Is Cartagena a good place to live as an expat?

What are Cartagena's main strengths and weaknesses for expats?

Yes. Cartagena is currently a good place to live as an expat if the Caribbean lifestyle is one of the main reasons for moving there, but it is much less convincing as a generic “cheap place to live in Colombia.”

That distinction changes almost everything.

Cartagena gives foreign residents warm weather every month of the year, beaches, a compact historic center, strong domestic and international flight connections, good private healthcare and several neighborhoods where a comfortable life is possible without owning a car. Someone earning remotely in dollars or euros can also live at a level that remains difficult to reproduce in many North American or Western European coastal cities.

The weaknesses are equally concrete. Cartagena has much higher violent-crime levels than Medellín or Bogotá, extreme heat and humidity, serious congestion, weak public transport and a tourism economy that puts unusual pressure on the neighborhoods foreigners tend to prefer. Housing can also become surprisingly expensive once we look at modern furnished apartments around Bocagrande, Castillogrande, Centro or the waterfront rather than average Colombian housing.

The latest local data have made the picture more complicated. Poverty dropped sharply in 2025, yet Cartagena still had the highest poverty rate among Colombia's five main cities. Tourism kept growing, while the local labor market weakened again during the first half of 2026. Reported street theft fell, but 53% of residents said they felt unsafe.

Cartagena therefore works best when we actively want Cartagena itself: the Caribbean climate, sea, architecture and social rhythm.

Is Cartagena still cheap enough for expats?

Cartagena can still feel inexpensive on a strong foreign income, but the expat version of Cartagena is no longer particularly cheap by Colombian standards.

The gap between local and foreign-facing prices is huge. DANE's latest income figures put average monthly income per person in Cartagena at roughly COP 1.1 million (about $350). Meanwhile, crowdsourced Expatistan prices put an 85 m² furnished apartment in an expensive part of Cartagena at around COP 4.3 million (about $1,350) per month and one in a more ordinary area at roughly COP 2.3 million (about $720).

Those figures come from different datasets and should not be compared as though they measured the same household, but the scale is still useful. A premium apartment marketed toward foreigners can easily cost several times the average monthly income earned per person in the city.

Restaurants follow the same pattern. Eating Colombian food away from the most touristic streets can still be inexpensive. Rooftops, imported products, beach clubs and international-style restaurants around Centro and Bocagrande operate in a very different price bracket.

Electricity also deserves more attention than it usually gets in cost-of-living comparisons. Cartagena is hot enough that many foreign residents run air conditioning for long periods every day. Expatistan currently estimates utilities for two people in an 85 m² apartment at around COP 608,000 (about $190) per month, although the real figure varies considerably with air-conditioning use.

Listings show the same thing. In May 2026, Ciencuadras put the average asking rent for an apartment in Cartagena at about COP 4.2 million (about $1,320) a month, and up to COP 5.8 million (about $1,830) in the most exclusive parts of the historic and northern Caribbean areas.

The peso has also strengthened a lot in 2026: in October 2026, a dollar buys about 3,175 pesos, roughly 15% fewer than in January, so budgets in dollars or euros stretch less than they did a year ago.

For someone earning $3,000 or $4,000 per month remotely, Cartagena can still offer a very comfortable lifestyle. Around $1,500 per month, the choices become much tighter if we want a furnished apartment in a premium neighborhood, frequent restaurants, private healthcare and regular leisure spending.

Cartagena living cost	Rough current level	What we should expect
Furnished 85 m² apartment, expensive area	COP 4.3m/month (about $1,350)	Premium expat housing is no longer cheap
Furnished 85 m² apartment, normal area	COP 2.3m/month (about $720)	Much better value away from prime zones
Furnished 45 m² studio, expensive area	COP 2.1m/month (about $660)	Manageable for many solo remote workers
Utilities for two, 85 m²	About COP 608k/month (about $190)	Air conditioning can push this higher
Average income per person in Cartagena	About COP 1.1m/month (about $350)	Shows how separate the foreign-facing market has become

Is tourism making Cartagena better or worse to live in?

