🇸🇻 El Salvador · 2026 edition
Investing in San Salvador
San Salvador ranks 5 of 13 Latin American cities on the ProLatam Data Index with 49.1 of 100, and 6 of 13 on the ProLatam Score. Its strongest pillar is tax competitiveness (74), its weakest is innovation (18). A foreign shareholder pays 33.50% in total on repatriated profit, under a territorial system. Coverage is 93%, since some sources do not reach this city.
ProLatam Data Index
49.1
Rank 5 of 13, balanced weighting
ProLatam Score
46.6
Rank 6 of 13, market-entry weighting
Strongest pillar
Tax Competitiveness
74 of 100
Weakest pillar
Innovation
18 of 100
How San Salvador scores on each pillar
Nine pillars, each normalized to 0 to 100 by a fixed published rule. A dash means the source does not cover San Salvador, which is not the same as a zero. Coverage of the weighted index for this city is 93%.
Swipe the table sideways for the reported value, the weights and the source.
What a foreign shareholder pays in El Salvador
Corporate income tax plus the standard non-treaty withholding on the dividend paid out of what is left, which is the figure that actually reaches an owner abroad.
Total on repatriated profit
33.50%
Corporate income tax
30.0%
Dividend withholding
5.0%
Standard non-treaty rate
Compliance hours per year
168
World Bank Paying Taxes, 2018 data
Sources: PwC, Worldwide Tax Summaries, reviewed 2026 · World Bank (discontinued series), Doing Business, Paying Taxes, 2020 edition, 2018 data
El Salvador taxes on a territorial basis, so income sourced outside the country is generally outside the net, which matters a great deal to a holding structure. Territorial: foreign-source income is not taxed. Free Zone Law exempts income tax, VAT and import duties, and the 2023 Technology and Manufacturing Innovation Law grants a 15-year income tax exemption.
Context, published but not scored
These shape a decision without belonging in the index. FDI inflows track the size of an economy rather than the appeal of a city, and a sovereign rating measures a government's ability to repay debt rather than a company's ability to operate.
GDP growth 2026
3.3%
IMF World Economic Outlook, national
FDI inflows
$475M
Net inflows 2025 from the Banco Central de Reserva; ECLAC publishes only a Central America aggregate.
Sovereign rating
B- (Stable)
Long-term foreign currency
English proficiency
538 (Moderate)
EF EPI city score, 1 to 800
Sources: International Monetary Fund, World Economic Outlook, April 2026 · ECLAC (UN), Foreign Direct Investment in Latin America and the Caribbean, 2026 (2025 data) · S&P Global Ratings, Sovereign credit rating, as of September 2026 · EF Education First, English Proficiency Index, 2025 (15th edition). Used with permission of International Monetary Fund, from World Economic Outlook, International Monetary Fund, April 2026; permission conveyed through Copyright Clearance Center, Inc.
Where El Salvador has moved since 2021
The rule of law pillar is the only one of the nine with a series comparable across five editions, so it is the only place this profile shows a direction rather than a snapshot. Scores are national, 0 to 1, higher is better.
2021
0.477
2022
0.458
2023
0.446
2024
0.432
2025
0.420
Over the period El Salvador weakened, -0.057 points. A move under 0.005 is reported as flat rather than as a trend. Compare all 10 economies.
Source: World Justice Project, Rule of Law Index, 2025
Sectors with a documented presence
BPO & Call Centers
AmCham El Salvador reports the BPO and call-center sector created 12,000 jobs in 2024, with 60 to 90 centers operating in the country.
SourceBitcoin & Digital Assets
El Salvador holds 7,762 BTC (about USD 598 M) in sovereign reserves and keeps adding roughly one bitcoin a day, the only sovereign bitcoin reserve in the world. Mandatory legal-tender status ended in January 2025 under the IMF agreement, while the digital-asset licensing regime remains in force.
SourceWhere El Salvador's inbound FDI comes from
National statistics, share of inbound foreign direct investment.
- Panama39.6%
- United States20.3%
- Honduras15.4%
- Mexico8.4%
- Other16.3%
Banco Central de Reserva, 2025 net flows. Shares are of positive contributions; Spain recorded a net outflow of USD 160 M that year.
Numbeo's 2026 Mid-Year ranking does not include San Salvador, so the Quality of Life pillar is left empty and its weight is spread over the others. Numbeo's own city page does show a figure, but it rests on the smallest sample of the cities tracked, and only ranked values are used. Coverage is reduced, so the score is not strictly comparable with cities that have every pillar.
Citing the San Salvador figures
The composite scores, ranks, weights and methodology are published under CC BY 4.0: reuse them, including commercially, with credit and a link to https://invest.pro-latam.org. The underlying indicators belong to their publishers, who are credited and linked wherever a figure appears. They are not part of the downloads, and this licence does not cover them. Read the CC BY 4.0 licence.
Pro Latam. (2026). ProLatam Latin American City Investment Index 2026 (Version 2026.5) [Data set]. https://invest.pro-latam.orgSource: Pro Latam Investment Hub, ProLatam Data Index 2026 (https://invest.pro-latam.org). Updated 2026-09-04.
Considering San Salvador for a market entry?
Pro Latam has been placing international companies in Latin America since 2010. The ranking is the public part of the work, and the rest is the part that depends on what you are actually trying to build.