Taichung
Taiwan · Asia · 2,868,452 people · Asia/Taipei · TWD
Taichung scores 65.8/100 for digital nomads under balanced weights, ranking 373 of 1000 cities. Expect about $1,588 per month, a nomad visa (Digital nomad visitor visa), and a measured median download speed of 40.7 Mbps.
Taichung is Taiwan's second-largest city and often its sunniest, with lower rents than Taipei and a wide, modern layout. High-speed rail reaches Taipei in about an hour. The metro is still a single line, so many residents ride scooters. Taiwan's digital nomad visitor visa allows stays of up to two years for visa-exempt nationals.
- Sunniest weather in Taiwan
- Lower rents than Taipei
- Night markets and bubble tea
- High-speed rail to Taipei in about an hour
Eating out
OpenStreetMap, 2026-10171,620restaurants within 3 km
Mapped around the centre of Taichung: one of the densest dining scenes in the dataset. A count of what is on the map, not a rating, and it does not affect the score.
How Taichung scores, factor by factor
Superscripts link to the source list at the bottom. Country-level figures apply to all of Taiwan.
Cost of living
Monthly cost for one person (log-scaled, cheaper is better).42
Safety
Homicide rate and political stability (country-level).86
Healthcare
WHO universal-health-coverage index and life expectancy (country-level).84
Internet
Median measured download and upload speed (M-Lab, city-level; the province or country aggregate where the city has too few tests).71
Visa ease
How easily your passport gets in and stays: visa-free days, eTA, visa on arrival, e-visa or consular visa, plus a nomad visa and how affordable its income threshold is. Averages US, EU and UK passports until you pick yours.71
Getting there & around
Non-stop airport destinations (hub size) plus editorial walkability and transit ratings.41
Climate
Share of months that are comfortable: 59–82°F (15–28 °C) mean, at most 5.9 in (150 mm) rain, at most 85% humidity.58
- Comfortable months: 7 of 1215 · city-level, 2001–2020 normals
Air quality
Annual mean PM2.5 on a fixed scale: 5 µg/m³ (WHO guideline) scores 100, 50 µg/m³ or worse scores 0.56
- Annual mean PM2.5: 24.6 µg/m³16 · city-level, 2023
Quality of life
Human Development Index and English proficiency (country-level).81
What does Taichung cost per month?
| Total, one person | $1,588 | city, outskirts one-bedroom |
|---|---|---|
| One-bedroom rent, centre | no data | city-level rent unavailable |
| Country cost index (US = 100) | 43 | country |
Can you stay legally?
| Nomad visa | Digital nomad visitor visa | |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum income | $3,333/month | |
| US passport | 90 days | |
| EU passport | 90 days | |
| UK passport | 90 days | |
Visa rules change often. Verify with the issuing government before you book.
Airports and nonstop flights
Taichung is served by one airport.
| Airport | Nonstop destinations | International | From US airports |
|---|---|---|---|
| RMQTaichung International Airport | 14 | 14 | 0 |
Wikipedia airport pages as of 2026-09: seasonal routes included, charters and announced-but-not-started routes excluded.
What is the weather like through the year?
Comfortable months by our rule: Oct–Apr. Rank cities for Dec–Feb →
| Month | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mean °F | 62 | 64 | 68 | 73 | 78 | 79 | 81 | 81 | 79 | 76 | 72 | 65 |
| Rain in | 1.9 | 1.8 | 3.2 | 4.5 | 10.1 | 12.3 | 8.5 | 13 | 7.4 | 2.4 | 1.8 | 1.7 |
| Humidity % | 74 | 74 | 73 | 74 | 78 | 84 | 83 | 85 | 82 | 75 | 74 | 73 |
Green temperatures mark months that meet the comfort rule (59–82°F, ≤5.9 in rain, ≤85% humidity). NASA POWER 2001–2020 climatology at the city coordinates.
Where can you stay in Taichung?
Three ways to live here, and what each does to the monthly budget. Rents are the one-bedroom figures from the cost table; hotels and short lets are priced per night and cost more, most of all in high season.
| Option | Rent per month | Monthly total | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| One-bedroom outside the centre | — | $1,588 | The basis of the monthly cost and the cost score. |
| One-bedroom in the centre | — | — | No city-level rent figure for this city. |
| Hotel or short let | — | — | For the first weeks or a stay under a month. Compare hotels on Navoy → |
Monthly rents assume an unfurnished lease of six months or more; furnished monthly lets usually cost 20 to 50 percent more.