Tourism is improving Cartagena's restaurants, flights and services while making several of its best-known neighborhoods more expensive, noisier and harder to enjoy as normal residential areas.

Cartagena received 3.82 million arriving air passengers in 2025, according to Aeronáutica Civil figures compiled by Cartagena Cómo Vamos. That was another 2.8% increase from 2024. International arrivals grew 3.5% to almost 737,000.

This is a long-running expansion rather than a one-season spike. Cartagena now ranks third in Colombia for arriving air passengers, behind Bogotá and Medellín. The scale of the visitor economy supports the restaurants, hotels, beach clubs, tours and entertainment that make the city unusually lively for its size.

Tourism employment also increased across several major categories in 2025. Accommodation and food-service employment rose from roughly 43,600 people to 49,300, while transport and storage employment increased from about 56,300 to 58,500.

Residents absorb the other side of that success. Centro Histórico and Getsemaní have become heavily oriented toward short stays, restaurants, nightlife and accommodation. Bocagrande combines ordinary residential life with hotels, short-term apartments and a large flow of beach visitors.

Cartagena's government has also had to keep dealing with familiar tourism frictions such as noise complaints, aggressive commercial activity and taxi overcharging.

That is why Manga and Castillogrande are increasingly attractive for longer stays: they keep residents close to Cartagena's main attractions without putting them directly inside its tourism machine.

Is Cartagena safe enough for expats today, or does it feel too dangerous?

Cartagena is safe enough for many expats to live normally, but current crime data and resident perceptions make it impossible to describe the city as relaxed or low-risk.

The latest complete Cartagena Cómo Vamos security review recorded 6,493 reported thefts from individuals in 2025. That was 10% fewer than the year before.

On a population basis, Cartagena recorded 641.9 thefts per 100,000 inhabitants. That was lower than Bogotá, Medellín, Cali and Barranquilla, although still above Colombia's national rate of 548.2.

Violent crime gives a much less comfortable picture. Cartagena recorded 410 homicides in 2025, almost exactly the 411 recorded a year earlier. The homicide rate reached 40.5 per 100,000 inhabitants, compared with 27.9 nationally.

The first half of 2026 looks better: the metropolitan police counted 153 homicides from January to June, 48 fewer than in the same months of 2025, a 23.9% drop.

Among Colombia's five major capitals, Cartagena had the second-highest homicide rate after Cali. Medellín was at 14.5 and Bogotá at 15.1.

Those homicide numbers need context. Almost 96% of the victims were men, particularly men aged 20 to 34, and much of Cartagena's lethal violence is concentrated geographically and linked to criminal disputes. A foreign retiree living in Castillogrande clearly does not face the city's average homicide risk.

Street crime is much more relevant to ordinary expat life. Phones, jewelry, poorly chosen nighttime walks, nightlife and opportunistic robbery require attention.

Resident perception is also getting worse. Cartagena Cómo Vamos found that 53% of residents said they felt unsafe in the city, compared with 40% the previous year. Only 16% said they felt somewhat or very safe.

Asked what worried them in their own neighborhoods, 58% cited street robberies. Gang activity came next at 25%.

Reported extortion cases also rose from 134 in 2023 to 379 in 2025, a 183% increase in two years. Extortion is less directly relevant to the average foreign retiree or remote worker than robbery, but it helps explain why falling theft numbers have not produced a stronger feeling of security.

Plenty of expats can live safely in Cartagena with sensible housing, transport and nighttime habits. Feeling completely carefree is harder.

Security measure	Cartagena	Useful comparison
Reported person thefts in 2025	6,493	Down 10% year over year
Theft rate per 100,000	641.9	Above Colombia overall, below the other four largest cities
Homicides in 2025	410	Almost unchanged from 2024
Homicide rate per 100,000	40.5	Medellín: 14.5; Bogotá: 15.1
Residents saying they feel unsafe	53%	Up 13 percentage points in one year
Residents saying they feel safe	16%	Down sharply from the previous survey

Is Cartagena too hot to live in year-round?

