D2 Visa vs. Golden Visa: Which Is Best for Entrepreneurs?

If you’re an entrepreneur thinking about moving to Portugal — or simply wanting a foothold there — you’ll quickly find there’s more than one route available.

The two main options are the D2 visa and the Golden Visa‘s company investment route. But depending on your situation, you might actually be better served by something else entirely.

Here’s the quick version:

• Planning to move to Portugal and run a business there? → D2 visa
• Tech startup wanting incubator collaboration? → Startup Visa (leads to the same permit as D2)
• Freelancer or remote worker with foreign clients? → D8 Digital Nomad Visa
• Not planning to live in Portugal, but want EU residency? → Golden Visa
• Experienced entrepreneur with a research-driven venture, comfortable with ~€175k non-returnable? → Possibly HQA (but a very narrow fit — we cover this in a separate comparison)

For most entrepreneurs who want to actually build something in Portugal, the D2 is the right answer. The Golden Visa’s company route exists, and it works — but it’s a fundamentally different proposition, and it comes with costs and obligations that many people underestimate.

Both routes lead to the same destination: Schengen access, EU residency, and a path to Portuguese citizenship after ten years. The main difference is how much flexibility you want, and how much you’re willing to pay for it.

Quick Recap

The D2 visa is Portugal’s entrepreneur and independent professional visa. There’s no fixed minimum investment and no requirement to hire staff. You set up a business, show it can support you financially, and live in Portugal. Technically, an individual only needs to show a business that creates €920 p/month (around $1,077).

The Golden Visa (company investment route) lets you invest €500,000 or more into a Portuguese company — either your own or an existing one — while creating at least five new jobs. Alternatively, you can skip the investment entirely and create ten jobs (or eight in a low density part of Portugal). In return, you only need to spend an average of seven days per year in Portugal. (For reference, €500k is around $585,250).

There are other Golden Visa routes — investment funds, cultural donations — but this article focuses on the company route, the one most relevant to entrepreneurs.

At a Glance: D2 vs. Golden Visa

D2 Visa: Pros and Cons

Pros

No fixed capital requirement. There’s no legally mandated minimum investment the way the Golden Visa has one. You need to show you have enough to get your specific business off the ground — some advisers suggest figures as low as €5,000 for a simple consultancy, others recommend showing closer to €50,000 for more capital-intensive businesses. As Scott Kirk explains: “There’s no minimum amount you have to invest like the Golden Visa… that’s to show the government that you have the funds necessary to make this business work.” The bar is: enough for your business to be viable.

No hiring requirement. You can run a solo business and qualify. The D2 doesn’t require you to create jobs — just to run a legitimate, sustainable operation. Of course, you can hire if you want.

Lower overall costs. Legal fees, company setup, and application costs typically run to a few thousand euros. Significant costs, but a fraction of what the Golden Visa involves. It’s also less costly to add a spouse, dependent children, or dependent parents. Expect to pay around €1,000-€4,000 per person in legal fees, but the main barrier is proving that your business will generate enough income to support them.

Faster processing. You’ll typically have your residence permit sooner through the D2 than through the Golden Visa, where AIMA backlogs have historically stretched timelines considerably.

You actually live in Portugal. If that’s the goal, the D2 delivers it directly. You access the public healthcare system, build genuine ties to the country, and — crucially — can benefit from IFICI (NHR 2.0) if you qualify.

Same path to citizenship. Permanent residency after five years, citizenship eligibility after ten — identical to the Golden Visa.

Cons

You have to live in Portugal. The D2 requires Portugal to be your primary base — roughly six consecutive or eight non-consecutive months per visa term. This works out at an average of 8 months per year.

There is some flexibility: because entrepreneurs often travel for work, you can formally request to spend more time outside Portugal if you have a justified business need. But this isn’t the same as the Golden Visa’s seven-day guarantee. It’s assessed case by case.

High scrutiny on the business plan. This is the most common reason applications get rejected. Sandra Gomes Pinto, an immigration lawyer, is clear on what’s expected: “It should be realistic. It should have a market analysis. It should be as concrete as it can be. For instance, it’s not ‘I will create three jobs’ — [it should include] job descriptions of the jobs you are creating, how much will they earn, how will you pay these amounts?”

