Canada keeps slipping down this ranking of the world’s most powerful passports

A new ranking has revealed what the world’s most powerful passports are this year.

Even though the Canadian passport made the top 10, it continued to fall down the list.

On January 13, Henley & Partners put out the Henley Passport Index 2026, which is based on exclusive data from the International Air Transport Association.

It ranked all global passports by the number of destinations holders of those passports can access without having a visa.

Henley & Partners said there is a record number of passports clustered at the top of the ranking this year.

Singapore has the world’s best passport for another year, with visa-free access to 192 destinations.

These are the top 10 most powerful passports in 2026, according to Henley & Partners:

1. Singapore
2. Japan and South Korea
3. Denmark, Luxembourg, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland
4. Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands and Norway
5. Hungary, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia and the United Arab Emirates
6. Croatia, Czechia, Estonia, Malta, New Zealand and Poland
7. Australia, Latvia, Liechtenstein and the U.K.
8. Canada, Iceland and Lithuania
9. Malaysia
10. United States

European countries dominated the top of this ranking, but Henley & Partners said the “notable” exceptions are the United Arab Emirates, New Zealand, Australia, Canada, and Malaysia.

With Canada’s passport, you can get visa-free access to 181 destinations.

That’s 11 destinations fewer than Singapore’s passport, which is the most powerful in the world.

But the Canadian passport gets you visa-free access to more destinations than the American passport!

This new list for 2026 marked yet another year of decline for Canada.

In the 2025 ranking, Canada was tied for the seventh most powerful passport in the world but was on the “losers list.”

That’s because this country’s passport had dropped from fourth to seventh place in the ranking over the last decade.

So, with Canada tied for eighth in the 2026 Henley Passport Index, the Canadian passport has slipped further down the list.

Even though the Canadian passport dropped a spot this year, the U.S. and the U.K had the “steepest annual losses in visa-free access” in the last year, according to Henley & Partners.