The Ultimate Guide to Living in Lisbon

Is Lisbon still worth it for digital nomads in 2026?

Living in Lisbon as a digital nomad is still a rational choice in 2026, and it is no longer a bargain. The short answers, from the Lisbon row rather than from a cafe thread:

• Cost: about $2,200 a month solo, about $1,800 on a longer stay. A short Airbnb sits near $120 a night, which is a different budget.
• Internet: yes for video calls. The average is 200 Mbps, reliability 9/10, power stability 9/10, coworking density High.
• Stay length: the row says Digital Nomad Visa, up to 365 days. That is the initial visa field, not a residence card and not a stay for most nationalities. Portugal's remote-work path is a temporary-stay visa (under a year) or a D8 residency visa of 4 months that leads to a 2-year permit, renewable for 3-year periods (Lei 23/2007, art. 75). Verify on MNE and AIMA pages.
• Skip it if that budget is fiction, or if you hate bureaucracy. "Bureaucratic processes" is a listed con, not a vibe you can ignore.
• Best months: Apr, May, Jun, Sep, Oct. Rainy months are Nov, Dec, Jan, Feb. July and August are neither. They are the crowd months.

The same page tags the city beach, party, and workhub. Safety is 8.8 (female safety 8). Time zone on the row is UTC+0. Pros are the food, the community, the weather, the history, and the transit. Cons are rising rents, summer tourist crowds, and bureaucracy, plus earthquake risk and nightlife noise.

Worth it, with conditions. You are paying Western European rent for a mild coastal capital with fast internet and a large scene. The bill sits with other Western European capitals, not with a starter-city budget. If budget, internet, and safety are not locked yet, start with How to Choose Your Next Nomad Base. If the open question is the month, use Where to Go Next by Season. The shortlist that still puts Lisbon on the Europe line is Best Places for Digital Nomads in 2026. Use that list to find candidates. Use this page, and the live destination row, before you book.

Who Lisbon is for (and who should skip it)

Lisbon fits people who want a European work city with a ready-made scene, a real coast within a train ride, and the budget to absorb the rent. It is a poor fit if you need the month to be cheap, or if paperwork makes you abandon plans.

It tends to fit if you:

• Can fund the solo baseline (about $2,200) or will actually live inside the longer-stay figure ($1,800)
• Need calls to work. 200 Mbps and reliability 9/10 are the point of picking this city over a cheaper beach
• Want community 9, nightlife 8, and English proficiency 8 in the cafes and coworking rooms
• Care about LGBTQ+ comfort. lgbtFriendly on this row is 9
• Can put the serious months in Apr-Jun or Sep-Oct, or you have a real plan for rain and for August crowds
• Can work UTC+0 (the row's field). Mainland Portugal moves clocks forward in summer, so civil time is an hour ahead of that field from roughly late March to late October. UK overlap stays close all year. US East Coast calls land in the Lisbon afternoon and evening

Skip it, or pick another city, if you:

• Cannot clear $1,800 even on a monthly lease with local food. The nightly median will not save you
• Want a walk-out-the-door beach apartment. The beach tag is the Atlantic coast by train (Cascais, Carcavelos, Costa da Caparica), not a Canggu-style sand path. Read Living in Bali if the sand is the product
• Hate queues, appointments, and forms. The D8 path and ordinary life admin both sit under the bureaucracy con
• Need silence. Nightlife noise is a listed con. Bairro Alto and Cais do Sodré are fun and loud
• Need the $1,800 figure while living in a new Principe Real flat and eating every meal in Chiado

Female safety on the row is 8. That is a strong score in this dataset. It is not a promise about a specific street at 2am. English at 8 means the work scene functions in English. Finanças, many landlords, and immigration appointments still run in Portuguese.

If you are still sorting those filters, the decision order is how to choose a base, not another viewpoint list.

Cost of living: budget bands from Nomad Spin data plus what changes the bill

Nomad Spin does not publish a fake "comfortable" total for Lisbon. It publishes three money fields. Those are the bands.

rentIndex is 55 (Barcelona 60, Porto 42, Budapest 32, Cape Town 30). That is relative rent pressure inside the dataset, not a dollar rent. Lisbon is the expensive European nomad default in this set. It is slightly under Barcelona and well above Porto and Budapest. The "rising rent prices" con is how people who remember 2018 get surprised. The dataset already prices the surprise in. Do not subtract a nostalgia discount.

