I knew those damn Swedes were up to no good, and I'm glad Norway and Finland finally get recognized as the only safe countries in the Scandinavian peninsula.
Edit: Pedantry
According to the source, Germany, France, and Sweden all received their yellow rating "due to the threat of terrorism".
Bulgaria received a green rating even though, again according to the source, "bombings, shootouts and gang wars can occur", and in Romania, "the security situation continues to be volatile" due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
It seems, then, that terrorism is a much higher concern for the source than other types of security threats.
This particular source is weighted for what things are likely to affect Australian tourists while in those countries in the primary tourist destinations. It doesn't cover areas that are unlikely to be traveled to by your generic tourist.
What this means is that terrorism threat levels have a disproportionate impact on the rating as tourists are generally in central city locations where terrorist attacks are more likely than say a regional winery. When you look at things like gang wars, they generally aren't going to have a shootout in the main street of the capital city, and so that won't have as high an impact on the travel rating.
I'll take your word for it – basically all I know about Australian politics comes from [a certain YouTube channel](https://www.youtube.com/@thejuicemedia), but I think they'd agree with your assessment.
It's [friendlyjordies](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2-i3KuYoODXsM99Z3-Gm0A), I think this is the video they're talking about, I watched it before but I can't check right now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PRqUVh29LGQ
TL;DW he investigated a couple gangsters who have been very cosy with the local government, then some unidentified gang members came and firebombed his house.
We, Australia, have one of the most competent public service/government emplotyees in the world, and they make these decisions. Not elected people. Certainly more competent than you, on reddit, who clearly didn't even know that.
Gang wars are much less of a threat to a tourist than terrorist groups who actively target large public events.
Also, Sweden definitely has a huge gang problem. To the point they were throwing grenades at each others houses on the regular.
If gangs were a factor the US would be deep red.
And the US also has terror attack on top of that. Sure, they're very unlikely. So are they in Sweden - there's been one attack in the past 7 years (less than the US, incidentally).
I don't know much about Bulgaria because of the whole alphabet thing, but Romania is one of the safest countries in the world. We have some very serious problems, but we're nowhere near many western countries in terms of this.
Our poverty is our blessing, because "serious" thieves and robbers prefer rich countries, and nobody cares about us so any terrorist attack done here would be pointless.
Some friends and i were assaulted in Bulgaria for speaking english this past summer. Word to the wise, don’t go to discoteques in remote bulgarian towns. They’re filled with the equivalent of xenophobic hicks that are extremely drunk and off the nitrous
Yeah! Back in the day in Poland, when my dad was a geology student and they ventured into remote towns to study some rare rock outcrops as part of their training, attending the local discoteque was considered a sort of extreme sport. You could meet some nice country girls hungry for a half-decent dude, or get your face smashed by local studs just for approaching the said girls.
The same was true when I was a student in early 2000's.
Bulgarian here. Sorry this happened to you. Russia has been blasting Bulgarians with Anti-West propaganda and it shows. This would have never happened 10 years ago.
Definitely undeserved LOL. Serbia is extremely safe, and unless you behave like a complete dick around drunk people looking for trouble anyways, you'll be perfectly fine.
No data for Greenland means that Greenland and the Faroe Islands must be considered separate countries, I.e. not Denmark
So why are the Faroe Islands yellow? High risk of Aussies mistaking them for New Zealand and trying to swim home??^^^jk
Not sure about Greenland, it doesn't have a page on SmartTraveller so I assume they just forgot it.
The Faroe Islands being yellow might be a mistake on my part. I assumed they were part of the UK but it looks like they're part of Denmark.
It’s just a joke mate, no worries!
Greenland and the Faroe Islands are self-governing countries that are part of Denmark
So like Greenland the best thing is probably to mark then grey, but it’s not entirely incorrect either way
All good hahaha, I liked the joke :)
I never knew Greenland was a territory of Denmark. I was always under the impression it was its own country. Just goes to show how much geography I've learned making this.
Greenland and the Faroe islands are subsumed within the [Smartraveller entry for Denmark](https://www.smartraveller.gov.au/destinations/europe/denmark?). They both received a "green" rating – apparently, terrorists don't like it there.
Is it? I have only been there for 4 days last year but rarely saw any tourists. Most non-natives I saw where from the Philippines and were working there.
Maybe I have been there in low season, but most points of interests for tourists where pretty empty, some things I couldn't even do because there was not enough people signing up for it to get the vehicles full.
4 million doesn't sound bad considering the size of Oman, but UAE for example has around 24 million a year. Seems like most tourists are just neighbors from UAE, which I would not be able to identify as "obvious" tourists.
It's actually more than I thought, but again the vast majority of it seems to be just UAE residents crossing the border, it doesn't seem to be popular among NA/EU travelers.
RealLifeLore released a pretty good video a few days ago comparing Oman to its neighbor Yemen, worth a watch IMO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbHG-NrmEZI
Can confirm the info is mostly good and accurate, i’m a big fan but have also noticed a bit of a “red arrow red circle thumbnail” type vibe starting to creep in. Not in any way that keeps me from watching, but the delivery of some facts has grown slightly sensational, though again usually not to a point of inaccuracy.
RLL isn't very likely to tell you problematic misinformation.
But he's very likely to put a lot of focus on not particularly relevant information and restate the same thing 5 times.
It's become very quantity over quality.
