Before I moved to Denmark last month, I spent a ton of time researching how long I could stay in the country before applying for a residency permit, which is how I discovered this amazing travel hack! Basically, citizens of some countries that can visit the Schengen area without a visa for up to 90 days, including the US, Canada, and Australia, can actually stay up to 180 days by spending the last 90 of those 180 days in a Schengen country that has a bilateral visa waiver agreement with their home country!

EU Schengen Zone 90-Day Rule for Visa-Free Travel

Tourists from many non-EU countries, including the US, UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, can travel to the Schengen area without a visa and stay up to 90 days in a 180-day period. Schengen area countries include Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland.

Bilateral Visa Waiver Agreement Allows Stays Up to 180 Days

Some Schengen countries have bilateral visa waiver agreements (BVWA) with other non-EU countries that allow tourists from those countries to stay in the individual Schengen country for up to 90 additional days after exhausting the 90-day Schengen limit! Denmark, for example, allows citizens of the US, Australia, Canada, Chile, Israel, Japan, Malaysia, New Zealand, Singapore, and South Korea to freely enter and stay in Denmark for 90 days, regardless of time spent in another Schengen country before entering Denmark. Latvia currently has the same policy for citizens of the US and 11 other countries.

How to check if your country has a BVWA with a Schengen country

Here is EU documentation from 2019 listing existing bilateral visa waiver agreements. But just because a BVWA exists does not mean it’s enforced! For example, the US has BVWAs with France, Italy, and other Schengen countries that are no longer enforced. Assume an existing BVWA isn’t enforced unless you find explicit documentation confirming this policy on the Schengen country’s official immigration website. Also, always confirm with the embassy of the Schengen country how they apply the rules of the BVWA and if you’ll need to provide any documentation to border officials at the point and time of entry.