The nightly median will quietly wreck the monthly baseline

Thirty nights at the published $120 median is $3,600 in lodging before food. That is already above the entire $2,200 solo month, and it is double the $1,800 longer stay. If you "try the city" on nightly Airbnb for a month, you are not on either monthly band, no matter how cheap the coffee is. The $1,800 and $2,200 figures assume a monthly place.

What moves you off the band

No extra dollar totals here. These are the levers, in the order they actually matter.

Annual average temperature on the row is 18°C. That is a coarse yearly figure, not a forecast. It does not tell you August will be empty or February will be a terrace month.

Reality checks

• The $2,200 number is a city baseline, not a Principe Real lifestyle quote.
• Imported groceries, specialty coffee, and riverfront dinners are how people blow a city that already is not cheap. The dataset cannot see your receipt.
• A cheaper room on a Bairro Alto side street or above a Cais do Sodré bar is not cheaper if you cannot sleep or take a call.
• Insurance is not inside those three fields. Budget it separately. This guide does not invent a premium.

Neighborhoods: Arroios, Santos, Principe Real, and quieter alternatives

Lisbon is hilly, small enough to cross, and different enough by neighborhood that the wrong pin wastes the month. There are no separate Nomad Spin destination pages for these areas. The canonical numbers live on Lisbon. The trade-offs below are how people actually use the city. Alfama and Baixa are the postcard defaults. They are usually the wrong work address.

Arroios and Anjos

Arroios and Anjos sit on the green metro line, east of the historic center. Intendente, the blocks around the Arroios market, and the streets toward Anjos are where a lot of longer stays actually land. You get a neighborhood that still feeds itself: produce, tascas, bakeries, and a multicultural high street, plus enough specialty coffee that week one does not feel barren.

Trade-off: this is not the cheap secret from a 2017 blog. Rising rents are a citywide con, and they showed up here early because people were priced out of Chiado and Principe Real. You are choosing a more local center, not a discount code. Some squares are lively late. Ask which way the bedroom faces.

Pick Arroios if you want the metro and you will cook or eat locally part of the week. Skip it if you need the garden-and-brunch version of Lisbon and you have already accepted the rent that comes with it.

Housing tell: confirm fiber in the unit, not "the building has internet." Older flats vary. A speed test in the room beats a listing adjective.

Santos

Santos runs along the hill and the river between Cais do Sodré and Alcântara. The design studios, independent shops, and restaurant streets are why people stay. Cais do Sodré station (metro, the Cascais line, ferries) is the practical edge of the neighborhood, which matters more than a postcard of the river.

Trade-off: the riverfront and the streets closest to Pink Street and the station are a night economy. Nightlife noise is a listed city con, and this is one of the places it is literal. Walk uphill toward Estrela and the blocks get residential fast. You can live in Santos and sleep. You can also live in Santos and regret the room that faces the bars.

There is no metro stop in the middle of Santos. That is fine if Cais do Sodré or a bus is a walk you will actually do with a laptop. It is a bad plan if you imagined a station under the apartment.

Best for a month if you want the city creative scene without sleeping in Chiado, and you will look at the street at 11pm before you pay.

Principe Real

Principe Real is the garden, the design shops, the brunch rooms, and the easiest "I want the scene without trying" hill in the center. It sits above Bairro Alto and within walking distance of Chiado and Rato. The LGBTQ+ nightlife nearby matches a city whose lgbtFriendly score is 9. If you arrive alone and want a social calendar in the first week, this hill does that faster than Alvalade.

Trade-off: you pay for it, and you walk it. The $2,200 baseline is already a city number. A new flat here plus cafe meals is how you leave the band without noticing. Weekend noise depends on whether you are on the garden side or the Bairro Alto side. Ask.

Pick Principe Real if you will use the cafes and the people. Skip it if you came to work and you already know brunch is how your Tuesdays disappear. You can go there for dinner from Arroios. You do not have to sleep there.

Quieter alternatives

Campo de Ourique is the residential grid west of the center: a market hall, groceries, families, and far fewer tour groups. There is no metro. Buses and your feet cover the week. This is the neighborhood long-stayers recommend when the center felt like a set.

