Bangladesh passport moves up three notches in global ranking

Dhaka: The Bangladeshi passport moves up three notches in the global power ranking—grabbing the 94^th spot, according to the latest Henley Passport Index 2025.

With visa free access to 39 countries currently, the passport previously held the 97^th position in 2024. Despite the development in the ranking, the number of visa free access has gone down by three notches from the earlier 42 countries in 2024.

The index is powered by exclusive Timatic data from the International Air Transport Association (IATA) and ranks all the world’s passports based on the number of destinations their holders can enter without a prior visa.

Asian nations continue to lead the global mobility race as Singapore holds the crown as the world’s most powerful passport, with visa-free access to 193 destinations out of 227 globally, with Japan and South Korea sharing 2^nd place, each granting their citizens access to 190 destinations visa-free.

A strong European contingent occupies the rest of the top five. Seven EU passports share 3^rd place — Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, and Spain, all with access to 189 destinations. Another seven-nation European cohort, with visa-free entry to 188 destinations, are joint 4^th—Austria, Belgium, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, and Sweden—while New Zealand, the only nation to challenge the regional dominance, ties in 5^th place with Greece and Switzerland.

At the other end of the global mobility spectrum, Afghanistan remains at the bottom of the ranking, with its citizens able to access just 25 destinations without a prior visa—a staggering mobility gap of 168 destinations between the top- and bottom-ranked passports.

The UK and US have each dropped a place in the global passport rankings since January, continuing a long-term downward trend. Once the most powerful passports in the world—the UK in 2015 and the US in 2014—they now rank 6^th and 10^th, respectively. Notably, the US is now on the brink of exiting the Top 10 altogether for the first time in the index’s 20-year history.

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