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From March 1, 2026, registering a company or an IE in Georgia no longer lets you work there. Most foreigners now need a Special Labour Permit first. Here’s who needs one, who’s exempt, and how to apply.
For years, Georgia ran one of the easiest setups for a foreigner who wanted to run a business here. You registered an Individual Entrepreneur (IE) online in an afternoon, paid 1% tax under small-business status, and got on with your work. The registration was the permission. Nobody asked for anything else.
From March 1, 2026, that’s no longer how it works. Registering an IE or a company still gives you a business, but it doesn’t give you the right to operate it. Under the reformed Labour Migration Law, most foreigners now need a separate document, the Special Labour Permit, before they can legally work, freelance, or run their own company in Georgia.
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Key Takeaways
- From March 1, 2026, most foreigners need a Special Labour Permit to work, freelance, or run a business in Georgia.
- Registering an IE or company is no longer enough on its own; it gives you a business, not the right to operate it.
- Genuine remote workers serving only foreign clients, plus permanent and investment residence permit holders, are exempt.
- Self-employed people apply themselves through labourmigration.moh.gov.ge; employers apply on behalf of staff.
- Fees are GEL200 for standard processing (around US$74) or GEL400 expedited (around US$148).
- The labour permit comes first, then a Work Residence Permit or D1 visa. You need both.
- Self-employed foreigners already in Georgia should apply by May 1, 2026, with full regularization by January 1, 2027.
What the Special Labour Permit Is
The Special Labour Permit (you’ll also see it called the Right to Labour Activity) is government permission to do paid work in Georgia. You apply for it through the labour ministry’s online portal, and the rules took effect on March 1, 2026.
Because of the new laws, being in Georgia legally and working in Georgia legally are now two different things. Visa-free entry, or a temporary residence permit, lets you stay. It does not, on its own, let you work.
Who Needs It (and Who Doesn’t)
This is the section worth reading slowly, because the line between “needs a permit” and “exempt” is where most of the confusion sits.
Who Needs a Permit
The requirement covers nearly everyone earning money through activity performed in Georgia:
- Employees of a Georgian company or a foreign company operating in Georgia
- Individual Entrepreneurs resident in Georgia, including those on small-business and micro-business status
- Freelancers and independent contractors working with local clients
- Company partners and directors of Georgian companies
If you registered an IE to invoice Georgian clients, or you sit as a director of an LLC you opened here, you are inside the system.
Good to Know: the permit is tied to a specific activity. It authorizes the field of work you declared on the application. You can’t use a permit issued for IT consulting to suddenly run a restaurant. Change what you do, and you’re looking at a new application.
Who Is Exempt
Several groups fall outside the requirement entirely:
- Permanent residence permit holders
- Investment residence permit holders
- Refugees and asylum seekers
- Accredited journalists
- Genuine remote workers whose work is performed exclusively for foreign companies or clients, with no local economic footprint in Georgia
That last category matters most for the nomad crowd. If you sit in a Tbilisi apartment writing code for a company in Berlin, billing a foreign entity with no Georgian clients, you are not the target of this law. The permit is aimed at foreigners plugging into the local economy, not at remote staff who happen to be physically present.
Good to Know: The exemption hangs on having no local footprint. Take on a Georgian client or draw a salary from a Georgian entity and you’ve stepped over the line, whatever your IE was originally for. A lot of nomads here use an IE precisely for the 1% tax rate, so check your own setup honestly.
What If Your Georgian Company Only Serves Clients Abroad?
This is the question that trips up the biggest group of foreigners here: the people who registered a Georgian IE or LLC purely to invoice clients overseas, usually to sit under the 1% small-business tax rate. On paper you run a Georgian business. In practice, not a single lari of your income comes from inside the country. Does the permit apply to you?
Start with what’s clear. The reform never tied the permit to whether you hold a Georgian registration on its own. It keys on where your income comes from and where the work is directed.
- The 2026 amendments carry a specific carve-out, sub-clause “L”, which exempts foreigners providing services to a non-resident person when the work relates to that person’s activities conducted outside Georgia.
- A sibling clause, “K”, exempts foreigners working entirely remotely for a Georgian employer where the role needs no physical presence in the country.
Two situations fall cleanly on the exempt side:
- You perform the work outside Georgia. If you travel to deliver it, or you log in from abroad as a remote employee of a Georgian firm, the activity happens outside the country and the permit doesn’t reach it.
- You genuinely export services to foreign clients. A German company, an American client, a Dubai-based firm: services billed to non-residents whose operations sit abroad are the exact profile the exemption was written for. Georgia’s own guidance points small-business IEs working only for the international market toward this exemption.
Good to Know: The word “only” is load-bearing. Take on a single Georgian client, or bill a Georgian company through the same IE, and you’ve created a local footprint. The permit then covers the whole activity, including the foreign-billed part, not just the Georgian slice.
Tip: Until that’s resolved, judge your own case on the facts. If the work is plainly performed abroad, you’re on solid ground. If you’re physically in Georgia on a Georgian IE, keep every contract, invoice, and bank record that shows your clients are foreign and your work is directed abroad, and get a written opinion from a Georgian immigration lawyer before assuming you’re exempt.
How to Apply
The process splits depending on whether you work for someone else or for yourself. Both routes go through the same official portal: labourmigration.moh.gov.ge.
