World's most powerful passports of July 2026
In 2006, a United States passport was the ultimate ticket to the world, offering its citizens a level of global access matched only by two other nations: Denmark and Finland.
What a difference 20 years makes. As the Henley Passport Index reveals in its newly released 20th-anniversary report, the global ranking of travel freedom now looks completely different.
The index, which monitors the travel freedoms offered by passports around the world based on the number of destinations their holders can visit visa-free or visa-on-demand, shows that US travel documents are no longer among the most powerful.
Today the United States is in 10th position but, because Henley counts multiple countries with the same score as a single spot in its standings, in reality that means 36 countries are ranked ahead of it.