Meaningful rejection risk. The D2 has a genuine refusal rate. A lawyer reviewing your application before submission is strongly recommended.

Not designed for freelancers. If you work remotely for foreign clients, the D2 is increasingly difficult to obtain. Inês Silva, an immigration specialist with visas.pt, is direct: “Since they created the D8, it’s now harder to get approval when you’re a freelancer on other types of visa… If you have the income required for the D8, don’t think about it twice and go for the D8.”

Golden Visa (Company Route): Pros and Cons

Pros

Radical flexibility. Seven days per year is all you need to maintain your residency. As one relocation adviser, Natasha from MoveIn, explains: “Sometimes we have clients that say ‘I would like to address a D2 or a D3 through incorporating a Portuguese company, but I can’t yet stay.’ So sometimes it’s advisable to go through the Golden Visa when you can’t stay that much yet in Portugal.” If your life and business are elsewhere, this is the only EU residency route that genuinely accommodates that while still leading to citizenship.

No requirement to become tax resident. You can keep your tax residency where it is. Some Golden Visa holders do choose to become tax resident in Portugal to access IFICI, but it’s a deliberate choice rather than a requirement.

More flexibility for your family. Golden Visa dependants aren’t tied to Portugal either. If your children want to study in the US or UK, or your spouse’s career is elsewhere, the Golden Visa doesn’t get in the way. The fees are higher, but the freedom it buys for the whole family is part of what you’re paying for.

Path to citizenship. Same ten-year timeline, accumulated while mostly living elsewhere.

Cons

It’s expensive. The €500,000 investment, legal fees, state application fees, and ongoing compliance costs add up significantly — and that’s before you factor in the cost of actually employing people.

You’re an employer — and that’s a real responsibility. Creating or maintaining jobs means payroll, social security contributions (employers pay around 23.75% on top of gross salaries), HR obligations, and genuine responsibility for other people’s livelihoods.

Scott Kirk is straightforward about this: “The difference between the Golden Visa for the five jobs is you have to maintain at least five full-time people. And of course, that’s not always the easiest to do for small businesses.”

Managing a business remotely is genuinely hard. If you’re spending seven days a year in Portugal, you need trusted people running things on the ground. Without that, problems compound quickly.

The passive alternative has its own risks. Investing €500,000 into an existing Portuguese company removes the day-to-day operational burden — but introduces different risks around governance, returns, and exit options that are largely out of your control.

Slower processing. The Golden Visa has historically involved much longer waits. Things are improving, but expect the D2 to be considerably faster.

Thin ties to Portugal can complicate citizenship. Seven days a year is the legal minimum, but citizenship applications increasingly expect genuine connections to the country. Creating jobs is a positive mark, but minimal physical presence could work against you when it actually matters.

D2 vs. Startup Visa: What’s the Difference?

These two are often confused, and it’s worth being clear: the Startup Visa is not a separate long-term visa category. It’s a specific track that ultimately leads to the same D2-style residence permit.

The key differences:

The Startup Visa requires incubator endorsement. You can’t apply without an acceptance letter from a government-certified incubator, which confirms your project’s innovation potential. The D2 has no such requirement — you apply directly.

The bar is higher on innovation and scalability. The Startup Visa is designed for tech-intensive, high-growth ventures with the potential to internationalise and create jobs. A consultancy or service business that would comfortably qualify for a D2 would likely not meet the Startup Visa’s criteria. IAPMEI, the government agency that evaluates applications, is looking for ventures with genuine scalability — typically a turnover or asset potential exceeding €325,000 within five years.

It can accommodate co-founding teams. Up to five founders can apply together under one project, which is a significant benefit — most other visas allow you to add family members but not business partners or non-family connections.

The trade-off: in exchange for a higher bar, you get structured incubator support, a clearer narrative around why Portugal should back your company, and — if you fit the profile — a stronger application overall.

In short: if your business is a consultancy, agency, or local service company, the D2 is your route. If you’re building a scalable, tech-driven startup with international ambitions, the Startup Visa track is worth exploring.