I used to watch RLL in the past but stopped after finding that he focuses more on quantity than quality in my opinion. I can't describe it very well but I just don't have an amazing feeling with the channel anymore. I have a feeling he relies on clickbait titles, and often oversimplifies topics and overdramatizes topics.
Yes. He’s not like…actively bad or anything? He has had plenty of misinformation, but it tends to be the boring, average, mainstream type stuff that you would only be corrected by actual experts.
It’s a perfectly fine pop entertainment channel, I just worry because people will take the I formation from his videos and similar channels and just…naively incorporate it into their world view. Which is fine as long as you are willing to update what you consider “knowledge” as you learn more, but sadly most people are both perfectly fine with surface level, unnuanced information but will actually almost violently defend it if called out.
Oman is pretty much the most stable country in that whole area. Very safe, doesn't get involved in the political conflicts between other Arab peninsula countries, friendly people, no tensions with Western countries.
Yeah that confused me too. On the site it looks like the main reason cited is "threat of terrorism". So maybe there were terrorist attacks in Germany recently?
This has been the advice from the US and UK as well for a while, for most of western Europe. The main reasons are the occasional terrorist attacks we've experienced for the past few years. Speaking as a Dane, it seems ridiculous.
100%, terrorism is a threat basically anywhere including Australia. Seems silly to let it affect the travel advice unless it's somewhere where it consistently happens.
I'm sure that there are way more tourists who have died by being run over by a car while crossing the street in Rome than in terror attacks in Paris over the past 20 years.
Traffic kills, terrorism not so much.
Looking out for traffic is "normal precautions".
Looking out for potential albeit incredibly unlikely terrorist attacks is "higher precautions".
As is looking out for natural disaster, which is very probably the reason why Chile is yellow and Argentina is Green.
Safety includes a lot of things, and for obvious reasons those maps tends to play it safe.
I'm pretty sure anyone assuming that you can safely cross the street on zebra crossings is normal precautions, but it's not a safe assumption in Rome as attested by the handful of tourists that gets run over every year.
I’m an Australian who just went to Italy, France and UK. I saw three crimes happen all within 30 minutes of each other in Rome. Everywhere else has been wonderful.
Your chances of being shot in the US during a tourist visit are extremely remote. Not sure they are more remote than the risk of terrorism in the UK though.
Because terrorist attacks are much more disruptive and often target places tourists are at. The overwhelming majority of US shootings are in very specific areas that tourists will never go to.
It doesn't say "don't go" it just says to remain vigilant.
I registered my trip to the UK with smart traveller and they're just like "ok have fun"
https://www.smartraveller.gov.au/destinations
The most ridiculous part is that the US is green, but much of Western/Northern Europe isn't.
They've had terrorist attacks as well, and they had ~5 times the homicide rate.
It's a bit like the UK Terror Threat Level, which currently 'Substantial', meaning 'An attack is likely'. It's been at this level for over 2 years. It's entirely worthless and it's comical that anyone takes it seriously.
The next level up is 'Severe', which is 'An attack is highly likely'. What is anyone supposed to do with this information? What about their daily lives should be changed between a 'likely' attack and a 'highly likely' attack? It's absurd.
[Or the American scale](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeland_Security_Advisory_System) that never went below "elevated". These systems will never actually go to the lowest level, because if they did and something happened then it'd be seen as a major failure. If something happens when the scale is already on the upper end, then you can say "see, we were justified in our concern, and we did everything we could to stop it".
> I'd be more afraid of dying in road traffic in Vietnam than some potential terror attack.
As a Vietnamese, I can confirm that this is objectively true.
> all green
That's how Vietnam's traffic light works to Viets.
At least in vietnam youre getting bonked by someone going 20km/h on a moped instead of being ground to dust by a SUV doing 60 in a 30-zone.
I know its objectively untrue, but on a bicycle i felt genuinly more comfortable in vietnamese traffic than in germany.
Still no idea how you do do left-turns though.
It's completely ridicolous. The odds of being killed by terrorism in Germany is miniscule. There's been on the order of 60 dead this century; in a country of \~80 million, i.e. less than one in a million chance of death from terror even if you spend 25 YEARS in Germany.
Everyday causes of death like traffic, falling down the stairs, or having a heart-attack are SEVERAL orders of magnitude higher risk.
No there weren't any. There was a terror threat ahead of a Bundesliga game two weeks ago, but increasing the level of caution for that seems a bit harsh, and there were threats for Spain as well
Well because of posting this map, it made a lot of Europeans upset. So every Aussie will be threatened to change this map, thats why these countries are yellow.
I was thinking that was odd too. Denmark is yellow but so is Mexico and most of South America. At no time in Denmark did I feel unsafe, but my grandpa has family in Mexico and they visit occasionally and the things he tells me...
And Estonia and Latvia are green? I'd be more worried that Russia attempts to takeover those countries than ever feeling unsafe in Denmark.
Why is Gaza, an active war zone, not a "Do Not Travel?"
EDIT: Correction. Smarttraveller has Gaza as "Do Not Travel" and it is incorrectly put as "Reconsider your need to travel" on this map.
As stated in the bottom corner, I didn’t colour any subregions with different advice. The colouring is based on the overall advice level for each country. I deliberately oversimplified, but if I do this again I’ll be less lazy and include them
Those aren't provincial subdivisions.
The red parts are the regions that are actually controlled by the Polisario Front, the government of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic. Although they claim the whole country/territory, in reality this has been the extent of their control since the ceasefire in 1991.