Estrela is the basilica, the garden, and a quieter hill next to Santos. Embassies, shade, and early nights. Pleasant, and not where you stumble into a nomad meetup on the walk home. Pair it with a coworking day closer to the river if your job is meetings.

Alvalade (and neighboring Areeiro) is everyday Lisbon on the metro: residential, more Portuguese, thinner on laptop cafes, often kinder to a monthly budget than Principe Real. Heden lists a room in Alvalade, so "quieter" does not have to mean "no desk." Confirm the space is bookable the week you arrive.

Parque das Nações, at the eastern riverfront by Oriente station, is the flat, modern version: newer buildings, easier fiber, malls, and very little Alfama texture. Choose it for a practical apartment and the train, not because you wanted tiles and trams.

Cascais is not a Lisbon neighborhood. It is a beach town at the end of the suburban line from Cais do Sodré. Take it if the beach tag is why you picked the city and you accept a commute back for the scene. Do not book it because a map made the coast look adjacent to Chiado.

Alfama and Baixa, and why they are usually the wrong month

Alfama is the oldest quarter: steep alleys, Fado, miradouros, and tram 28, which is a tourist vehicle rather than your commute. It is a beautiful weekend and a frustrating address. Grocery runs hurt. Tourist lets dominate in summer. Call quality in a guesthouse on a stair street is a gamble against a city average of 200 Mbps. Stay here for a few nights if you want the texture. Do not sign a month because the photo was good.

Baixa is the flat grid from the river square up to Rossio. Errands are easy, metro stops are real, and the street is commercial and loud. It is a sensible 10-day scout. It is a weak home for deep work. Chiado, next door, is the polished version of the same problem: convenient, expensive, and busy.

Booking placeholders

No partner IDs live in this guide. After you pick the neighborhood, these three slots are the booking order. The live modules are on the Lisbon destination page, not in this article.

Internet, coworking, and cafe work setups that actually hold video calls

The city average is 200 Mbps, reliability 9/10, power stability 9/10, coworking density High. That is a yes for video calls. It is a different product from Bali, where the dataset shows 50 Mbps and reliability 5, and the Bali living guide is blunt about street-by-street fiber. It is also a different product from Cape Town, where Living in Cape Town has to plan around power stability 4. Lisbon's power score is 9. You do not need a personal inverter strategy to have a work week here. Keep a charged laptop for cafes. Do not build a load-shedding plan you imported from another country.

The 9/10 is still an average. A renovated Arroios flat with fiber and a guesthouse in Alfama are not the same connection. Test the room.

A setup that holds calls

1. Home fiber you have tested. MEO, NOS, and Vodafone are the ordinary apartment providers. Ask which one is already in the unit, and run a speed test from the desk at the hour you take calls. "Wi-Fi included" in a short let is not that test.
2. A local SIM with real data. The same three networks sell prepaid and eSIM plans in the city and at the airport. If a call would hurt you to drop, keep a second SIM. Learn the hotspot before the day you need it.
3. One coworking room you have already used for a call. Not a miradouro cafe you liked for the view.

Coworking that is actually listed

These are spaces whose own sites still publish Lisbon rooms. Hours and day-pass rules change. Believe the operator's page the week you go, not this paragraph.

• Second Home publishes a Lisbon space inside Mercado da Ribeira, by Cais do Sodré, with weekday day passes. The market downstairs is busy. The point of the room is a desk and a call, not the food hall.
• Heden publishes several Lisbon locations, including Rossio, Santa Apolónia, and Alvalade, with day passes and longer desk plans. Reception hours on their site are weekday daytime. Treat "24/7" as a membership feature you have confirmed, not as a promise about a day pass.

Treat other famous names as closed or moved until you see them operating this month. A trial morning beats a 2022 roundup. Coworking density High means you have options. It does not mean every brand you remember is still at the old address.

Cafes

Principe Real, Chiado, and LX Factory will let you open a laptop almost anywhere. That is not the same as a 45-minute call. Do the call once, at the hour you actually meet, before you tell a client the cafe is your office. Lunch rush, a playlist, and a tiled room with no door will lose to a booked booth every time.

Time Out Market is a food hall. It is not an office. Tram 28 is not a backup connection.

