List of EU/EEA/Schengen countries

A lot of confusion exists in property understanding EU and Schengen countries.

Remember European Union (EU) is not the same as Europe. Here is some basic difference.

Europe is first of all is a continent. The European Union is a unique economic and political union between 27 EU countries that together cover much of the continent. A total of 44 nations are part of Europe, there are only 27 EU member states.

We have compiled full list of EU/EEA and Schengen countries.

27 EU countries

The European Union (EU) has 27 member states:

Austria
Belgium
Bulgaria
Croatia
Cyprus
Czech Republic
Denmark
Estonia
Finland
France
Germany
Greece
Hungary
Ireland
Italy
Latvia
Lithuania
Luxembourg
Malta
Netherlands
Poland
Portugal
Romania
Slovakia
Slovenia
Spain
Sweden

Non EU countries

These are non EU countries. Because of this nationals of these countries are not EU citizens. You wont get EU citizenship in these countries.

United Kingdom
Iceland
Norway
Liechtenstein
Switzerland
Andorra
San Marino
Greenland

Full list available here

30 EEA countries

EEA stands for European Economic Area. There are 30 EEA countries:

The 27 EU member states plus
Liechtenstein
Iceland
Norway

4 EFTA countries

EFTA stands for European Free Trade Association. It has 4 member states:

Iceland
Liechtenstein
Norway
Switzerland

27 Schengen countries

The Schengen area consists of 22 of the 27 EU member states plus the 4 EFTA countries:

Austria
Belgium
Croatia (Joined Jan 1, 2023)
Czech Republic
Denmark
Estonia
Finland
France
Germany
Greece
Hungary
Iceland
Italy
Latvia
Liechtenstein
Lithuania
Luxembourg
Malta
Netherlands
Norway
Poland
Portugal
Slovakia
Slovenia
Spain
Sweden
Switzerland

5 EU candidate countries

There are five EU candidate countries for acquis. These are countries that are already in the process of incorporating EU legislation into national law.