If you are not an EU citizen and you want to live in Malta from 2027, two names will come up in every conversation: the Malta Permanent Residence Programme, the MPRP, and the new Individual Tax Programme created by Legal Notice 195 of 2026. They are often presented as rival products on the same shelf. They are not. One gives you the right to live in Malta. The other decides how you are taxed once you do. Choosing well starts with seeing that difference clearly.
Two Different Kinds of Law
The MPRP is an immigration programme. Its rules are the Malta Permanent Residence Programme Regulations, Subsidiary Legislation 217.26, made under article 7A of the Immigration Act. The regulations say in terms that their scope is the grant of permanent residency rights on the basis of investment, and that a certificate issued under them is a permit under article 7A. Tax does not appear in the deal. An MPRP family is taxed under the ordinary rules of the Income Tax Act, like any other resident.
The Individual Tax Programme is a tax regime. L.N. 195 of 2026 was made under articles 56(23) and 96 of the Income Tax Act. It creates four categories of "special tax status", sets the 15% rate and the minimum tax, and comes into force on 1 January 2027. It does not grant anyone a right to enter or live in Malta, and it ends if you take certain steps towards permanence. The overview of the Individual Tax Programme compares its terms with the GRP and TRP.
For a third-country national, the relevant ITP category is global resident status. That is the category this comparison focuses on.
What the MPRP Costs and Requires
The MPRP's price list was last reset by L.N. 146 of 2025, published on 22 July 2025. No change to the MPRP regulations has been published in 2026. As the regulations stand:
- Administration fee: €60,000 for the main applicant, non-refundable. €15,000 is due within one month of applying, the remaining €45,000 within two months of the Letter of Approval in Principle.
- €7,500 per dependant for dependent children aged 18 to 28 and for dependent parents or grandparents. The spouse, children under 18 and adult children with a certified disability pay no fee.
- Contribution: €37,000, whether you buy or rent, payable within eight months of approval in principle.
- Donation: €2,000 to a registered Maltese philanthropic, cultural, sport, scientific, animal welfare or artistic NGO.
- Property: buy a residential property for at least €375,000, or rent one for at least €14,000 a year, anywhere in Malta or Gozo, and hold it for at least five years. After that, you must still hold a residential property in Malta or Gozo, owned or rented.
- Capital: assets of at least €500,000, of which at least €150,000 in financial assets, or at least €650,000, of which at least €75,000 in financial assets. The capital has to be held for five years from approval.
- Health insurance covering all risks normally covered for Maltese nationals, background checks, and an application through a licensed agent.
Add it up for a buyer with a spouse and minor children, and the non-recoverable outlay is about €99,000 in fees, contribution and donation, plus the property. For more on how the programme's costs have moved, see the MPRP costs and rules.
What you get is a residence certificate that the regulations treat as permanent, for the main applicant and approved dependants, without having to spend years building up residence first. On submitting the application you can also apply for a one-year temporary residence permit while it is processed.
What Global Resident Status Costs and Requires
The ITP's global resident status, as set out in L.N. 195, looks like this:
- Application fee: €8,500, non-refundable. Renewal every five years for €2,500.
- Tax: 15% on foreign-source income received in Malta by the beneficiary, spouse and qualifying children, with double tax relief. Other income is taxed separately at 35%.
- Minimum tax: €35,000 a year, payable by 30 April of the year before the relevant year of assessment, in full even in the first and last year of the status.
- Property: buy for at least €700,000, or rent for at least €14,000 a year, in Malta or Gozo, and live in it as your primary residence. Letting or subletting it ends the status.
- Other conditions: stable and regular resources, EU-wide sickness insurance, a valid travel document, the ability to communicate in one of Malta's official languages, not being domiciled in Malta and not intending to become domiciled within five years, fit and proper status, and representation by an authorised registered mandatary.
- Presence rule: the status ends if you stay in any other single jurisdiction for more than 183 days in a calendar year.
The applicant must be a third-country national who is not a long-term resident. That definition includes anyone who has applied for long-term resident status under S.L. 217.05, and becoming one later ends the status.
