now become Dojo, had a new owner, there was now lots of hip cafes, restaurants with European chefs, and the vibe in Canggu was now a more ambitious and fashionable version of Ubud. Where Ubud was for hippies, Canggu was for hipsters. From 2016 on, every year more and more people started to move to Canggu. In late 2017, it became so popular with nomads that for the first time Dojo had to deny new memberships. At the same time, it started becoming a hotspot for Instagrammers, who'd rent luxury villas with flamingo floats and snap pictures. In turn, this started attracting more tourists and have now made Canggu the most popular spot in Bali for nomads. For now, at least.
It's no surprise that Chiang Mai is currently the top city for digital nomads to live and work in. It has the far lowest cost of living in comparison to other cities, including low rent for decent apartments. With a variety of great co-working spaces on the rise, not to mention the number of coffee shops with decent Wi-Fi, you'll be spoilt for choice.
Koh Tao was a nice place to stay, but is not anymore. The main issue is the yet unsolved waste problem. Koh Taos air quality in the inner island has become very bad since more and more people start to burn their plastic waste in the backyard.