If You’re Self-Employed, an IE, or a Company Director
You apply on your own behalf. There’s no employer to file for you, which means the paperwork is yours to assemble. You’ll need:
- An electronic application stating your field of activity
- A valid passport or national ID
- Proof of business activity for an existing business: a turnover statement from the tax office showing real income
- Proof of business activity for a new venture: a detailed business plan setting out what you intend to do
The business-plan requirement is the part to take seriously if you’re just starting. A vague paragraph won’t carry the application. Treat it as a document the reviewer actually reads.
If You’re Employed
Your Georgian employer files the application for you. The key document on their side is the signed employment agreement, which establishes the role the permit covers. If you’re being hired into Georgia, this is worth confirming with the company before you arrive, because the permit has to clear before you start work, not after.
Once submitted, the Ministry reviews the application and issues a decision. Approval gives you the right to work in the declared activity, and only that activity.
The Second Step: Residence Permit or D1 Visa
To live in Georgia, you also need residence permit.
The labour permit comes first. You cannot get the residence side sorted until the permit is in hand. After it’s approved, the path depends on where you are:
- Already in Georgia: apply in person at the House of Justice for a Work Residence Permit (or an IT Residence Permit, if you qualify) within 10 calendar days of the labour permit being issued. The residence permit is then issued within about 30 days.
- Applying from abroad: apply at a Georgian consulate for a D1 visa (the long-stay work visa) within 30 calendar days of the permit being issued, then switch it to a residence permit once you arrive.
Sequence is everything here. Permit, then residence. Get them out of order, or skip the residence step assuming the work permit covers your stay, and you can end up legally working but without a valid basis to remain.
If you’re weighing this against other routes into the country, our guide to moving to Georgia lays out the broader residency picture.
Costs
The fee depends on how fast you want a decision. There are two tiers, and both are modest by international standards:
- Standard processing: GEL200, around US$74.
- Expedited processing: GEL400, around US$148, double the standard fee for a faster decision.
Renewals are priced on the same scale. Against the cost of running a business here, the permit fee is a rounding error. The expense that actually matters is the time and the paperwork, not the government charge. For a fuller view of what life here runs you, see our breakdown of the cost of living in Tbilisi.
Processing Time
The processing time is based on your tier.
- Standard: up to 30 calendar days.
- Expedited: around 10 working days.
Plan around the slower figure. Thirty calendar days is the worst case for the standard track, and since you can’t legally begin work until the permit is issued, that month is dead time if you didn’t start early. If you have a job offer or a client contract with a fixed start date, pay for the expedited track and build in a buffer.
The new system is in its first months of operation, and early bottlenecks are a realistic possibility.
Tip: Working before your permit is issued carries real fines, reported at GEL2,000 for working without authorization (charged to employer and employee alike), and GEL2,000 to GEL5,000 for self-employed violations, with the amounts increasing on repeat offences. The permit fee is trivial next to those penalties, so don’t jump the gun.
The Digital Nomad Residency Program: An Alternative Route
Alongside the work permit reform, Georgia launched a separate Digital Nomad Residency Program on September 1, 2025, aimed squarely at remote tech workers. For some readers it’s a cleaner path than the labour permit and residence two-step.
The headline requirements:
- Income: at least US$25,000 per year.
- Experience: two or more years in your sector, with an IT and tech focus.
- Reward: a three-year residency permit for approved applicants.
If you’re a remote IT professional with the income to qualify, this program can hand you a multi-year residency without the activity-specific labour permit, since your work is for foreign entities anyway. It overlaps heavily with the existing Georgia digital nomad visa route, so compare the two before committing to either.
For most genuinely-remote nomads, the practical takeaway is reassuring: between the foreign-employer exemption and this residency program, you have options that don’t involve the labour permit at all. The permit is the burden for people working into the Georgian economy, not over it from a distance.
Transition Deadlines if You’re Already Working Here
If you’re already operating in Georgia when the rules take effect, you don’t get to ignore them on a grandfather clause. There’s a transition window, and it’s tighter than it looks.
- March 1, 2026: the new system takes effect.
- May 1, 2026: the enforcement deadline for self-employed foreigners, including freelancers and IEs, to have applied.
- January 1, 2027: the date by which everyone already working in Georgia must have fully regularized their status.
If you run an IE here today, the clock that matters most is May 1, 2026. That’s roughly two months after the law lands to get your application in. Given a 30-day standard processing window, leaving it to mid-April is cutting it fine. Sort it in March.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I work remotely for my foreign employer without a permit?
Generally yes, if your work is exclusively for foreign companies or clients and you have no local economic footprint in Georgia: no Georgian clients, no local salary, nothing drawing on the domestic economy. The exemption exists precisely for this situation. The moment any part of your income comes from inside Georgia, the permit applies.
Does my Individual Entrepreneur registration still let me work?
Not on its own, not after March 1, 2026. The IE registration gives you a business structure and a tax status, but the right to actually operate it now comes from the Special Labour Permit. This is the single biggest change for the many foreigners who set up an IE here for the 1% small-business tax rate.
How long is the permit valid?
The permit is tied to your work. It’s granted for as long as your employment agreement runs, capped at one year, then renewed. Apply for any renewal well before it expires rather than at the last minute, and keep it lined up with your residence permit, which runs for the same period.
I only freelance occasionally. Do I still need it?
If the freelancing is for Georgian clients or run through a Georgian IE, yes, the requirement doesn’t have a casual-work carve-out. If it’s occasional work billed entirely to foreign clients with no local footprint, you fall under the remote-worker exemption. The test is who pays you and from where, not how many hours you put in.
Do I need a permit before or after I get residence?
Before. The labour permit comes first; the Work Residence Permit or D1 visa follows once the permit is issued. You can’t reverse the order.
