The advice is constantly changing but some countries are still letting you go there (and return to the UK) without having to quarantine. If you get it wrong, you could end up spending 28 days in quarantine — 14 days when you get to your holiday destination and 14 when you return to the UK!

So many people need to travel for various reasons, such as to see families, get business done, or because they booked a dream holiday last year, and a lot of people are looking for ways to get out of the UK, safely, to countries where the risks are lower.

I was surprised when I went to look at flights that the information on where you can travel is muddled and unclear in a lot of places. After doing a bunch of research for myself, I am sharing it with you in the hope it saves you a bit of time if you’re looking to leave the UK safely right now.

I’ve looked through the travel advice for every country on the UK’s “no quarantine on return to the UK” list and found out what the rules are for all but two of them.

There are currently 11 countries not enforcing a long quarantine on UK arrivals right now and whom the UK aren’t enforcing an arrival quarantine on, either.

Countries with no quarantine at all include the Canary islands, Dominica, Madeira, Maldives, St Barthelemy and Sweden.

Countries with no quarantine after you’ve gotten a negative PCR test (usually under 24 hours) include Bermuda, Greece.

Three further countries are still not impossible to take a short trip to, with up to 72 hours of quarantine in Finland, Grenada, St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

Technically, Antigua and Barbuda could be interpreted as no quarantine, if you go to Dominica for a couple of weeks, first.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t enough clear information about Akrotiri and Dhelekia or the Pitcairn island group, although given that Pitcairn doesn’t have an airport you would have to travel through another country with a quarantine rule to get there by boat.

Name of country	Quarantine on arrival?	Source:
Akrotiri and Dhelekia	Unknown
Anguilla	Quarantine
Antiqua and Barbuda	No quarantine if you arrive from Anguilla, Barbados, British Virgin Islands, Dominica, Grenada, Montserrat, St Kitts and Nevis, St Lucia, or St Vincent and the Grenadines (the “Travel Bubble”)	Source
Australia	Borders only open to Australians and people coming from New Zealand
The Azores	Quarantine
Barbados	Quarantine
Bermuda	Quarantine 12-24 hours (until PCR tests available) (this may be about to change).	Source
British Antarctica	Quarantine
British Indian Ocean	Quarantine
British Virgin Islands	Quarantine
Brunei	Quarantine
Canary Islands	No Quarantine	Source
Channel Islands	Depends which island and where in UK you are coming from. Tier 2/3 lockdown areas have to isolate on arrival.	Source
Cuba	Borders don’t seem open?
Cyprus	Quarantine
Denmark	Travel ban
Dominica	No quarantine	Source
Estonia	Quarantine
Falkland Islands	Quarantine
Faroe Islands	Travel ban
Fiji	Quarantine
Finland	72 Hours quarantine (unless positive PCR test, then longer)	Source
Germany	Quarantine
Greece	Quarantine until PCR test results are available (so not a full quarantine)	Source
Greenland	Travel ban
Grenada	5 day quarantine	Source
Hong Kong	Partial travel ban and quarantine	Source
Ireland	Quarantine (except Northern Ireland)	Source
Isle of Man	Borders not open
Latvia	10-day quarantine	Source
Macao	Borders not open
Madeira	No quarantine (unless positive PCR test)	Source
Malaysia	Quarantine
Maldives	No quarantine for tourists at all (but quarantine for returning residents)	Source
Mauritius	Quarantine
Montserrat	Quarantine
New Caledonia	Quarantine
New Zealand	Quarantine
Norway	10-day quarantine	Source
Pitcairn, Henderson, Ducie and Oeno	Unknown	Source
Seychelles	Quarantine	Source
Singapore	Quarantine
South Korea	Quarantine
South Georgia and the Sandwich Islands	Visit by permit only from Falkland islands (who have quarantine)	Source
St Barthelemy	No quarantine (unless positive PCR test)	Source
St Helena, Ascension and Tristan De Cuba	Quarantine
St Kitts and Nevis	Quarantine
St Lucia	Quarantine
St Pierre and Miquelon	Borders not open
St Vincent and the Grenadines	48-72 hour quarantine	Source (pdf)
Sweden	No quarantine for EU citizens	Source
Taiwan	Quarantine
Thailand	Quarantine
Vietnam	Borders not open

Remember to always check with the UK Foreign Office before travelling anywhere. All the information about quarantining on arrival in other countries applies to the whole UK (except Ireland, as noted above), although some devolved governments within the UK might have different lists of countries where you need to quarantine on return to the UK.

These rules are changing all the time, sometimes for no reason at all or at very short notice, especially on the British side of things, so unless your plan is to take a longer trip or just ride out Covid in a foreign country, be prepared for the Foreign Office to randomly remove your destination from this list a few hours before the rules come into force (like they keep doing).

Please check current quarantine rules from trusted, reputable sources like the ones linked above before booking flights, paying for a PCR test, or travelling to another country. There’s so much to consider right now when travelling to and from the UK.