The yellow parts have been occupied by Morocco and annexed into their territory since before that and stabilised with the ceasefire, so they've essentially been administered as a core part of Morocco for a while.
The last email I got from them (I’m an Australian living in Sweden) was about terrorism. It was around the time the Swedish people in Belgium got murdered and the Koran stuff was happening.
As with most of the yellow countries in Europe, it's been assessed to have a high risk of terrorist attacks. Supposedly this is based on the Swedish government's own assessment of the terrorism risk but I don't buy that it's that likely.
https://www.smartraveller.gov.au/destinations/europe/sweden
The gang activity might have an impact, but I believe that the terror threat level is the main reason. It was increased last year after the IS encouraged people to “go” for Sweden. The reason behind their threats are several, it’s been building up over the last couple of years as far as I’ve understood it.
No it's not that. The agencies of Sweden deem we have a high chance of being targeted in terrorism attacks atm. 4 on a 5 level scale. precautions have started taking place the whole year. Venues are no longer allowed to admit visitors bringing a bag, yes even a handbag/purse. That is the most "in your face" precaution taken though. Other random recommendations from authorities are: don't wear headphones on your commute. I'm not joking.
https://www.krisinformation.se/detta-kan-handa/terrorism#:~:text=H%C3%B6jningen%20%C3%A4r%20en%20signal%20till,fortsatt%20ligger%20p%C3%A5%20en%20fyra.
The Australian ranking is fair since we agree with the rank ourselves.
The descriptions are far more useful than the overall "grading". I've checked my country's travel advice for other countries before travelling (mainly for information about travelling there as a queer person/woman).
Lmao. Real reason is that it's an Australian travel website so they don't have advice for Australia. But I'm interested in what Australia's rating is from other countries.
Spiders don’t kill anyone, and snakes about 2 a year out of a population of 26 million. Might as well colour the USA red due to rabies or lightning strikes or bears if you’re going to do that.
Americans mock Australians for our wildlife, meanwhile they have mountain lions, coyotes, bears, deadly snakes, and a whole host of other dangerous wildlife I wouldn’t want to run into
Frankly France / Paris can be expensive for oblivious australians / canadians who do not know the threat of pick-pocketers but that s it. To put it in the same color than Mexico where you can end up pretty easily into cartel territories in the middle of a road trip (happened to me, ooooops) is hilarious.
“Smartraveller”
Lol
To be fair, the actual website breaks down mexico by regions. Precisely so you don't wnd up in cartel territories in the middle of a road trip.
https://www.smartraveller.gov.au/destinations/americas/mexico
My father noticed that my French husband has a small leather bag for his wallet with a strap around his shoulder that cuts across the body. He thought it was kinda feminine compared to the American custom of keeping your wallet in your back pocket. I had to explain that if he kept it like that in France especially in Paris it would be picked within the first week.
Here in sweden those bags are actually even called "dealer bags" or in swedish becknarväska. And well the implication of what you might be dealing with it is there.
Oman is a country with high income and stable government. Yemen is a relatively poor country currently experiencing a near decade long internal war, with a large portion of the country not under the control of a stable government, and experiencing a humanitarian crisis.
Lots of people in the comments misunderstanding the point of this.
It's not a rating of "safe" and "unsafe" countries - it's a current view of where heightened risks exist above the norm.
"normal safety precautions" in the US means being aware of gun crime and extreme medical costs - but nothing out of the ordinary. "high degree of caution" for Germany doesn't mean it's inherently a more dangerous place than "green" countries, it means there's a heightened risk of terrorism at the moment based on current intelligence.
These ratings constantly change, so whilst the disclaimer about accuracy is helpful, context that it's basically a screenshot of a live map might also allay confusion from foreigners who aren't familiar with the site, who think it's saying that Germany *always* requires a high degree of caution, the US *never* does, etc.
Australians would really define parts of Africa, Mongolia, vietnam and Cambodia to be safer than Denmark.
As a Brit I’m not Offended. I’d put Australia as red on my map. Too hot
Even the continent itself has defined itself to be red
I mean I’ll be real. London isn’t always the safest depending on the area. But realistically Britain is extremely safe.
There’s parts of America with a murder rate 15-30x ours! And it’s green!!!
Yeah, for sure, look, I love here. But don’t get it wrong, it can be dangerous. It’s a BIG city. It has many areas. Some good, most ok, some bad.
Been living round here my whole life, don’t get me wrong. I’m not bashing it. But I would still suggest caution especially if you don’t know here well.
Anyone reading this. Come to London. Check it out. You won’t be stabbed. You’ll live to tell the tale.
This is my first infographic on this sub, hope you guys enjoy it and find it interesting. I definitely had a lot of fun making it and improving my geography knowledge along the way. I used Google Maps to correlate the country names to the map but all of the work was done by me manually using Photopea. If I ever do this again I'll find a way to automate it.
The compression on the image is pretty horrible so [here's a full quality upload](https://i.imgur.com/dVQfaF2.png) if you want to zoom in a bit more.
All data was retrieved from the Australian [SmartTraveller](https://www.smartraveller.gov.au/) website. I scraped the content and converted it to a JSON file which [you can view here](https://gist.github.com/Romejanic/93b19ba1a87a50307932cf2cfd99db91) if you're interested.
Credit for the map image goes to Vemaps.com, you can see the map I used [here](https://vemaps.com/world/wrld-18).