Cartagena is probably too hot for anyone who already struggles with tropical humidity, because living there means dealing with Caribbean heat every month rather than enjoying it only on vacation.

Cartagena has very little temperature seasonality. The main seasonal difference is rain. There is no equivalent of Medellín's cooler evenings or Bogotá's sweater weather waiting later in the year.

That sounds obvious until we compare tourism with normal life. A visitor might spend an afternoon inside a hotel, pool or air-conditioned restaurant. Residents still have to buy groceries, walk to appointments, exercise, wait for transport and deal with the sun on ordinary weekdays.

Air conditioning becomes part of the housing decision rather than a luxury. Good insulation, cross-ventilation, bedroom air conditioning and the position of an apartment relative to the afternoon sun can materially change how comfortable the same neighborhood feels.

Heavy rain creates another practical problem. Cartagena is flat and low-lying, and flooding remains a concern during intense rainfall. The World Bank has identified parts of Cartagena as exposed to flash flooding, coastal flooding, storm surge and longer-term sea-level rise.

For people who genuinely enjoy tropical heat, the climate is a major advantage. For everyone else, it is one of the first things to test before committing long term.

Can you work remotely reliably from Cartagena?

Yes. Remote work is currently realistic in Cartagena, provided we choose the apartment as carefully for internet quality as for the view.

Fixed broadband is widely available in the central, tourist and higher-income parts of Cartagena, and coworking businesses operate around areas such as Getsemaní and the Convention Center. Mobile data provides an easy second connection when needed.

Cartagena also benefits from Colombia's generally competitive telecom market. For most remote workers, connection speed itself is no longer the main concern.

The building matters more.

Before taking a long lease, we would want to know which fiber or cable operator serves the apartment, whether the connection is dedicated to the unit, what actual speeds residents receive and how often the building experiences utility interruptions. A mobile-data backup is inexpensive enough that anyone whose income depends on video calls should have one.

Where Cartagena falls behind Medellín is the surrounding ecosystem. Medellín has many more coworking spaces, tech events, startup communities and neighborhoods built around long-stay remote workers.

Anyone moving mainly for professional networking will probably prefer Medellín. For ordinary remote work, Cartagena is already good enough.

Is Cartagena traffic bad enough to affect where you live?

Yes. Cartagena's traffic is currently bad enough that choosing the wrong home can turn a pleasant coastal city into a daily commuting problem.

TomTom's 2025 traffic dataset measured average congestion in Cartagena at 57.7%. A 10-kilometre trip took about 31 minutes on average.

During the evening rush, that same 10 kilometres took almost 39½ minutes. Average rush-hour speed fell to 16.1 km/h. Over the year, TomTom estimated that a typical rush-hour driver lost 132 hours to traffic.

There has been a small improvement: congestion fell four percentage points from the previous year and TomTom's annual average 10-kilometre travel time improved by 50 seconds. Nobody moving to Cartagena should mistake that improvement for fast mobility.

Local behavior confirms the problem. Cartagena Cómo Vamos's latest mobility survey found that 39% of residents mainly used informal transport such as mototaxis and shared cars. Transcaribe, the formal bus rapid-transit system, accounted for 20%.

Only 30% of Transcaribe users said they were satisfied with the system.

For expats, taxis and app-based transport remove some of the inconvenience, particularly because journeys remain inexpensive compared with the United States or Western Europe. They cannot remove congestion.

Living close to the places we use every day is therefore more important in Cartagena than it first appears.

Cartagena mobility indicator	Latest result	What it feels like
Average congestion	57.7%	Traffic is an everyday issue
Average 10 km journey	31 min 5 sec	Short distances take longer than the map suggests
Evening-rush 10 km journey	39 min 28 sec	Cross-city commuting gets frustrating quickly
Rush-hour average speed	16.1 km/h	Similar to a fast bicycle
Estimated annual rush-hour time lost	132 hours	More than five full days
Transcaribe satisfaction	30%	Public transport is a weak point

Can expats get good healthcare in Cartagena?

