Which cities are the most crypto-friendly? (and where it's illegal)

Which destinations have the most places listed on BTC Map?

San Salvador leads with 606 places listed within 25 km of its centre. Johannesburg (497), Los Angeles (311), Cape Town (288) and Lugano (276) follow. These counts include every active BTC Map place except ATMs and exchange offices.

16 of the 100 cities have 100 places or more. The median city has 18. 35 cities have fewer than 10, and 10 cities have none at all.

The cities that crypto travellers visit most are not the ones with the most listings. Travala and Binance Pay named Dubai, Bangkok, London, Tokyo and Paris as the top five destinations of crypto travellers in 2024. BTC Map lists 10 places in Dubai, 95 in Bangkok, 86 in London, 51 in Tokyo and 48 in Paris. In those cities, the hotel is paid before the trip: you pay StaySats in crypto, and we pay the hotel in local currency. For Dubai, read the travel alert on its city page first.

Where is paying in crypto on the spot banned or restricted?

Paying shops, restaurants or hotel desks in crypto on the spot is banned in 13 of our 100 destinations and restricted in 7. These rules target crypto used as money at the counter. Holding crypto can still be legal in the same country, as in Indonesia. Each row gives the rule, its status and its source; we checked them all on October 12, 2026.

Can I still book a hotel with crypto in those countries?

Booking online before you travel is a different act from paying on the spot. With StaySats, you pay us in crypto, and we pay the hotel in rupiah, lira, dong, baht, dirhams or another local currency. You never hand crypto to the hotel desk, a shop or a restaurant, which is what the local rules target.

At checkout, the exact total of the stay is held on your balance, not charged. It is charged only when the hotel confirmation number is issued, and released at once if the hotel can't confirm. See how it works.

Two limits apply. Hotels in Spain are not available yet, and we sell nothing in sanctioned countries: see where we can't sell hotels. Extras at the hotel, such as a deposit or the minibar, are paid in local currency or by card.

Why do some big destinations list so few places?

BTC Map depends on local volunteers who add and verify places, so counts vary with local activity and local rules. Dubai lists 10 places within 25 km, and Abu Dhabi and Macau list none. Singapore lists 10. In the United Arab Emirates, a 2024 central bank rule lets shops accept crypto only as a licensed dirham token.

In Singapore, guidelines of January 17, 2022 from the Monetary Authority of Singapore ask crypto firms not to promote their services to the public. That includes crypto ATMs in public places. A low count is a reason to pay for your hotel before you travel. It is not, by itself, a sign that crypto is illegal there.

Which crypto-friendly cities suit a long stay?

For a month or more, compare cities with many listings and a clear local rule. Funchal on Madeira lists 164 places and 7 hotels, Tbilisi 175 places, Medellín 135 places, Lisbon 53 places and 3 hotels. Chiang Mai lists 35 places and 9 hotels, but paying on the spot is restricted in Thailand.

Nomad visas and the crypto rule of each country are compared on digital nomads. Deposits, taxes and refunds for a 30-night booking are on monthly stays paid in USDT.

How is the index built?

• Source: the BTC Map public API (api.btcmap.org/v4/places), downloaded on October 12, 2026: 43,120 places, of which 13,386 deleted, leaving 29,734 active.
• Exclusions: 2,510 ATMs and exchange offices are left out of the city counts.
• Radius: 25 km around a city centre point set by hand, measured as a great-circle (haversine) distance.
• Verified: a place counts as verified when BTC Map shows a verification date of January 1, 2025 or later.
• Hotels: places shown with BTC Map's hotel icon.
• Local rule: one status per country (banned, restricted, not verified yet, no ban found), with its source and the date of our check.
• On sale with StaySats: our own sale status on the same date.

What are the limits of this data?

• BTC Map is built by volunteers from OpenStreetMap data. A listed place may have stopped taking crypto, and many places that take it are not listed.
• "Listed" never means "accepts crypto today". Check with the place before you rely on it.
• In the United States, some places shown with a fuel station icon may in fact be ATMs. We did not remove them.
• The hotel census is very incomplete: BTC Map lists 927 hotels in the whole world.
• Two nearby cities can share places when their 25 km circles overlap, for example Osaka and Kyoto.
• The 2021 Library of Congress report has not been updated, so the statuses based on it may be out of date.
• The index contains no hotel price and no count of our own hotels. We publish those only once they are measured.

How can I download and reuse the data?

Download the full index as JSON or CSV. The files add each city's check-in ID rule and the source URL of each local rule. They are free to reuse under the CC BY 4.0 licence. We update the index every quarter. The date on this page changes only when the data changes, and each update is logged in the changelog. Our other datasets are on open data.

How do I cite the destinations data?

Use this line, with the date of our count:

Source: StaySats, Crypto-Friendly Destinations (checked October 12, 2026), CC BY 4.0, https://staysats.com/crypto-friendly-destinations/.

A link is appreciated; any rel attribute is fine. Please also credit BTC Map and OpenStreetMap contributors for the place counts, since the counts come from their listings.

Who publishes this index, and is there a conflict of interest?

StaySats publishes it: the StaySats research desk of TravelGoat LLC (United States) compiles the data. No expert has reviewed it yet; named reviewers will be listed on our editorial policy when appointed. We sell hotel bookings paid in crypto. Our offer is included and marked: the last column of the table shows where you can book a hotel with us.

No city or merchant paid to appear, and our sales do not change the BTC Map counts. If you find an error, write to us through the contact page and we will correct it in the next update.