Šiauliai is Lithuania's fourth city, in the north — 214 km from Vilnius, 142 from Kaunas and only 128 from Riga. A manufacturing town with a free economic zone, an airfield NATO uses, and the lowest average wage of the five largest cities: €1,904 gross a month on 2025 social-insurance data against €2,807 in Vilnius. Its university was absorbed into Vilnius University in 2,021, leaving 8 bachelor's programmes of which 2 are taught in English.
It is also the city where the share of residents holding a foreign passport went from one in twenty to nearly one in five in six years, which is the more useful fact and the one nobody writes down. Move here if you have a job here; do not move here expecting the capital, only cheaper.
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About Šiauliai
The city dates its founding to the Battle of Saulė on 22 September 1236 and calls itself the City of the Sun, a joke the weather does not support. It covers 81.13 km², 18.87 km² of it green space, and calls itself the economic, cultural and educational centre of northern Lithuania. The Hill of Crosses sits just outside it, and is the one thing about the city most foreigners have heard of.
It is compact and walkable, nothing takes long, and — uniquely among Lithuanian cities of its size — you will not be a curiosity. What it does not have is published data: rents, local costs and local wages are largely unmeasured, which is a real constraint on planning a move from abroad.
The Population Question
Start here: every other question about Šiauliai turns on it, and the answer is genuinely contested.
| Published figure | Who published it | What it appears to count |
|---|---|---|
| 122,180 | State Data Agency figures reported December 2025 | Registered residents, including foreign nationals |
| 118,907 | The municipality's own facts page | "Permanent residents" at the start of 2024, attributed to the statistics department |
| 105,000 | The city's own free economic zone, on its investor page | Undated, and rounded |
We are not choosing between them. Three bodies — two of them the city itself — publish three numbers for the same place and none reconciles the others. What can be said with confidence is the shape.
- Foreign nationals were about 5% of registered residents in 2019 and 19.6% in 2025 — 23,915 people, chiefly Ukrainians (8,157) and Belarusians (4,355), then Tajiks, Uzbeks and Kyrgyz.
- Births fell from 1,062 in 2020 to 786 in 2024.
- Residents aged 18–25 fell from about 9,500 in 2015 to about 5,700 in 2024.
- Median age is 44, with the over-65 share up to about 20% over fifteen years.
What that adds up to. Whatever the headline number is doing, it is held up by immigration rather than births. A city that has lost a third of its young adults in a decade and replaced them with working-age arrivals from outside the EU is a specific kind of place — and for a foreigner deciding where to live, arguably a better one than the numbers suggest.
What the City Is For
Šiauliai is a manufacturing and logistics town, and says so itself rather than pretending otherwise.
The free economic zone covers 133 ha beside the airport and the Panevėžys highway. Its page names 6 companies operating in it and three target sectors: woodworking and furniture, metal processing and engineering, electronics. The incentive is 10 years at 0% corporate tax on at least €1,000,000 of fixed-asset investment, then relief for a further 6 years.
The industrial park is a separate municipal site: 15 companies signed, 11 trading — corrugated cardboard, metal processing, fishing equipment, logistics, trailers, fertiliser, windows and doors, bicycles — and about €82,580,000 invested. No plots remain available; the city directs investors to the zone instead.
The airport is the third leg: an international airport that also hosts the NATO air policing detachment, listed by the city among its investment assets. It is not a place you fly home from on a Friday.
The city and its own free economic zone do not agree on the tax incentive. The municipality describes the years after the tax-free decade as a 50% reduction; the zone's page prints 7.5%. Both cannot be right against the 17% standard rate this site cites from VMI — half of 17% is 8.5%, not 7.5% — so one page has not been updated. If an investment decision turns on it, get the figure in writing and check it against the current corporate rate.
What this means for a job search. The work is industrial, technical and logistics, mostly conducted in Lithuanian and Russian; there is no equivalent of Vilnius's shared-service and technology cluster. Remote work for a foreign employer makes that irrelevant, and Šiauliai is one of the cheapest places in the EU to do it from. If you need a local employer to hire you in English, this is the hardest of the four cities on this site.
The University That Stopped Being One
Šiauliai had its own university until 1 January 2,021, when it was absorbed into Vilnius University as VU Šiauliai Academy — the same buildings, a different institution.
| Now | Figure | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Students | 1,200–1,500 | The Academy's own about page |
| Institutes | 2 | Education, and Regional Development |
| Bachelor's programmes | 8 | The Academy's own admissions page |
| Of those, taught in English | 2 | Economics and Investment; Software Engineering |
Two English-taught bachelor's programmes is the whole international offer of the city's university. There is also a state college, and the zone's investor page claims over 2,500 engineering students across the academy, three colleges and a vocational school combined.