Cities with a similar profile
- Tainan Taiwan · 65
- Kaohsiung Taiwan · 67.1
- Hualien Taiwan · 67.6
- Taitung Taiwan · 70.3
- Hsinchu Taiwan · 68.3
Also in Asia: Agra, Ahmedabad, Almaty, Amed (Bali), Amritsar, Angeles City (Clark)
Frequently asked
- How much does it cost to live in Taichung as a digital nomad?
- A single person typically spends about $1,588 per month in Taichung. That is a 42/100 cost score, where 100 is the cheapest city in the dataset.
- Is Taichung safe for digital nomads?
- Taichung scores 86/100 on safety. Taiwan records 0.8 homicides per 100,000 people per year (WHO, 2021) and a political-stability score of 83.1/100 (World Bank WGI). Both figures are national, so neighbourhood-level risk can differ.
- Does Taiwan have a digital nomad visa?
- Yes. Taiwan offers the Digital nomad visitor visa with a minimum income of about $3,333 per month. Verify current rules with the issuing authority before applying. Full guide: https://nostos.navoy.io/visas/taiwan
- How fast is the internet in Taichung?
- Measured median download speed in Taichung was 40.7 Mbps (upload 17.3 Mbps) across 14,892 M-Lab tests in 2024. Measured speeds run below advertised plan speeds everywhere, so compare cities rather than reading the number as a plan.
- Is Starlink available in Taichung?
- Not yet. Starlink's availability map lists Taiwan as coming soon (Service date is unknown at this time) as of 2026-10. Roaming plans may work for short stays, but local rules on using them vary.
- Which airports serve Taichung and how many nonstop flights are there?
- Taichung is served by Taichung International Airport (RMQ) with 14 nonstop destinations, of which 14 are international. 0 US airports have a nonstop link. Source: Wikipedia, 2026-09.
- When is the best time of year to be in Taichung?
- The most comfortable months are Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, Oct, Nov, Dec. Mean temperatures range from 62°F (17°C) in Jan to 81°F (27°C) in Jul (NASA POWER 2001–2020 climatology).
- Taichung or Tainan: which is better for digital nomads?
- Tainan is the city with the closest factor profile to Taichung in this dataset. Which one wins depends on your weights; the comparison page puts every factor side by side with the numbers behind them.
Sources
Dataset 2026.10.7, published 2026-10-13. Download the full dataset or read the methodology.
- 1.City population (latest census or official estimate), Wikipedia (citing national statistics offices). CC BY-SA 4.0. Retrieved 2026-09-22. City-proper figures; the per-city source URL is stored with the seed row.
- 2.WhereNext city cost estimates 2026 (city pages), WhereNext. CC BY 4.0. Retrieved 2026-09-22. The '~$X/mo' single-person estimate published on each city page (the API only exposes countries). Scaled to the WhereToEmigrate basket by the median ratio observed on cities both sources cover, so figures are comparable across the dataset; the scaling factor is recorded in the value's note on /methodology. Where the headline estimate is below the city's own outskirts one-bedroom rent divided by 0.55 (rent at most 55% of a single person's spending), the total is raised to that floor; the page's figure is implausibly low there.
- 3.Cost of Living Global 2026 (city rows), WhereToEmigrate. CC BY 4.0. Retrieved 2026-09-22. monthly_cost_single_eur and rent_1br_center_eur, converted to USD at the ECB reference rate on the retrieval date (see ecb-frankfurter).
- 4.2026 Cost of Living Index (country level), WhereNext. CC BY 4.0. Retrieved 2026-09-22. Country-level monthly estimate used only where no city-level figure exists; cost_index kept for every city.
- 5.Intentional homicide rate, Taiwan (National Police Agency via Wikipedia), Wikipedia, citing Taiwan National Police Agency. CC BY-SA 4.0. Retrieved 2026-09-22. Taiwan is not covered by WHO GHO.
- 6.Worldwide Governance Indicators — Political Stability and Absence of Violence (score 0–100), World Bank. CC BY 4.0. Retrieved 2026-09-22.
