Egypt · Africa
Moving to Alexandria
Alexandria quick facts
Egypt at a glance
Middle East, North Africa, Afghanistan & Pakistan
Economy
World Bank · 2025Religion
% of populationCIA World Factbook / national censuses
Cost of living in Alexandria
Can you move to Egypt?
Pick your passport to see whether you can enter Egypt — and what it takes to stay.
Entry rules come from github.com/imorte/passport-index-data, updated 17 February 2026. They change without notice — confirm with the official immigration service before booking.
Getting set up in Egypt
Work permit and residence visa — two ministries, in order
A work permit from the Ministry of Manpower authorises you to do a specific job. A residence visa from the Ministry of Interior authorises you to remain in Egypt. Both are required and they are sequential. Employer-side approval typically lands within about two weeks, but the Interior security check can take up to thirty days after that — so about six weeks in a clean case. Permits commonly run one or two years. The Alexandria layer is administrative: the routine parts of the process, including residence registration, run through Alexandria Governorate offices rather than through Cairo, and a Cairo-written guide will send you to the wrong counter.
Read the full step-by-step guideGetting around a city mid-rebuild, and getting an Egyptian licence
You may drive on a valid international driving permit for six months from arrival. After that an Egyptian licence is required and there is no administrative conversion: all foreign nationals take a written and a practical test at their governorate's Traffic Department, which for you means Alexandria, and a bilingual certificate of residence issued through your consulate is part of the file. The bigger practical question in 2026 is not the licence but the network. The Raml tram — running since the 1860s and one of the oldest street tramways in the world — stopped in early 2026 for a rehabilitation into a modern light rail expected to take around two years, and the Abu Qir suburban rail line was separately suspended for conversion into a metro. Replacement buses and microbuses cover the Corniche and Abu Qir corridors, and congestion has got worse.
Read the full step-by-step guideBanking, and why you should hold dollars
CIB, QNB, NBE and Banque Misr all serve foreigners and all have branch networks along Alexandria's main corridors, with CIB generally the most flexible. A passport, a valid visa or residence permit, proof of address and a modest minimum deposit are the usual requirements. The consequential decision is currency: every major bank offers USD accounts alongside EGP, and given the pound's trajectory, holding foreign currency and converting only what you need is ordinary practice rather than caution. Alexandria is also a more cash-based city than Cairo outside the malls and the seafront chains, so plan for that.
Read the full step-by-step guideHealthcare, private hospitals and the universal insurance rollout
Egypt is implementing universal health insurance across six geographic phases, with the government having accelerated its target for near-universal coverage. The first phase covered Port Said, Luxor, Ismailia, South Sinai, Suez and Aswan. Alexandria has been slated for the third phase, materially earlier than Cairo, which sits in the final one — though the sequence has been revisited more than once and the government at one point weighed moving Alexandria forward, so treat any date as provisional. In practice most foreigners are outside the scheme regardless and use private hospitals with international insurance. Alexandria's private sector is the second deepest in the country after Cairo's, and Alexandria University's teaching hospitals give the city a genuinely strong public clinical base.
Read the full step-by-step guideGetting an Egyptian mobile number
Four networks: Vodafone Egypt, Orange Egypt, Etisalat (e&) and WE (Telecom Egypt). SIMs must be registered to your passport, and shops take a copy of the passport and of the visa page with your entry stamp. Vodafone and Orange have the strongest coverage; WE is the smallest and least consistent. Data is cheap and the process takes about five minutes. The Alexandria wrinkle is fixed-line: the older seafront and inland buildings vary enormously in what they can actually carry, so confirm what is available at the specific flat rather than at the district.
Read the full step-by-step guideIncome tax, the personal exemption and the 2024 increase
Egypt taxes personal income progressively across seven bands, from 0% to 27.5% on income above EGP 1.2 million. Every taxpayer gets an annual personal exemption of EGP 20,000, raised from EGP 15,000 by Law No. 7 of 2024, and the first EGP 40,000 of taxable income is charged at 0%. In combination, income up to roughly EGP 60,000 a year is effectively untaxed. Employment tax is withheld at source, so a single-employer employee generally has little to do. VAT is 14%.
Read the full step-by-step guideEach guide has verified costs, timelines, required documents, and the non-obvious gotchas — sourced from official government pages. Last verified August 2026.
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What to know before you go
Working here needs two permits from two ministries, in sequence
CriticalA work permit from the Ministry of Manpower authorises the specific job; a residence visa from the Ministry of Interior authorises you to be in the country. Both are required and they run one after the other. Employer-side approval typically lands within about two weeks, but the Interior security check can add up to thirty days behind it. Tell an Alexandria employer your realistic start date is about six weeks out, not two.
Your paperwork is filed in Alexandria Governorate, not in Cairo
CriticalEgypt's administration is governorate-based for the things you will actually queue for. You apply for a driving licence at the Traffic Department of the governorate where you are registered as resident, and residence registration and much of the routine paperwork follow the same rule. Guides written for Cairo will send you to the wrong building, and turning up in the wrong governorate means starting again.
The trams have stopped, and the replacement is years away
CriticalThe Raml tram, running since the 1860s and one of the oldest street tramways anywhere, was taken out of service in early 2026 for a rehabilitation into a modern light rail expected to take around two years, with European Investment Bank funding forming part of a project costed in the hundreds of millions of euros. The Abu Qir suburban rail line was separately suspended for conversion into a metro. A fleet of buses and microbuses is covering the Corniche and Abu Qir routes in the meantime, and congestion has worsened. Do not choose a neighbourhood on the assumption that either line is running.
