In the near future, the Estonian government plans to introduce a “virtual residence permit” service. In comparison with the usual residence permit, the virtual one will not give the foreigner the right to enter the countries of Europe without hindrance and does not give any social guarantees. A virtual residence permit is an opportunity to obtain a Schengen visa under a simplified procedure. It is a procedure for opening a bank account in Lithuania, registering a company via the Internet without entering the country, while the procedure itself will be difficult, including biometric data, but then it will be constantly simplified. The population of Estonia is 1.4 million, while the country plans to issue 10 million virtual residence permits for foreigners until 2025.
Only a foreigner who invests at least 65 000 Euro in Estonia or 16 000 Euro in case of opening an individual enterprise can get a residence permit in Estonia today.
Thus, it can be concluded that the virtual residence permit will be useful for allowing a foreigner to register a company and open a bank account in the country without a visit, to simplify the procedure for obtaining a Schengen visa to the European Union, but to apply for a residence permit (which gives the right to live, conduct business, travel, give social guarantees, etc.) the foreigner will have to come to Estonia and invest the minimum amount of money in the company.