Spanish tourist says Europe is 20 years behind Singapore after clearing immigration in 5 minutes

People walk at Changi Airport in Singapore. Photo by AFP

Close to 127 million travelers cleared Singapore immigration in 2025 without producing a passport, the authority said in May, a 270.2% increase on the previous year.

That figure covers Singapore residents and departing visitors, who pass through on facial and iris biometrics alone. Arriving foreign visitors, including Spanish nationals, still present a passport at the automated lanes.

Average clearance time per traveler fell 60%, from 25 seconds to 10 seconds, after the authority completed its passport-free rollout across all four Changi terminals in September 2024.

Changi, which handled 69.98 million passengers in 2025, collected five titles at the Skytrax World Airport Awards in London on March 18, including world’s best airport for immigration service and a record 14th overall World’s Best Airport award.

Seoul Incheon placed second in the global ranking and Tokyo Haneda third.

Commenters on the Spanish tourist’s video also pointed to Singapore’s buses, noting that arrival times can be tracked through transit apps or Google Maps, Mothership reported. Others said residents tend to notice how smoothly the system runs only once they travel abroad.

The MRT network averaged 2.37 million train-km between failures in July, a fourth consecutive month above two million and more than twice the reliability target set in 2017, according to Land Transport Authority figures reported by AsiaOne on Aug. 14.

Citing the same data set, Mothership reported in July that no delay had exceeded 30 minutes since November 2025, the longest such run since records began in 2011.

Reliability had fallen to 1.67 million train-km over the 12 months to September 2025, its weakest reading in nearly five years, before a Rail Reliability Taskforce convened in February. Train service delivery and punctuality have held above 99% since.

Singapore returned to first place among 70 economies in the IMD World Competitiveness Ranking published on June 18, ahead of Hong Kong and Switzerland, the Singapore Economic Development Board said. The country ranked first in business efficiency and third in government efficiency.