Living in Austria
The practical side of the move — registration, schools, healthcare, banking and the car — and the order in which to do each of them.
In short
- Register your address with the municipal office (Meldezettel) within three days of moving in.
- Health cover follows employment or self-employment; residents without either can self-insure for EUR 565.25 a month (2026).
- A driving licence from outside the EU/EEA must generally be exchanged for an Austrian one within six months of taking up residence.
- Household goods moved from outside the EU can enter free of customs duty and import VAT under the personal-property relief.
- International school fees in Vienna run from roughly EUR 7,500 to EUR 40,000 a year (2026/27, indicative); public schools are free.
The first weeks, in order
Most of what a new arrival has to do in Austria is administrative rather than difficult, and nearly all of it goes faster in the right order. The address registration comes first, because almost everything else — the tax number, the bank account, the e‑card, the car registration — asks for it. The table below is the sequence we recommend; the fuller version, including everything that should happen before the move, is set out step by step on the relocation timeline.
| Task | When | Where and how |
|---|---|---|
| Register your address (Meldezettel) | Within 3 days of moving in | Registration office of your municipality; in Vienna, any district office |
| Notify the tax office | Within 1 month of residence beginning | Finanzamt Österreich; document the date your residence commenced |
| Open a bank account | First weeks (or before arrival) | See banking and finance in Austria |
| Arrange health cover and the e‑card | With the job, or in the first weeks | Automatic for employees; otherwise see healthcare in Austria |
| Secure school and kindergarten places | Ideally well before the move | Directly with the schools — see schools and universities |
| Re-register an imported car | Within about one month, as a rule | Registration offices run by the insurers — see moving, customs and vehicles |
| Exchange a non-EU driving licence | Within 6 months | Driving-licence authority (Führerscheinbehörde) |
| Review wills and your estate plan | First months | Becoming resident changes the applicable succession law — see succession law and wills |
One point deserves emphasis, because it is misunderstood constantly: the Meldezettel is a public-order registration, not a tax event. Registering does not by itself make you an Austrian tax resident, and failing to register does not prevent it. Tax residence follows its own rules — a dwelling kept and used, or more than six months of presence — which are explained on the page about when Austrian tax residence begins. Anyone whose affairs are more complicated than a salary should have read that page, and ideally the one on pre-immigration tax planning, before the boxes are packed.
Settling in, topic by topic
Each of the practical topics has its own detailed page. Together they cover what families ask us most often once the legal and tax questions are settled.
Schools and universities
Vienna's international schools compared, with indicative 2026/27 fees, the free bilingual public streams, and what universities cost.
Healthcare
How public insurance follows work, what voluntary self-insurance costs, and why most families add private Sonderklasse cover.
Banking and finance
Opening accounts, the source-of-wealth file every private bank will ask for, and which reports flow automatically to other countries.
Moving, customs and vehicles
Duty-free import of household goods from outside the EU, bringing a car, NoVA registration tax and licence exchange.
Cost of living and economy
Inflation, prices against Zurich, Munich and London, safety rankings and Vienna's climate, with dated figures.
Household employees
Families who bring or hire housekeepers, nannies, cooks or drivers become employers in the full legal sense. Every household employee must be registered with the health insurance carrier before the first day of work; registration after the event is an offence, not a formality. Wage tax and social-security contributions are withheld through payroll in the same way as for any other employee, and a written statement of the main terms of employment is required.
Domestic staff are covered by their own statute and by a minimum-standards framework that fixes minimum pay, working-time limits, rest periods and holiday entitlements. The rules are protective and are enforced. Most families hand the mechanics — registration, monthly payroll, year-end filings — to a payroll provider from day one, which costs little and removes the risk of inadvertent non-compliance. Staff who accompany the family from abroad may also need their own residence and work permits; the routes are summarised on the immigration overview.
Driving licences and pets
An EU or EEA driving licence remains valid in Austria and need not be exchanged, although it can be swapped voluntarily. Licences from other countries are treated less generously: most may be used for about six months after residence is taken up, and within that window an Austrian licence must be applied for. Licences issued by states outside the road-traffic conventions Austria recognises — mainland China, Indonesia, Colombia and Nepal among them — do not permit driving here even in those first months, although they can still be exchanged. Whether a practical driving test is required depends on the issuing country: Japanese, British, Swiss, Serbian and Montenegrin licences, among others, are exchanged for every class without a test, and American, Canadian, Australian, New Zealand, South Korean, Israeli, South African and Emirati licences without a test for ordinary cars; other licences require a test for each class. A medical certificate is needed in every case. The details, together with everything about importing and registering a car, are on the page about moving, customs and vehicles.
Pets travel easily within the EU: a microchip, an EU pet passport and a valid rabies vaccination are the essentials. Switzerland, Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein and a handful of small territories issue pet passports too, and animals coming from them enter on the same footing. From other non-EU countries an official animal-health certificate and the owner's written declaration are needed instead, and animals arriving from countries outside the EU's low-rabies-risk list must additionally show a blood-titre test carried out well before travel. Airlines and movers handle the logistics routinely; the paperwork simply needs to be started early, since some of the deadlines run in months.
Everything on this page happens after the move. The decisions with real money attached — tax residence, companies, trusts, property, the estate plan — have to be taken before it. The relocation timeline shows both halves in one sequence.
Considering a move to Austria?
Tell us where you stand — the country you are leaving, the shape of your family and your assets, and when you plan to move. We advise on the legal and tax consequences of relocating to Austria and coordinate with advisers in the country of departure.
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