It rains here, and the winter storms genuinely disrupt the city
ImportantAlexandria has a Mediterranean climate rather than Cairo's desert one: mild, humid and properly wet between November and March, with named storms — the nawwa — that flood low-lying streets and the Corniche. Drainage is limited and the city stops for the worst of them. Summers are noticeably cooler and less punishing than Cairo's. If you are choosing a ground-floor or basement flat, ask directly what happens to that street in a heavy nawwa.
Summer is the busy season, and it moves the rental market
ImportantAlexandria and the north coast west of it are where Cairo goes in July and August. Furnished flats near the sea are worth far more as short summer lets than as annual tenancies, which means some landlords will not offer a twelve-month contract at all over the season, and quoted rents on the seafront rise sharply. If you are arriving in spring, either sign before the summer market starts or plan to look inland.
Hold dollars, as everywhere in Egypt
ImportantThe Egyptian pound has lost most of its value against the dollar in recent years. The major banks all offer USD accounts alongside EGP ones, and keeping savings in foreign currency while converting only what you need each month is ordinary practice among residents rather than a precaution. This will matter more to your finances than any tax bracket does.
Top industries & employers
Ports, shipping & logistics
Alexandria Port Authority, Dekheila Port, container terminal operators and freight forwarders
Alexandria and Dekheila together handle the large majority of Egypt's foreign trade — commonly cited at around 60%. Shipping, customs clearance, freight and terminal operations are the city's defining commercial sector and hire in English.
Petrochemicals & refining
The Alexandria and Sidi Kerir petrochemical and refining complexes and their downstream plants
The industrial belt west of the city around Dekheila and Amreya is Egypt's petrochemical heartland, and a substantial technical employer for chemical, process and maintenance engineers.
Maritime education & research
Arab Academy for Science, Technology and Maritime Transport; Alexandria University's marine faculties
The Arab Academy is an Arab League institution and the region's leading maritime training body. It gives Alexandria a genuinely international academic sector oriented around the sea rather than around Cairo's ministries.
Higher education
Alexandria University, Pharos University, Alexandria's medical and engineering faculties
Alexandria University is one of Egypt's largest and oldest, with a very strong medical school. Academic and teaching-hospital posts are a common route into the city for foreign professionals.
Libraries, culture & heritage
Bibliotheca Alexandrina, the Graeco-Roman museums, the conservation and archaeology sector
The Bibliotheca Alexandrina, opened in 2002 on the site of the ancient library, is a major research and cultural institution with international partnerships — an unusual employer for a city of this size, and a genuine intellectual centre of gravity.
Textiles, food processing & manufacturing
Long-established spinning and weaving firms, food processors, the Borg El Arab industrial zone
Alexandria has been an industrial city for a century and remains one. The Borg El Arab zone to the south-west carries much of the newer manufacturing investment, along with the city's second airport.
Where to go in Alexandria
Bibliotheca Alexandrina
Culture · Chatby, on the Corniche
A vast disc of a library tilted towards the sea on the site of the ancient one, with reading halls, museums, an antiquities collection and a planetarium.
Local tip: The main reading room is the thing to see and you need a ticket to enter it, so go inside rather than photographing the granite wall from the road. The temporary exhibitions are consistently better than the permanent ones.
Qaitbay Citadel
Landmark · Tip of the eastern harbour, Bahari
A 15th-century fortress standing on the foundations of the Pharos lighthouse, at the very end of the harbour breakwater.
Local tip: Walk out along the harbour arm at sunset rather than driving to the gate. The best view of the citadel is from the corniche looking back, and the fish restaurants in Bahari behind it are where you should eat afterwards.
Kom El Shoqafa catacombs
Landmark · Karmouz
A three-level Roman burial complex cut into rock, where Egyptian, Greek and Roman funerary art collide in the same chambers.
Local tip: Genuinely strange and often nearly empty. The mixed iconography — Anubis in a Roman legionary's armour — is the point, and it is the clearest surviving evidence of what this city actually was.
The Corniche & Stanley Bridge
Nature · The full length of the seafront
A continuous seafront road and promenade running the length of the city, with the Stanley Bridge arching over a bay of tiered bathing cabins.
Local tip: Walk a stretch of it in the early evening, which is when the city is out. In winter, come and watch a nawwa storm break over the sea wall from a safe distance — it is the most Alexandrian thing you can do.
Anfushi fish market
Hidden gemFood · Bahari, by the western harbour
The working fish market where the boats land, and the restaurants around it where you choose from ice and have it grilled.
Local tip: Buy the fish yourself at the market and take it to one of the neighbouring kitchens to cook — that is the local way, it costs a fraction of ordering off a menu, and you get the better fish.
Montaza Palace gardens
Hidden gemNature · Eastern end of the Corniche
A royal palace and a large wooded park on a headland at the far eastern edge of the city, with its own beaches and a Florentine-style tower.
Local tip: The eastern end of the city is where Alexandrians go to escape it. Come on a weekday morning, walk the pine groves down to the water, and you will have the place almost to yourself.
Emergency numbers in Alexandria
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