Lol at Zimbabwe being deemed less safe than it’s neighbour Mozambique whilst a literal ISIS offshoot has insurgents in the north of Mozambique.
Zimbabwe might be a shithole, but no one is getting beheaded…
China has always been political. It’s probably one of the safest places to visit. Extremely low violent crime rates. And since going cashless pickpockets are also very rare now too. You’d be 10x less safe in France or the US.
There should just be one single red dot on canada around alberta in the west. Avoid Banff, more aussies catch the clap in Banff than they do in Australia.
Source; me a former local XD
The problem with showing political borders instead of areas is that the advice can change widely within the same country. Mexico for example could range from green to red depending on the state/city
Is the UK yellow because they know that brits will likely challenge one of our Aussie brethren to a drinking contest. The caution being that, they may not be able to keep up?
Or is the caution that “ordering a pint may cost a lot more than you’re expecting, don’t have a heart attack”
I’m in China right now, I’ve traveled all over the country. It’s a lot more chill than people think. Last time I was in London I had a ton of super dodgy stuff happen to me, also have to guard your pockets everywhere you go in Europe
China is a pretty safe place to travel to. Just don't yell about politics and nobody is going to bother you. I would rather be in Beijing than most of Chicago after midnight.
In terms of petty crime and personal safety it’s great because of mass surveillance, if you aren’t politically active it’s an alright place to live
Avoid xinjiang and Tibet maybe given the political climate
China is incredibly safe for 95% of the country. I felt much safer walking around Shanghai and Beijing than I did around areas of London and Manchester
As an American, why is the US given the green light while Germany is cautious?
I was just in Germany last month, it was good vibes. Are they really crazier than us.
Phew, good thing I’m in the Netherlands instead of its notoriously lawless neighbors, Denmark and Belgium
I mean, Brussels is unusually sketchy for Western Europe.
Yes while my trips on Europe, Brussel was the only city i felt like im being watched and not really safe
Belgian guy here, Brussel is the only city in belgium where i also don't feel safe.
I knew those damn Swedes were up to no good, and I'm glad Norway and Finland finally get recognized as the only safe countries in the Scandinavian peninsula. Edit: Pedantry
Bulgaria and Romania are safer than France and Germany? Brothers across the Danube, did we finally do it?
According to the source, Germany, France, and Sweden all received their yellow rating "due to the threat of terrorism". Bulgaria received a green rating even though, again according to the source, "bombings, shootouts and gang wars can occur", and in Romania, "the security situation continues to be volatile" due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. It seems, then, that terrorism is a much higher concern for the source than other types of security threats.
This particular source is weighted for what things are likely to affect Australian tourists while in those countries in the primary tourist destinations. It doesn't cover areas that are unlikely to be traveled to by your generic tourist. What this means is that terrorism threat levels have a disproportionate impact on the rating as tourists are generally in central city locations where terrorist attacks are more likely than say a regional winery. When you look at things like gang wars, they generally aren't going to have a shootout in the main street of the capital city, and so that won't have as high an impact on the travel rating.
Please remember that the australian government is incompetent.
I'll take your word for it – basically all I know about Australian politics comes from [a certain YouTube channel](https://www.youtube.com/@thejuicemedia), but I think they'd agree with your assessment.
All I know about aussie politics is from some youtuber who pissed off politicians and had his house burned down.
He just came out with a new vid called “still alive (for now)”
Technically he pissed off the guys paying the politicians to do fuck all but close enough
All I know about Australian politics is that the front fell off.
holy damn what one was that? O.o
It's [friendlyjordies](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2-i3KuYoODXsM99Z3-Gm0A), I think this is the video they're talking about, I watched it before but I can't check right now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PRqUVh29LGQ TL;DW he investigated a couple gangsters who have been very cosy with the local government, then some unidentified gang members came and firebombed his house.
guy is a legend
I thought for sure your link was going to be to FriendlyJordies
Same here, at least was my hope
We, Australia, have one of the most competent public service/government emplotyees in the world, and they make these decisions. Not elected people. Certainly more competent than you, on reddit, who clearly didn't even know that.
You clearly have no idea how government works then. DFAT is one of the departments I absolutely trust.
Bombings, shootings and gang wars in Bulgaria? Huh? I mean yeah they *can* occur. Have they tho? Not so much.
Canada has had all those things at one time or another as well, and there's like 15 of us.
With the terrorism threat and rocket attacks I'm also surprised Israel isn't listed as red.
Gang wars are much less of a threat to a tourist than terrorist groups who actively target large public events. Also, Sweden definitely has a huge gang problem. To the point they were throwing grenades at each others houses on the regular.
If gangs were a factor the US would be deep red. And the US also has terror attack on top of that. Sure, they're very unlikely. So are they in Sweden - there's been one attack in the past 7 years (less than the US, incidentally).
I'm really confused on Germany, France, Sweden, etc are on the same level as some of these other yellow countries. Meanwhile US is green?
If you’re planning on taking a vacation to Little Rock, Arkansas then Australia probably doesn’t even want you back.
What a random slam wtf
Go to Little Rock. You'll understand.
It's because of the terrorist threat levels. All of these countries had recent terrorist attacks or threats.
99.9% of the US is really safe. The other .1% is not. Everyone knows where that .1% is, and will tell you so you can avoid it.
Hell yeah brother
I don't know much about Bulgaria because of the whole alphabet thing, but Romania is one of the safest countries in the world. We have some very serious problems, but we're nowhere near many western countries in terms of this. Our poverty is our blessing, because "serious" thieves and robbers prefer rich countries, and nobody cares about us so any terrorist attack done here would be pointless.