A Note on the HQA Visa

If you’ve come across the HQA (Highly Qualified Activity) visa — sometimes marketed as a cheaper, faster alternative to the Golden Visa — it’s worth understanding what it actually is before getting too excited.

The HQA is designed for experienced entrepreneurs and professionals who want to develop a genuinely research-driven venture in collaboration with a university or R&D institution. It’s run through Empowered Startups rather than being a standard visa category, and the ~€175,000 cost is non-returnable project funding, not an investment. The stay flexibility is also less clearly defined in law than the Golden Visa’s seven-day rule — it’s assessed case by case rather than guaranteed.

For the right person — an experienced operator with a research-intensive concept who genuinely wants that academic collaboration — it can be a strong fit. For most entrepreneurs, it isn’t.

We have a full comparison of the HQA and Golden Visa if you want to explore this further.

Tax: IFICI and When Portuguese Tax Residency Isn’t Attractive

If you move to Portugal on the D2, you’ll become a Portuguese tax resident.

That opens the door to IFICI (sometimes called NHR 2.0), Portugal’s current incentive regime for qualifying entrepreneurs and professionals. Qualifying individuals can benefit from a 20% flat tax rate on Portuguese-sourced income for up to ten years — a significant advantage compared to Portugal’s standard progressive rates, which reach 48% at higher income levels.

However, Portuguese tax residency isn’t automatically advantageous. If you currently live in a low-tax country — the UAE, for example, or certain US states — becoming a Portuguese tax resident could increase your overall burden. IFICI has specific eligibility criteria, and not every business model or income type qualifies. Speak to a tax adviser who understands both your current jurisdiction and Portugal before making assumptions.

For Golden Visa holders, the default is that you don’t become Portuguese tax resident — which suits many applicants perfectly. Some opt in deliberately to access IFICI, but it’s a choice, not a requirement.

Best Fit by Scenario

Freelancer or remote worker moving to Portugal The D8 (Digital Nomad Visa) is specifically designed for remote workers earning from foreign clients. It’s simpler, faster, and increasingly the route that AIMA expects freelancers to use. If you have the income to qualify, don’t overcomplicate it. However, if you don’t have the income, you may want to look at the freelancer track of the D2.

Founder opening a local business, planning to live in Portugal This is the core D2 case. You’re building something in Portugal, you want to be there to run it, and you don’t need to spend half a million euros or hire anyone to get residency. The D2 is the right fit.

Tech startup founder with scalable, innovation-driven concept Look at the Startup Visa track before defaulting to a standard D2. If your venture has genuine international growth potential and would benefit from incubator support, the Startup Visa route may strengthen your application and open additional doors — at the cost of a higher bar to clear.

Investor backing an existing Portuguese company, not planning to move This is probably the cleanest version of the Golden Visa company route. You invest in a business that already employs people, take a shareholder position, and maintain residency without managing day-to-day operations. The operational burden is lower — but you’re trusting someone else’s business, governance, and exit timeline.

Remote entrepreneur who wants EU residency but lives and works elsewhere The Golden Visa is almost certainly the right route. If moving to Portugal isn’t part of your plan — now or in the foreseeable future — the D2 simply doesn’t work as a remote-holding visa. The Golden Visa does.

Which One Should You Choose?

For most entrepreneurs genuinely planning to move to Portugal, the D2 is the better option. It’s cheaper, faster, and built for exactly the situation most applicants are in. You don’t need a half-million euro investment or a payroll to qualify — just a viable business and a realistic plan.

The Golden Visa company route is a different kind of commitment. The flexibility is real and genuinely valuable — but it comes with a cost that goes beyond the financial. You’re taking on responsibility for other people’s jobs, and that obligation doesn’t pause when business gets difficult. Many applicants focus on the residency benefits and underestimate what it actually means to be an employer in a country they visit for seven days a year.

The one scenario where the Golden Visa clearly makes sense is if you have no intention of living in Portugal, at least for now. The D2 doesn’t work as a remote-holding visa. The Golden Visa does, and for that specific need, it remains one of the very few viable options in Europe.

But if you’re moving anyway — the D2 is almost certainly the right answer.