Checklist for a rental you might keep

• Speed test in the room, not a screenshot from the lobby
• Which provider, and whether the building's Wi-Fi is shared with other guests
• A quiet corner with a door, if you talk for a living
• Which way the windows face, if the street has bars
• A named fallback (Second Home, Heden, or a second SIM) written down before you need it

Visas and stay length: Schengen visits vs Portugal D8 digital nomad visa (verify current rules)

This is operational orientation, not legal advice. Fees, income thresholds, and AIMA timelines move. The number on our city page is not the law.

What Nomad Spin currently shows

The Lisbon row says Digital Nomad Visa, 365 days. Porto's row says the same pair. That is what you will see on /destinations/lisbon and /destinations/porto, with a note under the visa stat. Use 365 as the initial-visa field in the dataset. It is not a visa-free allowance, and it is not a card you already hold.

Two remote-work visas, then a residence permit

Portugal's remote-work route is two visas, then a permit. It is for work done for an employer or clients outside Portugal. It is not a permit to take a Portuguese job, and it is not a Schengen tourist stamp.

A temporary-stay visa covers a stay under one year and allows multiple entries. The residency visa (often called the D8) allows two entries and is valid for 4 months. In that window the holder applies to AIMA for a residence permit. That temporary residence permit is valid for 2 years from the date the card is issued and is renewable for successive 3-year periods (Lei 23/2007, art. 75).

Sources: the MNE visa-type page, the consolidated text of Lei 23/2007, and the AIMA remote-work residence permit page (art. 88(1)). You will need proof of remote work for an employer or clients abroad and an address in Portugal. Check the income threshold, fees, and AIMA timelines on those official pages before you book. This guide does not print a euro income figure.

Apply from outside Portugal, at the consulate that covers where you actually live. Document lists live on that post's page.

AIMA is where the residence permit is finished after you enter on the residence visa. "Bureaucratic processes" is a listed con because this step has a reputation for queues. Do not fly on the assumption that the appointment will be next week.

Schengen tourist visits

A short stay in the Schengen area is a different product. For many passports that means visa-free entry of up to 90 days in any 180-day period, counted across the whole Schengen area, not 90 days in Portugal plus another 90 in Spain. Other passports need a short-stay visa before they fly.

A tourist entry is not the D8. This guide will not tell you that remote work for a foreign employer is allowed on a tourist stamp.

EU, EEA, and Swiss citizens do not use the D8. Free-movement rules plus a registration step, if you stay, are a different path. It is still paperwork.

What this guide will not pretend to settle

Tax residence is separate from the visa. A long stay can make you tax resident. The broad NHR incentive that older posts still sell is closed to new applicants. Nothing here is tax advice. This guide does not state citizenship or permanent-residence timelines.

Other routes (D7 passive income, student visas, work visas for Portuguese employers) have their own files. The D7 is not the digital nomad visa. This guide does not explain them.

A simple decision frame

• A few weeks, and your passport qualifies: a Schengen short stay, after you confirm the 90/180 count.
• Many months, working for foreign clients or a foreign employer: the temporary-stay visa or the D8 residency visa, then the AIMA permit, using the live consulate checklist.
• A year because the city page says 365: not a plan. 365 is the initial-visa field. The residence permit, if granted, is 2 years and can renew for 3.
• "I will just stay and sort it out": not a plan.

When the destination page and the consulate disagree, the consulate wins.

When to go: best months, rainy season, and peak tourist reality

The weather fields are short, and they are enough to avoid the expensive mistake.

The season guide makes the same split: Lisbon's friendliest months are the shoulders, and November flips into the rainy list. People still book July because a photo was sunny. Sunny is not the same as easy when Alfama, Belém, and the trams are full and the nightly rate has left the $120 median behind. June is still a best month on the row, and it can already feel busy. July and August are the months the dataset does not call best.

What the rainy season actually does to a work month

November through February is wet and windy, not a tropical monsoon and not a reason to cancel a fibered apartment. Outdoor lunches shrink. Some hillside streets get gloomy. The city is more local, which is often when the $1,800 band is easier to recognize. If you came only for terraces, you will be disappointed. If you came to work, this window is honest.

Do not "extend a perfect October" into a non-refundable winter let without reading rainyMonths. And do not mix the rainy season up with August to talk yourself into a crowd month.

Summer crowds

"Tourist crowds in summer" is a listed con. July and August are the peak: cruise-ship days, tram 28 queues, restaurant menus in four languages, and housing that behaves like a resort. Book the neighborhood on purpose. Alfama in August is the mistake.