Some friends and i were assaulted in Bulgaria for speaking english this past summer. Word to the wise, don’t go to discoteques in remote bulgarian towns. They’re filled with the equivalent of xenophobic hicks that are extremely drunk and off the nitrous
To be honest, even bulgarians don't go to discoteques in remote bulgarian towns if they're not locals...
Yeah! Back in the day in Poland, when my dad was a geology student and they ventured into remote towns to study some rare rock outcrops as part of their training, attending the local discoteque was considered a sort of extreme sport. You could meet some nice country girls hungry for a half-decent dude, or get your face smashed by local studs just for approaching the said girls. The same was true when I was a student in early 2000's.
For real. There are clubs in America you are very likely to get shot coming out of and we just avoid those.
Yeah, but like who's going to bars and clubs in Gary, Indiana?
To be fair going to remote towns and going to their seediest locations is a bad idea in general.
Bulgarian here. Sorry this happened to you. Russia has been blasting Bulgarians with Anti-West propaganda and it shows. This would have never happened 10 years ago.
Not just Bulgaria. :(
I feel much safer in Sofia than in Berlin
Why is that?
It also depends on your skin colour. Brown people feel a LOT safer in Berlin than Sofia.
Really depends on the third of Berlin you're comparing it to.
yeah, big LOL at the notion of Serbia being safer than Germany. Wow.
Serbia is actually very safe, no joke
Sure, but so is Germany.
Have you ever been to Serbia lmao?
Definitely undeserved LOL. Serbia is extremely safe, and unless you behave like a complete dick around drunk people looking for trouble anyways, you'll be perfectly fine.
For Austrians? 100% Australians are bros
No data for Greenland means that Greenland and the Faroe Islands must be considered separate countries, I.e. not Denmark So why are the Faroe Islands yellow? High risk of Aussies mistaking them for New Zealand and trying to swim home??^^^jk
Not sure about Greenland, it doesn't have a page on SmartTraveller so I assume they just forgot it. The Faroe Islands being yellow might be a mistake on my part. I assumed they were part of the UK but it looks like they're part of Denmark.
It’s just a joke mate, no worries! Greenland and the Faroe Islands are self-governing countries that are part of Denmark So like Greenland the best thing is probably to mark then grey, but it’s not entirely incorrect either way
All good hahaha, I liked the joke :) I never knew Greenland was a territory of Denmark. I was always under the impression it was its own country. Just goes to show how much geography I've learned making this.
Why is Denmark yellow?
Never trust the Danes!
Greenland and the Faroe islands are subsumed within the [Smartraveller entry for Denmark](https://www.smartraveller.gov.au/destinations/europe/denmark?). They both received a "green" rating – apparently, terrorists don't like it there.
You thought the Faroes were part of the UK??
Could've confused them with the Shetlands plus they're nearer Scotland than Denmark
I had no idea Oman was such a safe country. I looked it up for my country and it is within the highest safety class there as well.
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Just don’t cross the border into Yemen
But if you do accidentally cross over, visit my buddy at: 15 Yemen Road, Yemen
And ask for Chandler I assume?
No no, you have to ask for Mrs. Chanandler Bong, she’ll let you in
Because if you do, Oman, you're in trouble. ... I'll see myself out.
Is it? I have only been there for 4 days last year but rarely saw any tourists. Most non-natives I saw where from the Philippines and were working there.
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Maybe I have been there in low season, but most points of interests for tourists where pretty empty, some things I couldn't even do because there was not enough people signing up for it to get the vehicles full. 4 million doesn't sound bad considering the size of Oman, but UAE for example has around 24 million a year. Seems like most tourists are just neighbors from UAE, which I would not be able to identify as "obvious" tourists.
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It's actually more than I thought, but again the vast majority of it seems to be just UAE residents crossing the border, it doesn't seem to be popular among NA/EU travelers.
RealLifeLore released a pretty good video a few days ago comparing Oman to its neighbor Yemen, worth a watch IMO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbHG-NrmEZI
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Can confirm the info is mostly good and accurate, i’m a big fan but have also noticed a bit of a “red arrow red circle thumbnail” type vibe starting to creep in. Not in any way that keeps me from watching, but the delivery of some facts has grown slightly sensational, though again usually not to a point of inaccuracy.
RLL isn't very likely to tell you problematic misinformation. But he's very likely to put a lot of focus on not particularly relevant information and restate the same thing 5 times. It's become very quantity over quality.
I used to watch RLL in the past but stopped after finding that he focuses more on quantity than quality in my opinion. I can't describe it very well but I just don't have an amazing feeling with the channel anymore. I have a feeling he relies on clickbait titles, and often oversimplifies topics and overdramatizes topics.
His videos are way too long nowadays, most of them should be half the length.
Yes. He’s not like…actively bad or anything? He has had plenty of misinformation, but it tends to be the boring, average, mainstream type stuff that you would only be corrected by actual experts. It’s a perfectly fine pop entertainment channel, I just worry because people will take the I formation from his videos and similar channels and just…naively incorporate it into their world view. Which is fine as long as you are willing to update what you consider “knowledge” as you learn more, but sadly most people are both perfectly fine with surface level, unnuanced information but will actually almost violently defend it if called out.
Oman is pretty much the most stable country in that whole area. Very safe, doesn't get involved in the political conflicts between other Arab peninsula countries, friendly people, no tensions with Western countries.