Yes. Private healthcare is now one of Cartagena's stronger arguments as a long-term expat destination.

Hospital Serena del Mar has materially improved the level of complex care available locally. The hospital currently offers more than 60 medical specialties and subspecialties, including oncology, cardiovascular surgery, neurosurgery, intensive care, diagnostic imaging and high-complexity surgery.

It is operated by Fundación Santa Fe de Bogotá and has a dedicated international-patient service. The international team works with foreign insurers, can provide medical reports in English or Spanish and offers 24/7 assistance to international patients.

That is particularly important for retirees and families. A serious medical problem no longer automatically creates the assumption that we need to fly to Bogotá or Medellín for specialist treatment.

Cartagena's wider healthcare system is less straightforward. Colombia's health-insurance system has been going through substantial financial and administrative strain, and access through particular EPS providers can be inconsistent. Serena del Mar itself has had payment disputes with some insurers.

Foreign residents with strong private or international health coverage are in a much better position than someone relying entirely on the cheapest possible local arrangement.

Is Cartagena a good place to live with children?

Cartagena can be very good for expat families with enough money for private schooling and the freedom to live close to school, but it becomes much less attractive when the family budget is tight.

Schooling is the main dividing line.

Cartagena has established international and bilingual private schools, including Colegio Jorge Washington and Colegio Británico. Colegio Jorge Washington follows an English-Spanish U.S.-style college-preparatory curriculum and has historically offered both a U.S. high-school diploma and the Colombian Bachillerato.

International education is expensive relative to the rest of Cartagena, with annual tuition running into several thousand dollars per child before additional charges. Neither school publishes its current fees online, so families should request the 2026-2027 prices directly. For 2027, the Ministry of Education allows private schools to raise their fees by up to 11.24%.

Geography also matters more with children. Several international schools, newer residential projects and Hospital Serena del Mar sit away from the historic core. Crossing Cartagena twice a day for school can quickly undo the appeal of living in a beautiful but badly located apartment.

There are genuine lifestyle advantages too. Children can spend much of the year outdoors, the coast creates easy weekend activities, private domestic help is far more affordable than in North America or Western Europe, and family-oriented residential buildings frequently include pools and security.

For families, the strongest version of Cartagena usually requires enough budget to choose both the school and the neighborhood rather than compromising heavily on one of them.

Do you really need Spanish to live in Cartagena?

You can get by in Cartagena with basic Spanish, but living there for years without learning the language would severely limit the city you actually experience.

Cartagena's tourism industry makes the first few weeks unusually easy. English appears regularly in international hotels, upscale restaurants, tour businesses, some private hospitals and international schools.

Nearly 737,000 international passengers arrived by air in 2025, so businesses in the tourist districts deal with foreigners every day.

Normal life quickly moves beyond that environment. Landlords, building administrators, plumbers, internet technicians, delivery drivers, taxi drivers, banks and government offices cannot be expected to conduct everything in English.

Spanish also changes the social side of Cartagena. The metropolitan city has more than a million residents, while the visible expat and tourist scene occupies a relatively small part of it.

Basic Spanish is enough to arrive. Conversational Spanish makes long-term life considerably easier.

Where should expats actually live in Cartagena?

For most long-term expats, Manga, Castillogrande and Bocagrande are currently the strongest starting points, while Centro Histórico and Getsemaní make more sense for people who knowingly choose tourism and nightlife as part of daily life.

Bocagrande is the easiest first move. Supermarkets, gyms, restaurants, pharmacies, apartment towers, beaches and taxis are packed into a relatively narrow peninsula. New arrivals can function immediately without understanding much of the wider city.

The trade-off is density. Bocagrande attracts large numbers of visitors, beachfront commerce and short-term renters.