Booking placeholders

Same three slots, still with no partner IDs. Buy them only after the month is one the table above allows.

Daily life: food, transit, safety, and community

Food

"Incredible food scene" is a listed pro, and it is real: grilled fish, petiscos, coffee, and neighborhood rooms that are better than the square they sit near. It is also how the $2,200 month leaks. The market version (Arroios market, Campo de Ourique market, a Pingo Doce or Continente run) is how you eat inside the band. Chiado and the Time Out Market are how you eat like the month is a holiday. Do the market version on workdays.

Belém's pastry pilgrimage is a trip, not lunch. Do it once, early, then go back to the bakery on your own street.

Transit

"Excellent transit" is a listed pro, and it is the main logistical advantage over a scooter city. Metro, buses, trams, ferries, and the suburban rail to Cascais and Sintra cover a normal week. The monthly transit pass (Navegante, loaded on a Viva Viagem card) is the product for a stay. Occasional tickets are the product for a weekend.

Use the metro for Arroios, Anjos, Baixa, Chiado, and Alvalade. Use Cais do Sodré for Santos-edge trains and ferries. Do not plan the commute on tram 28. Hills are the tax: Principe Real, Alfama, Estrela, and Graça will make you earn the viewpoint. Baixa and the riverfront are the flat parts.

Bolt and Uber exist for the late night and the suitcase. They are not the way you cross town twice a day if you wanted the $1,800 band.

Safety

Safety 8.8 is high for this comparison set (Porto 9.0, Budapest 8.3, Barcelona 7.5, Cape Town 5.5). Female safety is 8. The practical risks in the center are pickpockets on crowded trams, at Rossio, and on busy miradouros, plus ordinary nightlife common sense where the bars are. This is not a city that requires a car for a two-block walk after dinner. It is still a city. Watch the bag on tram 28. Do not leave a laptop on a cafe chair.

Earthquake risk is a listed con. It is a geologic fact about the region, not a weekly operational problem the way rent and crowds are. Newer buildings in Parque das Nações and older masonry in Alfama are different buildings. That is a housing question to ask, not a reason to invent a personal seismic plan in this guide.

Private clinics and hospitals in town cover the usual nomad problems. You are a cash or insured patient until someone says otherwise. Sort the insurance placeholder before you need the desk.

Community, and the bureaucracy friction

Community 9 shows up as recurring coworking, language exchanges, sports, and the same cafe three days in a row. You can meet people in the first week if you go back to the same room. You can also spend a month in Principe Real and only meet other people who are leaving on Friday. Arroios, Santos, and Campo de Ourique put more of the actual city in the week.

The friction is admin. A longer stay wants a NIF (tax number), a lease the landlord will actually register, and patience with appointments. English at 8 covers the coworking front desk. It does not cover every counter. A little Portuguese, or a patient friend, matters more for a lease than for a menu. This is the same bureaucracy con as the visa section, just on a Tuesday: utilities, contracts, and offices that close when you thought they would not.

Lisbon vs Cape Town, Porto, and Budapest (and when to look at cheaper Europe)

Choose with the rows, not with tiles. Figures below are the live dataset fields, not a new ranking.

Stay with Lisbon when you want community 9, call-grade internet, and a coastal capital, and you can fund $2,200 (or live inside $1,800 on purpose). The beach is a train. The paperwork is real. The scene is why people accept both.

Look at Porto when you want the same country, the same 200 Mbps and reliability 9, the same D8 field, and a lower solo month ($1,800, longer stay $1,400). Safety on the Porto row is 9.0. You give up scale: community 6, coworking Med, nightlife 6. Rainy months are also Nov-Feb. Porto is the cheaper Portugal answer, not a smaller Lisbon with the same social density.

Look at Budapest when you want cheaper Europe with the same headline internet (200 Mbps, reliability 9, power 9) and you can take a colder city (tempAvgC 11, rainy Nov-Dec). The solo month is $1,500, the longer stay $1,100. Nightlife is 9. Community is 7. lgbtFriendly is 5, against Lisbon's 9. The visa field is also a digital nomad visa of up to 365 days, which means you still verify Hungary's current rule rather than copying Portugal's. Budapest is the dataset's answer when the Lisbon bill is the problem and you still want a European workhub. The Budapest living guide is that comparison in full, including the White Card.

