Everything you need to know to work remotely from Thailand
Thailand is one of the most popular destinations to work remotely, either for yourself, your own business, or a company back home. The internet is fast, cost of living is low, quality of life is high, it’s an all around good time - but there are a few catches.
Visas and work permits
The two big drawbacks are visas and the law.
Visa issues - Depending on how long you want to stay in Thailand, visa issues eventually become a headache for most. If you’re willing to fly in and out every 2-3 months, you can get by for 1-2 years on tourist visas and such. Then people often turn to education visas and other options to prolong their stay. Since 2024 there’s finally a visa made for remote workers, the DTV, valid for five years with 180 days per entry.
Legality issues - We don’t want to be that guy who’s always ruining everybody’s mood on a forum somewhere by pointing out the fact that you’re technically working illegally without a work permit - but, it does need to be taken into consideration - at least so you keep yourself out of the way. Performing any kind of work in Thailand, for your own company abroad (unless you’re on a DTV), or for a local company is not permitted without a work permit. Of course, what people should do, and what people do, do, are two different things. There must be tens of thousands of designers, programmers, traders, drop shippers - people from all corners of the internet enjoying their lives in Thailand, working under the radar - every coffee shop has someone working on their laptops.
Taxes
We’ve written a brief overview on taxes, but here are the basics. We can’t give specific advice as it’s highly dependent on you as an individual.
Tax residency - The tax residency test is very simple in Thailand. If you are in the country for 180 days or more within a given calendar year, you are a tax resident. It doesn’t matter if you’re on a tourist visa, or if you’re a tax resident elsewhere - you are liable to pay tax. This does not mean that you owe any tax, but you should take it into consideration.
Territorial tax system - Thailand operates a territorial tax system which provides many benefits to some individuals and businesses. Up until January 2024, there was a loophole which allowed you to keep foreign sourced income outside of the country until the next tax year, at which point you could then transfer it all into Thailand tax-free. This loophole has been removed and any income you earn as a tax resident from 2024 onwards is now taxable whenever you remit it into Thailand. The territorial rule is still in place - but note that this is foreign sourced, meaning that you should take into consideration where the work was performed which generated that income, not only where the income was paid from, and is now held.
Tax ID - If you have become a Thai tax resident and you either need to pay taxes in Thailand, or you need a TIN (Tax Identification Number), you are able to apply for one regardless of the visa you hold. If you have read that you cannot obtain a TIN without a Non-B visa or Work Permit - this is false.
Personal income tax - Personal income tax is about as far as we’ll go in this article. Foreign income, the sale of digital assets (such as Bitcoin) and local income are all taxed under personal income. The following personal income tax rates are in place:
| Taxable Income per year (THB) | Tax rate |
| Up to 150,000 baht | 0% |
| Taxable income above 150,000 THB up to 300,000 | 5% |
| Taxable income above 300,000 THB up to 500,000 | 10% |
| Taxable income above 500,000 THB up to 750,000 | 15% |
| Taxable income above 750,000 THB up to 1,000,000 | 20% |
| Taxable income above 1,000,000 THB up to 2,000,000 | 25% |
| Taxable income above 2,000,000 THB up to 5,000,000 | 30% |
| Taxable income above 5,000,000 | 35% |
Working from coffee shops
Remote work is huge in Thailand. People fly from all around the world with their laptops to sit in a nice air conditioned coffee shop, maybe with access to a pool, a fresh coconut in hand, surrounded by beautiful women and men - and of course, fast WiFi.
It’ll be obvious when you arrive that working from coffee shops is mostly the norm and most either tolerate, or encourage it, though there are some exceptions. We think there’s some general etiquette here that needs to be taken into consideration.
Length of time - If you’re working 8 hour days every day, you’ll be better off in a co-working space. There’s only so much coffee and so many drinks you can consume in a day. With that said, some coffee shops are borderline co-working spaces, so it may be fine there.
Purchase drinks and food - Generally, we think the rule is to purchase something every 1-2 hours. If you’re sitting in a tiny family owned cafe and you’re taking a full table customers could be waiting for, consider moving to somewhere larger, or set up for remote workers.
Location - In Chiang Mai, many coffee shops are actually listing themselves as coworking spaces on Google Maps. Sometimes they have a setup such as providing 1-2 hours of internet per purchased beverage - obviously you could just hotspot after that but we recommend supporting the businesses that are supporting us. Cafes outside of Chiang Mai and Bangkok will be less accustomed to customers coming through to work, but there should still be no problem - worst case, there’s no power outlet or the WiFi isn’t great.
Internet
The internet in Thailand is excellent. Fibre optic is widely available with 1gbps speeds for less than $30 per month. Cafe and public WiFi is usually somewhere between 100-500mbps when connected with a 5G wireless connection.
Mobile data is also perfect for remote workers. 5G coverage is very broad so you can literally almost work from anywhere, even on a 3rd class train from Bangkok to Chiang Mai, you’re flying through the middle of the countryside in a cab with no windows, but you’re blazing online with 5G speeds.
The main two carriers for mobile data are AIS and TrueMove - both of these options will work fine.