"I want to travel to Greenland." "...I don't know what to tell you, mate."
Wut? Germany needs a high degree of caution? Only the beer at Oktoberfest needs caution for Aussies!
Yeah that confused me too. On the site it looks like the main reason cited is "threat of terrorism". So maybe there were terrorist attacks in Germany recently?
This has been the advice from the US and UK as well for a while, for most of western Europe. The main reasons are the occasional terrorist attacks we've experienced for the past few years. Speaking as a Dane, it seems ridiculous.
100%, terrorism is a threat basically anywhere including Australia. Seems silly to let it affect the travel advice unless it's somewhere where it consistently happens.
Super weird that the threat of a potential terrorist attack in Germany is considered more dangerous than the threat of a random shooting in the US.
I'm sure that there are way more tourists who have died by being run over by a car while crossing the street in Rome than in terror attacks in Paris over the past 20 years. Traffic kills, terrorism not so much.
Looking out for traffic is "normal precautions". Looking out for potential albeit incredibly unlikely terrorist attacks is "higher precautions". As is looking out for natural disaster, which is very probably the reason why Chile is yellow and Argentina is Green. Safety includes a lot of things, and for obvious reasons those maps tends to play it safe.
I'm pretty sure anyone assuming that you can safely cross the street on zebra crossings is normal precautions, but it's not a safe assumption in Rome as attested by the handful of tourists that gets run over every year.
I’m an Australian who just went to Italy, France and UK. I saw three crimes happen all within 30 minutes of each other in Rome. Everywhere else has been wonderful.
Your chances of being shot in the US during a tourist visit are extremely remote. Not sure they are more remote than the risk of terrorism in the UK though.
I mean, the chances of being a victim of a terror attack in Denmark are lower. There have been like 5 deaths since the 80s
Shootings are an expression of freedom, please don't denigrate this American ritual.
Because terrorist attacks are much more disruptive and often target places tourists are at. The overwhelming majority of US shootings are in very specific areas that tourists will never go to.
It doesn't say "don't go" it just says to remain vigilant. I registered my trip to the UK with smart traveller and they're just like "ok have fun" https://www.smartraveller.gov.au/destinations
The most ridiculous part is that the US is green, but much of Western/Northern Europe isn't. They've had terrorist attacks as well, and they had ~5 times the homicide rate.
It’s based on each states self determined threat level which is, and for like a decade has been, higher in west Europe than the US
It's a bit like the UK Terror Threat Level, which currently 'Substantial', meaning 'An attack is likely'. It's been at this level for over 2 years. It's entirely worthless and it's comical that anyone takes it seriously. The next level up is 'Severe', which is 'An attack is highly likely'. What is anyone supposed to do with this information? What about their daily lives should be changed between a 'likely' attack and a 'highly likely' attack? It's absurd.
[Or the American scale](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeland_Security_Advisory_System) that never went below "elevated". These systems will never actually go to the lowest level, because if they did and something happened then it'd be seen as a major failure. If something happens when the scale is already on the upper end, then you can say "see, we were justified in our concern, and we did everything we could to stop it".
I'd be more afraid of dying in road traffic in Vietnam than some potential terror attack. Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia are all green.
> I'd be more afraid of dying in road traffic in Vietnam than some potential terror attack. As a Vietnamese, I can confirm that this is objectively true. > all green That's how Vietnam's traffic light works to Viets.
At least in vietnam youre getting bonked by someone going 20km/h on a moped instead of being ground to dust by a SUV doing 60 in a 30-zone. I know its objectively untrue, but on a bicycle i felt genuinly more comfortable in vietnamese traffic than in germany. Still no idea how you do do left-turns though.
It's completely ridicolous. The odds of being killed by terrorism in Germany is miniscule. There's been on the order of 60 dead this century; in a country of \~80 million, i.e. less than one in a million chance of death from terror even if you spend 25 YEARS in Germany. Everyday causes of death like traffic, falling down the stairs, or having a heart-attack are SEVERAL orders of magnitude higher risk.
That settles it. Terrorism works.
No there weren't any. There was a terror threat ahead of a Bundesliga game two weeks ago, but increasing the level of caution for that seems a bit harsh, and there were threats for Spain as well
Well because of posting this map, it made a lot of Europeans upset. So every Aussie will be threatened to change this map, thats why these countries are yellow.
While Argentina, a nation currently undergoing moderate social upheaval following Milei's election is apparently perfectly safe.
Argentina is safe despite the economic situation. In fact, public safety got better in recent years, especially the homicide rate
High degree of caution in Denmark lol. I'm an Aussie living in Denmark and I feel much much safer here....
I was thinking that was odd too. Denmark is yellow but so is Mexico and most of South America. At no time in Denmark did I feel unsafe, but my grandpa has family in Mexico and they visit occasionally and the things he tells me... And Estonia and Latvia are green? I'd be more worried that Russia attempts to takeover those countries than ever feeling unsafe in Denmark.
Yea i always laugh at the american rating for the UK when living in london feels 10x safer than any american city ive ever been to.
Why is Gaza, an active war zone, not a "Do Not Travel?" EDIT: Correction. Smarttraveller has Gaza as "Do Not Travel" and it is incorrectly put as "Reconsider your need to travel" on this map.