The Two Side by Side
| MPRP | ITP global resident status | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | Permanent residence permit | Special tax status |
| Legal basis | S.L. 217.26, Immigration Act art. 7A | L.N. 195/2026, Income Tax Act art. 56(23) |
| One-off costs | €60,000 fee, €37,000 contribution, €2,000 donation, €7,500 per fee-paying dependant | €8,500 fee |
| Recurring costs | None under the programme | €35,000 minimum tax a year; €2,500 renewal every five years |
| Property to buy | €375,000 | €700,000 |
| Property to rent | €14,000 a year | €14,000 a year |
| Capital test | €500,000 or €650,000 in assets | Stable and regular resources |
| Tax on foreign income | Ordinary rules | 15% on income received in Malta |
| Term | Permanent, subject to conditions | Five years, renewable |
The Tax Side of the MPRP
Because the MPRP says nothing about tax, an MPRP family falls under the ordinary Income Tax Act. For someone who is resident in Malta but not domiciled here, that means the remittance basis: foreign income is taxed when it is received in Malta, at the ordinary progressive rates in article 56. The guide to non-dom treatment versus special tax status explains the mechanics.
There is a floor. Article 56(27) sets a minimum tax of €5,000 a year for an ordinarily resident, non-domiciled individual whose foreign income of at least €35,000 is not received, or not fully received, in Malta, unless they are taxed under a scheme with its own minimum tax.
So the tax comparison comes down to arithmetic. The ITP's €35,000 minimum at a 15% rate is equivalent to tax on €233,333 of remitted foreign income. If you bring less than that into Malta each year, you pay the minimum, not the rate. Under the ordinary non-dom rules, what you do not remit is not taxed in Malta at all, subject to the €5,000 floor, and what you remit is taxed at progressive rates. Which is cheaper depends almost entirely on how much foreign income you actually need to bring in, and whether you have Malta-source income as well.
Can You Hold Both?
This is the question most families ask, and the legal texts give a clear starting answer.
The MPRP regulations require a beneficiary not to benefit under a list of other schemes: the Residents Scheme Regulations, the Highly Qualified Persons Rules, the High Net Worth Individuals rules for non-EU nationals, the Malta Retirement Programme Rules, the Qualifying Employment in Innovation and Creativity Rules and the Residence Programme Rules. The Global Residence Programme is not on that list, and neither is the Individual Tax Programme.
L.N. 195 in turn bars beneficiaries of a list of older incentive rules, and excludes long-term residents under S.L. 217.05 from global resident status. The MPRP is not on that list either, and an MPRP certificate is a permit under the Immigration Act, not long-term resident status under S.L. 217.05.
Read side by side, then, neither text rules out combining an MPRP certificate with global resident status, just as the MPRP list never named the Global Residence Programme. It is a reading of the published texts, not a ruling. Before building a plan on it, get written confirmation through your authorised mandatary and your licensed MPRP agent, and watch for any guidance the Commissioner for Tax and Customs publishes before the rules take effect.
The 2026 Window: the Global Residence Programme
There is a third option for anyone who moves quickly. The Global Residence Programme Rules remain on the statute book. Their current terms are lighter than the ITP's: a €15,000 minimum tax, property from €275,000 to buy (€220,000 in Gozo or the south of Malta) or €9,600 a year to rent in Malta, and a €6,000 application fee (€5,500 for a qualifying owned property in the south). The Global Residence Programme guide sets out how it works.
L.N. 195 adds a proviso to rule 3(3): special tax status granted up to 31 December 2026, including applications received by that date, continues to apply until 31 December 2031. For a family already weighing a move, a complete application filed this year may lock in five years on the older terms. After that, the €35,000 minimum and the €700,000 property threshold apply.
Which Route Fits Whom
The honest answer depends on three questions.
Do you need a residence right at all? If you are a third-country national with no other basis to live in Malta, the tax status alone does not get you in. The MPRP is one route; the realistic routes to permanent residence sets out the others and who each suits.
How much foreign income will you bring in? Below roughly €233,000 of remittances a year, the ITP's minimum sets your bill at €35,000. Families remitting less may find the ordinary non-dom rules, with their €5,000 floor, cheaper; run the numbers on your own income. Families remitting several hundred thousand a year are where a flat 15% starts to pay.
Do you want permanence? The MPRP is built for it. The ITP ends when you seek long-term residence. On the texts, the two can sit together only as long as the permanence you rely on is the MPRP certificate, not long-term resident status.
For a wider view of how all of Malta's residence and tax programmes fit together, the overview of the GRP, TRP, MPRP and MRP is the map, and the property buyer's guide covers the purchase that both routes require if you do not rent.
The short version: the MPRP answers "can I live here permanently?" The Individual Tax Programme answers "how will my foreign income be taxed?" From 2027 the second answer gets more expensive. The first one has not changed this year.
Work with Sebastian
If you want to know which Malta residence route and tax status fits your passport, your income and your plans, book a consultation.
