Guide
What your insurance certificate must say for a Greek visa
By Covered Abroad Research Desk · Last verified July 2026
The rule in writing
“Greece’s national (type D) visas require travel medical insurance with minimum cover of €30,000, valid for the whole Schengen area and the full duration of stay, covering emergency care, hospitalisation, and repatriation.”
Official source: Greek Ministry of Foreign Affairs (mfa.gr) national-visa documentation — Last verified:
Quick check · the €30,000 figure
Several consulate checklists on this page anchor to a €30,000 minimum. Check your current policy's medical cover limit against that figure:
The figure is only one line of the rule: scope, duration, and the exact certificate wording matter too. Run the full policy check, or request a quote and a person reviews the wording for your file.
The five lines the visa officer reads
Greece's national (type D) visa is checked against a specific wording standard published by the Greek Ministry of Foreign Affairs (mfa.gr). The visa officer is reading for five things on your certificate, not a general "travel insurance" label.
First, the sum insured must be stated in the document itself, at a minimum of €30,000. Second, the certificate must say it is valid across the whole Schengen area, not Greece alone. Third, the dates on the certificate must cover your full intended stay, start to finish. Fourth, emergency care, hospitalisation, and repatriation each need to be named as covered benefits, not implied. Fifth, the name and dates on the certificate must match your passport exactly.
Missing any one of these five lines is the most common reason a certificate gets sent back. See what this level of cover costs at Greece cover costs.
What happens at the permit stage
The wording above covers the visa application itself. Applicants report that the residence permit stage further down the line can be a different conversation. Some report their local office expecting fuller cover, specifically valid in Greece, once they are applying to convert the visa into a permit.
We can't state a fixed rule here because there isn't one to state. This is office-discretionary, a case question rather than a checkbox, and what one office asks for can differ from another. If you already know which office you'll be dealing with, that's worth mentioning to us before you buy, so we can look at your case specifically rather than the general visa-stage wording alone. Our FIP visa insurance page has more on this fuller cover if it's relevant to your situation.
Getting your certificate checked
Because the visa-stage wording is precise and the permit-stage question is case-by-case, we don't leave certificate wording to guesswork. A person confirms the certificate for your office before you buy, checking it against the five lines above and against anything you've told us about your permit plans.
Three ways to move: run your situation through our printable checklist first if you want to see the requirements laid out, ask for a policy check if you already hold a certificate and want it read against these lines, or go straight to a quote if you're ready to arrange cover that clears €30,000 with room to spare.
Get the moving-paperwork checklist
The month-by-month timeline so the insurance certificate is ready before your appointment, not after.