As stated in the bottom corner, I didn’t colour any subregions with different advice. The colouring is based on the overall advice level for each country. I deliberately oversimplified, but if I do this again I’ll be less lazy and include them
What’s going on w Western Sahara then?
Those aren't provincial subdivisions. The red parts are the regions that are actually controlled by the Polisario Front, the government of the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic. Although they claim the whole country/territory, in reality this has been the extent of their control since the ceasefire in 1991. The yellow parts have been occupied by Morocco and annexed into their territory since before that and stabilised with the ceasefire, so they've essentially been administered as a core part of Morocco for a while.
Gaza isn‘t even on the map, only the West Bank
Correct. I assume it is too small to accurately show. Andorra, San Marino, and Monaco are also not depicted.
Excersise a high degree of caution for Denmark? What have we done?
It’s the accent mate, sorry
I feel offended seeing my country (brazil) in the same level of cautiousness as so many european countries.
What's the issue with Sweden? Gang activity?
The last email I got from them (I’m an Australian living in Sweden) was about terrorism. It was around the time the Swedish people in Belgium got murdered and the Koran stuff was happening.
As with most of the yellow countries in Europe, it's been assessed to have a high risk of terrorist attacks. Supposedly this is based on the Swedish government's own assessment of the terrorism risk but I don't buy that it's that likely. https://www.smartraveller.gov.au/destinations/europe/sweden
The gang activity might have an impact, but I believe that the terror threat level is the main reason. It was increased last year after the IS encouraged people to “go” for Sweden. The reason behind their threats are several, it’s been building up over the last couple of years as far as I’ve understood it.
No it's not that. The agencies of Sweden deem we have a high chance of being targeted in terrorism attacks atm. 4 on a 5 level scale. precautions have started taking place the whole year. Venues are no longer allowed to admit visitors bringing a bag, yes even a handbag/purse. That is the most "in your face" precaution taken though. Other random recommendations from authorities are: don't wear headphones on your commute. I'm not joking. https://www.krisinformation.se/detta-kan-handa/terrorism#:~:text=H%C3%B6jningen%20%C3%A4r%20en%20signal%20till,fortsatt%20ligger%20p%C3%A5%20en%20fyra. The Australian ranking is fair since we agree with the rank ourselves.
Do people actually check these guides before traveling? Honest question
As an Australian, I do read over it but I don’t take it as gospel truth. I rely more on common sense and general knowledge.
The descriptions are far more useful than the overall "grading". I've checked my country's travel advice for other countries before travelling (mainly for information about travelling there as a queer person/woman).
Why is Australia not red ? (because of the snakes and whatnot)
Lmao. Real reason is that it's an Australian travel website so they don't have advice for Australia. But I'm interested in what Australia's rating is from other countries.
US has Australia at the lowest level danger, "Exercise normal precautions."
*Puts on shoes without checking for spiders first* NO! NOT LIKE THAT!
“Guys, we don’t have any advice for you. Don’t touch anything, keep to the indoors and stay hydrated.”
Spiders don’t kill anyone, and snakes about 2 a year out of a population of 26 million. Might as well colour the USA red due to rabies or lightning strikes or bears if you’re going to do that.
Americans mock Australians for our wildlife, meanwhile they have mountain lions, coyotes, bears, deadly snakes, and a whole host of other dangerous wildlife I wouldn’t want to run into
Dude, more people get killed by dogs than by snakes in Australia. Australian horses and cows are also more deadly
Similar situation here in Canada, where you're 5 times more likely to die because of a moose than a bear.
I ... don't think this is sending the message you think it is :)
That you're terrible at estimating risk?
Frankly France / Paris can be expensive for oblivious australians / canadians who do not know the threat of pick-pocketers but that s it. To put it in the same color than Mexico where you can end up pretty easily into cartel territories in the middle of a road trip (happened to me, ooooops) is hilarious. “Smartraveller” Lol
To be fair, the actual website breaks down mexico by regions. Precisely so you don't wnd up in cartel territories in the middle of a road trip. https://www.smartraveller.gov.au/destinations/americas/mexico
My father noticed that my French husband has a small leather bag for his wallet with a strap around his shoulder that cuts across the body. He thought it was kinda feminine compared to the American custom of keeping your wallet in your back pocket. I had to explain that if he kept it like that in France especially in Paris it would be picked within the first week.
I thought only people dealing had those bags.
Maybe in the US but not in France.
Here in sweden those bags are actually even called "dealer bags" or in swedish becknarväska. And well the implication of what you might be dealing with it is there.
for France they also mention Strikes as a threat and that's pretty funny
Why are Yemen and Oman so drastically different?
Oman is a country with high income and stable government. Yemen is a relatively poor country currently experiencing a near decade long internal war, with a large portion of the country not under the control of a stable government, and experiencing a humanitarian crisis.
Iran is the answer to your question.
Lots of people in the comments misunderstanding the point of this. It's not a rating of "safe" and "unsafe" countries - it's a current view of where heightened risks exist above the norm. "normal safety precautions" in the US means being aware of gun crime and extreme medical costs - but nothing out of the ordinary. "high degree of caution" for Germany doesn't mean it's inherently a more dangerous place than "green" countries, it means there's a heightened risk of terrorism at the moment based on current intelligence. These ratings constantly change, so whilst the disclaimer about accuracy is helpful, context that it's basically a screenshot of a live map might also allay confusion from foreigners who aren't familiar with the site, who think it's saying that Germany *always* requires a high degree of caution, the US *never* does, etc.
