Has anyone here looked into relocation options for blockchain professionals in the EU, UK, Canada, or Australia?

I went through this last year and honestly, the biggest problem is that the marketing around these visas doesn’t match how they work on the ground.

Take the UK Global Talent Visa. Yes, they say GitHub and papers matter. In reality, I saw people with solid repos get stuck because no one “recognized” their work. What actually helped applicants was external backing — foundations, known protocols, or people already trusted in the ecosystem. Pure code alone rarely closed the loop.

For the EU, Germany’s Blue Card is the least confusing — but only after you have an offer that meets the salary bar. The hard part isn’t eligibility, it’s that many blockchain startups don’t want to touch visa paperwork at all. If a company hasn’t hired non-EU talent before, expect long delays or a quiet no.

Canada’s Global Talent Stream looks great on paper. Fast timelines, clear process. But it’s completely employer-driven. If the company isn’t familiar with the program, things stall quickly, no matter how strong your profile is.

Australia was the most misleading for me. The language sounds inclusive, but in practice they want clear signs you’re near the top of your niche — public recognition, citations, media, or widely used work. Being “very good” isn’t enough.

The main lesson: immigration systems don’t judge potential or effort. They judge proof other people can verify. If your work is hard to check from the outside, expect friction — even if you’re genuinely skilled.

If you have any other questions, feel free to add here. am happy to help you out

Coming from the security / QA side, the process looks very different than it does for general dev roles — and that catches a lot of people off guard.

If your background is smart contract auditing, blockchain QA, protocol testing, or infra security, most immigration systems don’t immediately “get” your value. Titles like Blockchain Security Engineer or Web3 QA often don’t map cleanly to visa occupation lists, so the burden shifts to how you prove impact.

What worked for people I’ve seen succeed wasn’t volume of audits or bug reports, but traceability:

Audits where findings are publicly referenced or acknowledged

CVEs, disclosures, or write-ups that others cite

GitHub repos tied to real protocols, not just tooling

Community trust signals (repeat audit engagements, maintainer trust, invitations)

For the UK and Australia, security profiles often struggle unless there’s clear third-party validation. Quiet, NDA-heavy work is a disadvantage — even if you’re excellent. Immigration reviewers can’t evaluate “internal” impact.

In Canada and parts of the EU, security roles usually succeed only with a job offer, because it simplifies classification. Talent-based routes are tougher unless your work is already visible in public ecosystems.

A common mistake security folks make is assuming technical depth = immigration strength. It doesn’t. What matters is whether someone outside your company can independently confirm that your work mattered.

If most of your best work lives behind NDAs, relocation is still possible — but the strategy has to start 12–18 months earlier, deliberately building public proof before applying.