Henley Passport Index names world's most powerful passports 2023

It's that time of the year again when the world's most powerful passport is revealed.

After a couple of years when the title was rendered pretty meaningless due to closed borders, the new rankings from the Henley Passport Index show little movement over the last 12 months.

For the fifth year in row, Japan has claimed the crown. Its citizens can visit visa-free 193 of the 227 destinations that the index measures.

Singapore slipped from joint first to join South Korea in second, with Germany and Spain just behind. Australia stayed in joint eighth, or joint 23rd depending on how you want to read the rankings, with visa-free access to 185 countries.

One of the big movers over the years is the United Arab Emirates. It has jumped 49 places over the past decade. Ranking 64th in 2013 with a visa-free score of just 72, the UAE now has 178 visa-free destinations.

Down at the bottom is Afghanistan with a score of just 27. Henley said the difference of 166 destinations between it and Japan is the widest global mobility gap in the index's 18-year history. Iraq, Syria Pakistan, and Yemen complete the bottom five.

In its summary, Henley noted that there was a direct link between passport strength and economic power.

"On a macro level, the new study by Henley & Partners reveals that just 6 per cent of passports worldwide give their holders visa-free access to more than 70 per cent of the global economy. And only 17 per cent of countries give their passport holders visa-free access to more than four-fifths of the world's 227 destinations.

"The Japanese passport gives visa-free access to 85 per cent of the world and, collectively, these countries account for a whopping 98 per cent of the global economy (Japan's own GDP contribution is around 5 per cent). In contrast, the Nigerian passport at the lower end of the index provides visa-free access to only 46 destinations (20 per cent of the world), which account for just 1.5 per cent of global GDP. The lowest ranked Afghanistan passport provides visa-free access to just 12 per cent of the world and less than 1 per cent of global economic output."