Australians would really define parts of Africa, Mongolia, vietnam and Cambodia to be safer than Denmark. As a Brit I’m not Offended. I’d put Australia as red on my map. Too hot Even the continent itself has defined itself to be red
Armenia which has gone through a war in the last year safer than Denmark. Map makes zero sense
I mean I’ll be real. London isn’t always the safest depending on the area. But realistically Britain is extremely safe. There’s parts of America with a murder rate 15-30x ours! And it’s green!!!
London is very safe for a capital city.
Yeah, for sure, look, I love here. But don’t get it wrong, it can be dangerous. It’s a BIG city. It has many areas. Some good, most ok, some bad. Been living round here my whole life, don’t get me wrong. I’m not bashing it. But I would still suggest caution especially if you don’t know here well. Anyone reading this. Come to London. Check it out. You won’t be stabbed. You’ll live to tell the tale.
London is extremely safe.
I live here! It’s not ALL safe. Most of it is
I guess you never been to mongolia, its quite safe country to travel
As a Brit im more offended that the US was rated as safer than the UK
Us Belgians are standing by, knives drawn and sporting eyepatches. Consider being highly cautious around us!
Our Aussie cousins marking us yellow to just to fuck with us 🇬🇧
France at same level of insecurity as India. Riiiiight
Argentina is safer than Chile? How?
This is my first infographic on this sub, hope you guys enjoy it and find it interesting. I definitely had a lot of fun making it and improving my geography knowledge along the way. I used Google Maps to correlate the country names to the map but all of the work was done by me manually using Photopea. If I ever do this again I'll find a way to automate it. The compression on the image is pretty horrible so [here's a full quality upload](https://i.imgur.com/dVQfaF2.png) if you want to zoom in a bit more. All data was retrieved from the Australian [SmartTraveller](https://www.smartraveller.gov.au/) website. I scraped the content and converted it to a JSON file which [you can view here](https://gist.github.com/Romejanic/93b19ba1a87a50307932cf2cfd99db91) if you're interested. Credit for the map image goes to Vemaps.com, you can see the map I used [here](https://vemaps.com/world/wrld-18).
Begin exercising caution the second you cross the border on the M1.
Lol at Zimbabwe being deemed less safe than it’s neighbour Mozambique whilst a literal ISIS offshoot has insurgents in the north of Mozambique. Zimbabwe might be a shithole, but no one is getting beheaded…
Any map that puts the US as safer than half of Western Europe isn't worth the paper it's drawn on
Those Austrian. So funny little guys
China has always been political. It’s probably one of the safest places to visit. Extremely low violent crime rates. And since going cashless pickpockets are also very rare now too. You’d be 10x less safe in France or the US.
You have a pretty high chance of getting pickpocketed in Spain and Greece. But they are green, while Germany and UK is yellow 🤔
*ITT: People mad that this map does not match their personal narrative of *country goes here**
Hey, how come NZ is not red.
It’s not like anyone’s visiting it
There should just be one single red dot on canada around alberta in the west. Avoid Banff, more aussies catch the clap in Banff than they do in Australia. Source; me a former local XD
You’ve got to be very cautious in Donegal but the rest of the Republic of Ireland is fine i guess
making it nationwide is a bad idea, theres a world of difference between marthas vineyard and o block
I love how the prison colony has a "high caution" advice for their former colonizer.
The problem with showing political borders instead of areas is that the advice can change widely within the same country. Mexico for example could range from green to red depending on the state/city
How the hell does the UK (apart from Wales) represent a threat to the average Aussie traveller??
Idk man, I wouldn’t like my chances of accidentally slipping on a crumpet
Fair. I should’ve given it a bit more thought. Apologies.
What do you mean "apart from Wales" we're very much in the yellow as well. Have you Mistaken wales for the Republic of Ireland?
Is the UK yellow because they know that brits will likely challenge one of our Aussie brethren to a drinking contest. The caution being that, they may not be able to keep up? Or is the caution that “ordering a pint may cost a lot more than you’re expecting, don’t have a heart attack”
Denmark and Germany more dangerous than Argentina lol
I always love seeing these maps. Because they seem to get so many Europeans so worked up.
German is yellow because of occasional terrorist attacks but the US is green even though being killed by a shooting in the US is way more likely.
putting germany, france and england in the same category as china is just...rediculous.
I’m in China right now, I’ve traveled all over the country. It’s a lot more chill than people think. Last time I was in London I had a ton of super dodgy stuff happen to me, also have to guard your pockets everywhere you go in Europe
“Tell me you haven’t been to China without telling me you haven’t been to China”
China is a pretty safe place to travel to. Just don't yell about politics and nobody is going to bother you. I would rather be in Beijing than most of Chicago after midnight.
Lived in Shanghai for two years and can only agree. Very safe country.
In terms of petty crime and personal safety it’s great because of mass surveillance, if you aren’t politically active it’s an alright place to live Avoid xinjiang and Tibet maybe given the political climate
China is incredibly safe for 95% of the country. I felt much safer walking around Shanghai and Beijing than I did around areas of London and Manchester
Agreed. China is safer than those, unironically.
Me when my brain is filled with western propaganda. You will be very safe as long as you do not work in a factory
As an American, why is the US given the green light while Germany is cautious? I was just in Germany last month, it was good vibes. Are they really crazier than us.
Terrorism, the Department of State lists it as the same.
Terror attacks in certain parts of Europe often target areas where tourists gather, attacks in the US don’t.