Look at Barcelona when you want another coastal workhub and you will pay more, not less. Barcelona is $2,500 solo, $2,000 longer stay, $130 a night, with 300 Mbps. Safety is 7.5. Best months overlap Lisbon's shoulders (May, Jun, Sep, Oct). It is the upgrade, or the sideways move, not the discount. Neighborhoods, the rent strategy, and Spain's telework path are in Living in Barcelona.

Look at Cape Town when you want mountains and ocean at $1,400 solo and you will take safety 5.5 and power stability 4 seriously. That is a different product. Read Living in Cape Town before you treat "coastal city" as one category. The visa field there is an exemption, 90 days, not a 365-day nomad visa.

If the Europe price is the whole objection, Porto and Budapest are the cheaper rows in this comparison. If the objection is "I needed the beach outside my door and half the bill," Lisbon's beach tag will not become Bali. Living in Bali is the social island at about $1,200 solo, with internet reliability 5. Living in Chiang Mai is the starter city at about $850, with no beach and a burning-season con. Different problems. Different guides.

First-week setup checklist and how to compare Lisbon on Nomad Spin

Common mistakes

• Treating the 365-day field as a stamp you already have
• Paying the $120 nightly median for thirty nights and calling the month $2,200
• Booking Alfama or a Baixa view apartment for the month, then discovering the hills, the noise, and the tourists
• Choosing Principe Real, then acting surprised that the long-stay $1,800 figure did not survive contact with brunch
• Using cafe Wi-Fi, or Time Out Market, for the client call you cannot drop
• Arriving in July or August because a weather app said sunny, and ignoring the tourist-crowds con
• Assuming the D8 income floor is a euro number you saw in a 2024 screenshot
• Comparing Lisbon only with Bali's photos, and never opening Porto or Budapest

First week

Days 1-2

• SIM in the phone, hotspot tested
• One coworking trial (Second Home or a Heden room you have confirmed), including a real call
• Walk the neighborhood at night, and walk it once with groceries, so you know the hill

Days 3-4

• See more than one monthly place. Run the speed test in the room
• If you are on a Schengen stamp, write down the 90/180 math and the date you must leave
• If you are on a D8 residence visa, write down the AIMA date. Do not discover it in week three

Days 5-7

• Commit to one neighborhood for two to four weeks, not to "Lisbon" in the abstract
• Fix the work loop: home deep work, coworking on call days, one cafe that passed the call test
• Only then book the longer stay, the onward flight, and insurance

Booking placeholders

Still no partner IDs. These slots are last, after the week above, not before the flight is emotional.

How to compare Lisbon on Nomad Spin

Nomad Spin scores 780+ cities. Lisbon should win only when your floors are honest.

1. Open the home page and spin the globe with a budget ceiling that can clear $2,200, or a plan to live inside $1,800. If your ceiling is $1,400, Lisbon is already out, and the spin should be allowed to say so.
2. Set an internet floor the 200 Mbps and reliability 9 can clear, and a safety floor 8.8 can clear. Then look at who else survives. Often that is Porto or Budapest, not a cheaper version of Principe Real.
3. Open Lisbon and read bestMonths, rainyMonths, and the tourist-crowds con against your dates. The season guide is the calendar version of that check.
4. If Barcelona is still in the pile, open Barcelona and Living in Barcelona and compare $2,500 and safety 7.5 against Lisbon's $2,200 and 8.8, not the beaches. If Cape Town or Bali is still in the pile, open Cape Town, Bali, and their living guides, and compare power and reliability, not the word "coast."
5. If you want the ranked context, read Best Places for Digital Nomads in 2026 after the filters, not instead of them. If you want the decision order, use How to Choose Your Next Nomad Base.

Spin the globe with those floors. Lisbon should win when you want a European workhub, the calls matter, and the month is a shoulder season you can afford. It should lose when you are under the budget, you will not do the paperwork, or you wanted a beach apartment and a starter-city bill.

Last updated: October 2026. Visa rules, prices, and which coworking spaces are open change quickly. The $2,200, $1,800, $120, 200 Mbps, 9/10, and 8.8 figures are Nomad Spin's Lisbon row. The D8 and Schengen notes are orientation. When they disagree with the consulate or with AIMA, the official source wins.