Castillogrande feels calmer and more residential. It has some of Cartagena's most expensive apartments, but also waterfront walking areas, modern buildings and considerably less commercial chaos.

Manga deserves more attention from people planning to stay. It sits just outside the historic center, has attractive residential streets and retains much more ordinary neighborhood life. Current property-market data also put housing below the extraordinary prices found inside Centro Histórico or prime Bocagrande.

Centro gives residents immediate access to Cartagena's most beautiful streets, plazas and restaurants. The price of that access is tourism, nightlife, events and noise.

Getsemaní pushes that trade-off even further. It is one of the liveliest areas in the city and one of the least obvious choices for anyone whose idea of a good Tuesday night involves silence.

Farther north, developments around Serena del Mar offer modern housing, newer infrastructure and proximity to the hospital and some schools. Residents give up central walkability and become much more dependent on cars or taxis.

Cartagena area	Why live there	Main problem	Best fit
Manga	Residential, central, good value relative to prime areas	No immediate beach lifestyle	Long-term residents
Castillogrande	Quiet, upscale, waterfront	Expensive	High-budget couples and families
Bocagrande	Extremely convenient	Dense and touristy	First-time expats
Centro Histórico	Architecture, restaurants, walkability	Noise and tourism	People who actively want historic-city life
Getsemaní	Social scene and nightlife	Hard to escape the action	Shorter stays and social expats
Serena del Mar/north	Modern housing, hospital, space	Dependence on road transport	Families and newer-build buyers

Is Cartagena improving as a city right now?

Cartagena has made real progress on poverty and income, but the latest employment figures show why we should be careful about calling this a broad economic turnaround.

The strongest recent improvement is poverty.

DANE's 2025 results show Cartagena's monetary-poverty rate falling from 41.1% to 34.6% in one year. Cartagena Cómo Vamos estimates that roughly 59,000 people moved above the monetary-poverty line.

Extreme poverty dropped even faster, from 13.2% to 9.3%, meaning around 36,000 fewer people were living below the extreme-poverty threshold. The Gini coefficient also improved from 0.525 to 0.486.

Among the 23 cities tracked by DANE, Cartagena recorded the largest reduction in monetary poverty.

The level remains high. Roughly one in three residents is still below the monetary-poverty line, compared with 23.4% in Barranquilla, 19.7% in Cali, 17.8% in Bogotá and 16.7% in Medellín.

The freshest employment figures are considerably worse.

During the first half of 2026, Cartagena's unemployment rate rose from 9.8% a year earlier to 13.5%. Around 64,200 people were looking for work without finding it.

More unusually, Cartagena Cómo Vamos found that Cartagena was the only one of Colombia's six largest cities to lose employed people over that period.

Commerce lost about 7,400 workers, equivalent to a 9% drop. Employment also declined in construction, arts and entertainment, and accommodation and food services.

About 12,600 self-employed workers also disappeared from that category between the first halves of 2025 and 2026, without an offsetting increase in private or public salaried jobs.

The city is improving on poverty, but the latest labor data make the recovery look much less secure.

Cartagena economic indicator	Earlier level	Latest level	Change
Monetary poverty	41.1%	34.6%	-6.5 pts
Extreme poverty	13.2%	9.3%	-3.9 pts
Gini coefficient	0.525	0.486	Lower inequality
First-half unemployment	9.8%	13.5%	+3.7 pts
Unemployed people, first half 2026	—	~64,200	Sharp deterioration
Self-employed workers	227,100	214,500	-12,600

Is Cartagena better for expats than Medellín or Bogotá?

Cartagena is the better choice when the coast is central to the lifestyle we want; Medellín and Bogotá remain stronger all-round cities for jobs, transport, professional networks and big-city services.

Security already creates a large difference. Cartagena's latest homicide rate was 40.5 per 100,000 inhabitants. Medellín recorded 14.5 and Bogotá 15.1. Cartagena does perform better on reported theft per capita, so the comparison cannot be reduced to one crime number, but its level of lethal violence is clearly higher.