Do not come here to be an international student
If you are choosing where in Lithuania to study in English, this is not a candidate. Vilnius and Kaunas have the programmes, the peer groups and the English-speaking services around them — see universities and student life. Šiauliai's academy is a real institution; it is simply not built for someone arriving without Lithuanian.
Cost of Living Against Vilnius
| Line | Šiauliai | Vilnius | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Average gross wage, 2025 | €1,904 | €2,807 | Social-insurance data; lowest of the five largest cities |
| 30-day transport pass | €32.50 | €38.00 | Šiauliai is dearer than Kaunas and Klaipėda |
| Single ride, card or app | €0.74 | — | 30-minute transfer included; €1.50 from the driver |
On wages the picture is unflattering. On 2025 social-insurance data the five largest cities run €1,904 in Šiauliai, €1,994 in Panevėžys, €2,193 in Klaipėda, €2,435 in Kaunas and €2,807 in Vilnius: last, about 32.17% behind the capital.
Getting There and Getting Around
| To | Distance |
|---|---|
| Riga | 128 km |
| Kaunas | 142 km |
| Klaipėda | 165 km |
| Vilnius | 214 km |
Riga is closer than Vilnius, which changes life here more than people expect: for flights, weekends and shopping, the natural big city is in another country.
Buses are run by the municipal operator on tariffs set by council decision of 6 November 2025, in force from 1 January 2026.
- €0.74 for a single ride on the card or the app, with a 30-minute transfer included; €1.50 if you buy from the driver
- €32.50 for a 30-day pass bought at a kiosk, €32.00 online
- €28.00 for the weekdays-only version, €27.50 online
- €3.30 for a day, €9.70 for a week
- €1.50 for the plastic card itself
Šiauliai's tariff page publishes no student concession. Vilnius applies the statutory 80%, Kaunas and Klaipėda publish 50%, and Šiauliai's table lists none — so a student here pays €32.50 against €7.60 in the capital. The operator's concessions page does set out the statutory categories, so the entitlement may exist in practice, but a discounted price nobody publishes is not a price. Ask at the ticket office before buying a month.
Who Should and Should Not Move Here
Move here if
- You have a job here already — in the zone, the industrial park, logistics or manufacturing
- You work remotely for a foreign employer — you keep the salary and take the country's lowest costs
- You are joining family or a community already here — and there is a large one, which is not true of most Lithuanian cities this size
- You want a Baltic base near Riga rather than near Vilnius
Do not move here if
- You are coming to study in English — there are two such programmes in the city
- You need a local employer to hire you in English — the market for that is in Vilnius
- You are moving speculatively — with no rent or cost data published, you cannot budget this city from a desk abroad
- You want a scene — the 18–25 population has fallen by roughly a third in a decade
In summary. Šiauliai is a working city, cheaper than the capital and paying accordingly, and the wage gap eats much of the cost advantage for anyone earning locally. It is not a cheaper Vilnius or a smaller Kaunas — it has none of Kaunas's international student infrastructure. What it has, uniquely among Lithuanian cities of its size, is a foreign-born working population large enough that the institutions have had to get used to it. If your reason for coming is work, that is worth more than a scene.
Climate
Monthly mean air temperature (°C), 1991–2020 norms, Šiauliai station, Lithuanian Hydrometeorological Service. Means across the whole day, not daytime highs.
The annual mean is 7.2°C, annual precipitation 610 mm, and the station records 1,838.5 hours of sunshine a year.
The city's own page says something different. Its municipal facts page prints -7°C for January against the service's 1991–2020 norm of -3°C. The figures here are the meteorological service's.
The winter here is the winter everywhere in Lithuania, and the part that matters is the darkness rather than the cold: the long-term December norm for the country is 29 hours of sunshine across the whole month. Arriving from a brighter climate, read the section on it first.
Practical Information
- 112 — emergency number, free from any phone with or without a SIM, English spoken
- Lithuania uses the euro; cards work everywhere and contactless is standard, but decline Dynamic Currency Conversion at ATMs
- Declare your place of residence at the municipality once you have an address
- Open an account before you arrive — Revolut, Paysera and Wise take a passport; the banks want a permit and an asmens kodas you will not have for weeks. See bank accounts
- Get a Lithuanian mobile number early — parcel codes, clinic appointments and bank verification assume one. See phones, internet and post
- Russian is widely useful here, more so than in Vilnius, and Lithuanian is required for most local employment
Frequently Asked Questions
How many people actually live in Šiauliai?