- 7.UHC service coverage index, World Health Organization, Global Health Observatory. CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO (WHO data policy). Retrieved 2026-09-22.
- 8.Life expectancy at birth, Taiwan (Ministry of the Interior), Taiwan Ministry of the Interior, Department of Statistics. Open Government Data License, Taiwan. Retrieved 2026-09-22. Taiwan is not covered by WHO GHO; figure transcribed from the MOI abridged life table.
- 9.M-Lab NDT statistics (city aggregates, 2024), Measurement Lab. CC0 1.0. Retrieved 2026-09-22. Median of daily median download/upload throughput over 2024 for the city aggregate; sample count is the number of tests. Speeds reflect user-initiated tests, not advertised plans.
- 10.Starlink availability map, SpaceX (Starlink). Factual status cited from starlink.com. Retrieved 2026-10-07. Residential service status per country from the file Starlink's map loads. Grouped as on the map: launched or available = available; coming soon, pending regulatory approval or test = coming soon; blacklisted = not offered; unknown or excluded = unknown. Shown on city pages and as a ranker filter; not part of any score. Roaming and maritime plans can work in more places.
- 11.Nostos long-stay visa guides, Navoy. CC BY 4.0. Retrieved 2026-10-04. One record per country in data/manual/visas/<iso2>.json, compiled into data/visa-guides.json. Each guide lists the official government pages it was compiled from with retrieval dates. A guide's `verification` field is set only when a named person has re-read every source; until then pages say the guide is not yet reviewed by a person.
- 12.Passport Index dataset (visa requirements, 199 passports × 199 destinations), Ilya Ilyankou (compiled from passportindex.org). MIT. Retrieved 2026-09-22. Days per visit where stated; 'visa free' without a limit is credited as unlimited; eTA, visa on arrival, e-visa and visa required are credited 0 days for scoring but shown by kind. The default US/EU/UK figures use the US, German and British passports.
- 13.Airport destinations (Wikipedia airline and destination tables), Wikipedia contributors; countries via Wikidata. CC BY-SA 4.0. Retrieved 2026-09-24. Distinct destination airports listed in each airport article's passenger table, resolved through Wikidata. Seasonal routes count; charters and routes announced but not yet flying are excluded. The as-of date is the newest article revision among the city's airports. Falls back to the OpenFlights snapshot when an airport has no article or table.
- 14.Walkability and transit ratings (editorial), Navoy. CC BY 4.0. Retrieved 2026-09-22. Judgment ratings, not measurements. Explained on /methodology.
- 15.NASA POWER climatology (2001–2020 monthly means), NASA Langley Research Center. Public domain (US Government). Retrieved 2026-09-22. T2M, PRECTOTCORR and RH2M at the city coordinates (0.5° grid). Monthly precipitation = mm/day × days in month.
- 16.SatPM2.5 satellite-derived annual PM2.5 (V6.GL.02.04), Atmospheric Composition Analysis Group, Washington University in St. Louis. CC BY 4.0. Retrieved 2026-10-07. Annual 2023 PM2.5 for the 0.1° grid cell at the city centre, from satellite aerosol retrievals combined with a chemical transport model and ground monitors. Used only for cities with no WHO database row. Where the same country has WHO-measured cities, values are scaled by the median measured/satellite ratio there (corrects desert-dust overestimates in the Gulf). Across 247 cities with both, log-correlation with WHO values is 0.88 and the median difference 2 µg/m³.
- 17.OpenStreetMap restaurants (Overpass API), OpenStreetMap contributors. ODbL 1.0. Retrieved 2026-10-02. Count of OpenStreetMap elements tagged amenity=restaurant within 3 km of the city centre coordinate. Measures how many restaurants are mapped, which tracks real density well where OpenStreetMap is well maintained (Europe, the Americas, East and Southeast Asia) and under-counts where it is not (parts of Africa and Central Asia).
- 18.Human Development Index, Taiwan (DGBAS calculation), Taiwan Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics. Open Government Data License, Taiwan. Retrieved 2026-09-22. UNDP does not publish an HDI for Taiwan; DGBAS applies the same method.
- 19.EF English Proficiency Index 2024 (band), EF Education First. Proprietary; band cited as a fact with attribution. Retrieved 2026-09-22. Only the proficiency band is stored, transcribed by hand from the public ranking.