A Youth Mobility visa enables people aged 18-30 (or 35 for some countries) to live and work in the UK, usually for up to two years. It used to be called the “working holiday-maker scheme” and some people may still call it that. Crucially, there is no requirement to have an employer to sponsor a Youth Mobility visa or even for the applicant to necessarily intend to work in the UK, which makes it much more flexible than other work visa routes.

The big drawback to the Youth Mobility visa is that it is only available to citizens of a select list of 13 countries (plus British overseas territories). The other requirements for this visa are in Appendix Youth Mobility Scheme to the immigration rules and there is also some guidance on the scheme for Home Office staff. 

The rules for Indian citizens, who were added to the scheme for the first time in 2022 and have been able to submit applications from early 2023, are more restrictive than for other nationalities.

Main requirements

Nationality

Appendix Youth Mobility Scheme says at YMS 1.3:

The applicant must be one of the following:

(a) a British Overseas Citizen, British Overseas Territories Citizen or British National (Overseas); or

(b) a national or citizen of a country or the holder of a passport issued by a territory, listed in Annex Youth Mobility Scheme: eligible nationals.

The vast majority of the take-up is from citizens of the 13 countries listed in Appendix Youth Mobility Scheme: eligible nationals. Only one person with one of the rare forms of British nationality listed at (a) has been issued with a Youth Mobility visa in the year ending June 2024.

Each country has an annual quota of Youth Mobility visas that can be granted to its citizens.

In 2024, the countries and quotas are:

• Andorra – 100 places
• Australia – 45,000 places
• Canada – 8,000 places
• Hong Kong – 1,000 places
• Iceland – 1,000 places
• India – 3,000 places
• Japan – 6,000 places
• Monaco – 1,000 places
• New Zealand – 8,500 places
• Republic of Korea – 5,000 places
• San Marino – 1,000 places 
• Taiwan – 1,000 places
• Uruguay – 500 places

The effect of the cap on potential applicants varies depending on the applicant’s country of nationality. Australia, New Zealand and Canada have large allocations which are never filled. For example, even pre-pandemic around 9,000 – 10,000 Youth Mobility visas were issued to Australians every year, well below the then 30,000 quota. Now the quota has been raised to 45,000 but in the year ending June 2024, according to Home Office statistics only 9,935 applications were made by Australians. Quotas are often devised subsequent to updated trade deals. 

By contrast, the Home Office operates a lottery for applicants from Taiwan and Hong Kong to manage demand. Applicants register their interest by email and the Home Office distributes “invitations to apply” at random.

There is also a different lottery for Indian citizens. 

Age

Applicants must be aged 18 to 30 (or 35 for nationals of Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Korea). Applicants who are 17 can apply but only get entry clearance from their 18th birthday. If an individual turns 31 (or 36) after the visa is issued, they will remain eligible to remain in the UK for as long as their visa is valid. 

Maintenance

Applicants must demonstrate that they have savings of £2,530 as required by YMS 5.1. This is calculated using the exchange rate on the date the application was submitted. The detailed rules on maintenance for this route are in Appendix Finance, which says:

Funds may be held in any form of personal bank or building society account (including current, deposit, savings, pension from which the funds can be withdrawn or investment account) provided the account allows the funds to be accessed immediately.

The applicant must have had the funds in such an account for at least 28 days leading up to their application.

Special rules for Indian citizens

Indian citizens supposedly qualified for the Youth Mobility Scheme for the first time in 2022 but the much anticipated Indian Young Professionals Scheme ballot opened for the first time on 28 February 2023. You can find up to date information on the ballot and apply when the 2025 ballot opens here. The 2024 ballot opened on 16 July 2024 and closed on 18 July 2024.

Indians applying for what is being branded the “Young Professionals Scheme” will need to have some qualifications or skills not required for citizens of the other Youth Mobility countries. They must satisfy paragraph YMS 4.2 of the Appendix:

The applicant must:
(a) have been issued with an invitation to apply in accordance with the invitation to apply arrangements set out in Appendix Youth Mobility Scheme: eligible nationals; and
(b) have made their application within the period of time specified in that invitation to apply; and
(c) provide the unique application number for that invitation to apply; and
(d) provide a local police certificate or a police clearance certificate that has been issued no more than 6 months before the date of application; and
(e) hold a qualification equal to or above RQF level 6.

Refusals

The general grounds for refusal apply. In addition, there are several special reasons for refusing a Youth Mobility application.

First, you cannot get a Youth Mobility visa twice. If you apply a second time then you will be refused even if you still meet the other requirements. Importantly, though, this only applies if you actually spent time in the UK on the visa, so if someone applies for and gets a Youth Mobility visa but decides not to use it, then they could still get another one the following year if they wished.

Second, applicants must not have children under the age of 18 who live with them or are financially dependent on them. Children born to Youth Mobility visa holders during their stay in the UK can however be added to the visa as a dependant.

Conditions

Successful applicants get two years’ entry clearance. For most, there is no possibility of renewing the visa and no possibility of applying for indefinite leave to remain. People may however be able to extend their stay in the UK by switching to another visa, such as a Skilled Worker visa. 

However, there is an exception for nationals of Australia, Canada and New Zealand who are able to apply to extend their visa for a further year, up to a total of three years continuous residence in the UK under the Youth Mobility Scheme. The cap on the number of applications (listed above) does not apply to those in country visa extensions. 

As with almost all other routes, entry clearance will be granted subject to a no recourse to public funds condition.

There are very few limits on what a successful applicant can do with their two years in the UK and no requirement to do anything at all.

A couple of select forms of work are prohibited. Youth Mobility visa holders cannot work as a professional sportsperson/coach. There are also some slightly bizarre constraints on self-employment:

(b) no self-employment, except where the following conditions are met:

(i) the person has no premises which they own, other than their home, from which they carry out their business; and

(ii) the total value of any equipment used in the business does not exceed £5,000; and

(iii) the applicant has no employees

Youth Mobility visa holders can also use their two years to study in the UK (except for courses which require an Academic Technology Approval Scheme clearance certificate).

Making an application

The requirements for a Youth Mobility visa are much easier to fulfil than almost any other UK immigration route. It is also cheaper than most, with a £298 application fee and a reduced rate of the Immigration Health Surcharge (£776 per year rather than £1,035). That makes the total cost of the two-year visa £1,850. 

Applications are made online. Unsurprisingly, the success rate is very high. In 2019 around 20,000 Youth Mobility applications were granted, and 300 refused. And post-pandemic, in the year ending June 2024, around 24,000 applications were granted, and 518 refused.

This article was originally published in November 2020 and has been updated most recently by Sonia Lenegan so that it is correct as of the new date of publication shown.