Nobody publishes one settled figure. State Data Agency figures reported in December 2025 give 122,180 registered residents; the municipality's facts page gives 118,907 permanent residents at the start of 2024; the city's own free economic zone tells investors 105,000, undated. Two of the three are published by the city itself and disagree by 13,907 people. The direction of travel is clearer than the level: births falling, young adults leaving, the total held up by immigration.
Is it true that nearly a fifth of the city is foreign?
Of registered residents, yes, on the State Data Agency series reported in December 2025: 19.6%, or 23,915 people, against about 5% in 2019. The largest groups are Ukrainians at 8,157 and Belarusians at 4,355, then Tajiks, Uzbeks and Kyrgyz. An outsider here is not a novelty, and shops, employers and public services have had to adjust within about five years.
How much less does Šiauliai pay than Vilnius?
On 2025 social-insurance data the average gross wage was €1,904 a month against €2,807 in Vilnius — a gap of about 32.17%, and last of the five largest cities: Panevėžys €1,994, Klaipėda €2,193, Kaunas €2,435. These are not the State Data Agency municipality wages quoted on the Vilnius and Kaunas pages — different publisher, basis and period, so compare within one source.
What does rent cost in Šiauliai?
Nobody publishes it. The Ober-Haus asking-rent series behind this site's Vilnius, Kaunas and Klaipėda figures does not extend to Šiauliai, Numbeo has no dataset at all, and the most recent national-agency commentary carries 2015 prices. The absence is the finding: you cannot budget a move here from a desk abroad the way you can budget a move to Vilnius. Get quotes from actual listings first.
Can I study in English in Šiauliai?
Barely. Šiaulių universitetas ceased to exist independently on 1 January 2,021, absorbed into Vilnius University as the Šiauliai Academy, which publishes 8 bachelor's programmes, 2 of them in English: Economics and Investment, and Software Engineering. Enrolment is stated as 1,200–1,500 across the whole academy. If English-taught study is why you are coming to Lithuania, Vilnius and Kaunas are the answer.
What kind of work is there?
Manufacturing, engineering, logistics and the free economic zone, which targets woodworking and furniture, metal processing and engineering, and electronics. The municipal industrial park lists 11 trading companies. What there is not is a shared-services or technology cluster of the kind that makes Vilnius hireable in English, and most work here is conducted in Lithuanian and Russian. Remote work for a foreign employer makes the low local costs pure gain.
Do students get a discount on Šiauliai city buses?
The city's published tariff page lists no student concession: the 30-day pass is €32.50 at a kiosk and €32.00 online, with no student line beside them. The operator's separate concessions page does set out the statutory categories, including full-time higher-education students, so the entitlement probably exists in practice — but a price nobody publishes is not a price. Ask at the ticket office before buying a month, with an ISIC card or EU-issued student ID.
Is the airport any use to me?
Not for getting home. The international airport the city lists among its investment assets also hosts NATO's air policing detachment: a cargo and military field, not a departure board full of city breaks. The airport that matters here is Riga, 128 km away against 214 km to Vilnius. Planning travel around Latvia rather than the Lithuanian capital is one of the genuine adjustments of living here.
Is Šiauliai colder than Vilnius or Kaunas?
Not meaningfully. The Hydrometeorological Service's 1991–2020 norms for the Šiauliai station give a January mean of -3°C, a July mean of 18.3°C and an annual mean of 7.2°C, with 610 mm of precipitation and 1,838.5 hours of sunshine a year. The city's own facts page prints -7°C for January, which does not match the norm; we use the meteorological series and flag the difference.
So should I move to Šiauliai?
If you have a job here, yes — cheap, compact, and unusually used to foreigners for a Lithuanian city of its size. If you work remotely for a foreign employer it is one of the best-value places in the EU to do that from. If you are coming to study in English, to find English-language professional work, or to see what turns up, choose Vilnius or Kaunas: the wage gap to the capital is roughly 32.17%, and the city publishes almost no data you could plan a speculative move around.
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Disclaimer
General guidance, not financial or legal advice. Costs and conditions change — check current listings and confirm details locally. Nothing here is paid placement, and what a link pays never affects the ordering.