Transport is another disadvantage. Medellín has a metro system, integrated cable cars and a much stronger public-transport reputation. Bogotá's mobility is famously frustrating, yet its scale provides far more formal transport choices than Cartagena.

Professional life tilts even further toward the two larger cities. Bogotá is Colombia's corporate and institutional center. Medellín has built one of Latin America's most visible remote-work and startup communities. Cartagena's economy is much more concentrated around tourism, logistics, port activity, commerce and industry.

Cartagena wins on a different set of criteria.

Neither Bogotá nor Medellín provides Caribbean beaches, warm sea, colonial streets and the ability to live within minutes of waterfront walks all year. Cartagena also has an airport that is unusually well connected for a city of its size.

Someone moving mainly for work and professional opportunity should probably choose Medellín or Bogotá. Someone who already has income and wants life outside work to revolve around the sea has a much stronger reason to choose Cartagena.

Priority	Cartagena	Medellín	Bogotá
Beach and Caribbean lifestyle	Excellent	Poor	Poor
Comfortable temperatures for most people	Very hot	Excellent	Cool
Remote-work community	Good	Excellent	Very good
Professional opportunities	Moderate	Strong	Excellent
Public transport	Weak	Strong	Moderate-strong
International connectivity	Strong for its size	Strong	Excellent
Current homicide rate	High	Much lower	Much lower
Historic/coastal atmosphere	Excellent	Moderate	Good
Ease of living without local employment	Very good	Very good	Good

Who probably shouldn't move to Cartagena?

People who hate heat, dislike thinking about security or expect clean and efficient urban transport will probably struggle with Cartagena after the initial excitement wears off.

Heat is the hardest problem to buy our way out of. A better apartment gives us better air conditioning, yet streets remain hot and humid.

Money helps more with security. Guarded buildings, reliable taxis and better locations reduce exposure considerably. Even then, the latest resident survey showing 53% of Cartagena residents feeling unsafe tells us that security awareness remains part of ordinary life.

Traffic follows the same pattern. Living centrally can dramatically reduce how often we encounter it, though anyone regularly crossing the city will still deal with slow journeys.

Cartagena is also a weak choice for someone whose main goal is career development inside Colombia. The latest employment data reinforce that conclusion: unemployment reached 13.5% during the first half of 2026, and Cartagena was the only one of the country's six largest cities to lose employed people during that period.

Foreigners bringing their own income face a very different equation.

Finally, bargain hunters should be careful. Cartagena can still be excellent value compared with Miami, Barcelona or other international coastal cities, but prime Cartagena is expensive by Colombian standards.

So, is Cartagena a good place to live as an expat?

Yes. As of now, Cartagena is a good place to live as an expat, and we would recommend it fairly confidently to people who specifically want a Caribbean home rather than simply a low-cost base abroad.

The strongest case for Cartagena has become stronger. International connectivity remains good, serious private healthcare is available locally, remote work is easy enough from a well-chosen apartment, and several neighborhoods give foreigners genuinely different ways to live.

Recent evidence also prevents us from romanticizing the city.

Cartagena still had a 34.6% monetary-poverty rate after one of the biggest poverty reductions in Colombia. Its homicide rate remains far above Medellín's and Bogotá's. More than half of surveyed residents currently say they feel unsafe. Traffic can turn ten kilometres into a 40-minute evening journey. And the newest labor figures show unemployment back at 13.5%.

Someone earning $3,000 or more remotely, comfortable with tropical heat, willing to learn Spanish and happy to spend a little more for the right neighborhood can build an excellent life here.

Someone looking for cool weather, low crime, efficient public transport, cheap premium housing or Colombia's strongest professional ecosystem will find better options elsewhere.

Our conclusion is clear: Cartagena is one of Colombia's most compelling expat cities when living by the Caribbean is the point. When the beach and Cartagena lifestyle are only nice extras, Medellín or Bogotá usually makes more sense.