Am I Eligible for a German Work Visa? Degree, Job, Salary

A German work visa is not scored on your overall profile. It is decided by three separate gates, and all three have to clear: your degree has to be recognised, you have to hold a concrete job offer for qualified employment, and the salary in that offer has to reach the line that applies to your route. A strong CV does not compensate for a failed gate. Which gate you fail also decides which route stays open to you.

The three gates are independent

Eligibility is a conjunction, not a weighted score. Each gate has its own legal basis. § 18 Abs. 2 AufenthG sets the general conditions that apply to every skilled-worker title: a concrete job offer, a recognised qualification, and, for applicants aged 45 and over, a salary floor. § 18b then covers skilled workers with academic training, and § 18g the EU Blue Card.

Recruiters and forums talk mostly about the salary line, because it is the only gate that is a number. In practice the degree gate closes more Indian applications than the salary gate does, and it closes them earlier, often before a package is ever negotiated. Work the gates in order.

Gate 1: your degree has to be recognised

Recognition is not an opinion held by your employer or the visa officer. It runs on anabin, the database maintained by the Zentralstelle für ausländisches Bildungswesen (ZAB). Two things are checked, and both have to pass: the awarding institution must be rated H+, and your degree itself must be listed as comparable to a German one.

If the institution is H+ but your specific degree is not individually listed, or the entry is ambiguous, the fix is a Statement of Comparability (Zeugnisbewertung) from ZAB. That certificate is the document the mission and the Ausländerbehörde accept in place of a clean anabin entry. It takes weeks, so it belongs at the start of your timeline, not after the contract is signed.

The recurring Indian trap is structural rather than academic: degrees awarded through affiliated colleges rather than the parent university, and three-year bachelor degrees whose comparability turns on the exact institution entry. Check the entry for the awarding university, not the college you attended. The full mechanics sit in the anabin recognition gate.

Gate 2: the job has to be qualified employment

§ 18 Abs. 2 Nr. 1 AufenthG requires a concrete job offer. Not a shortlist, not an interview round: a contract or a binding offer that names the role, the hours, and the pay. And that job has to be qualified employment (qualifizierte Beschäftigung, § 2 Abs. 12b AufenthG), meaning a role that normally requires at least two years of vocational training or a degree.

Since the skilled-worker reform took effect, a skilled worker under § 18a or § 18b may take any qualified employment. The job no longer has to sit in the field of the degree, so a mechanical engineer can lawfully take a qualified role in logistics. The Blue Card is stricter: § 18g requires employment that is appropriate to the higher-education qualification, so the job must actually fit the degree, and the contract must run for at least six months.

Regulated professions add a gate on top of all this. Doctors, nurses, teachers and, in some Länder, engineers need a Berufsausübungserlaubnis or Approbation before a work permit is possible at all. See the recognition gate for regulated professions.

Gate 3: the salary has to clear your line

Which line applies depends on the route, not on the person. All figures are derived from the Beitragsbemessungsgrenze of the general pension insurance, which is €101,400 in 2026, and every one of them is reset each January:

• Blue Card, general (§ 18g Abs. 1 S. 1): €50,700 gross per year, that is €4,225 a month. No approval from the Bundesagentur für Arbeit is needed.
• Blue Card, shortage occupation or recent graduate (§ 18g Abs. 1 S. 2 and Abs. 2): €45,934.20, that is €3,827.85 a month, if your degree is less than three years old or your role sits in a listed shortage occupation. Here the Bundesagentur für Arbeit does have to approve the terms of employment.
• Skilled worker without a Blue Card (§ 18b): no flat threshold below 45. Your livelihood must be secured and the pay has to be comparable to local pay for the role.
• First permit at 45 or older (§ 18 Abs. 2 Nr. 5): €55,770, unless you can prove adequate pension provision. The age is measured at first issuance, which is why the Blue Card is often the better route past 45: it does not differentiate by age.
• No recognised degree, pronounced practical experience (§ 19c Abs. 2 AufenthG with § 6 BeschV): €45,630. IT specialists can also reach the Blue Card on three years of relevant experience gained in the last seven, at the €45,934.20 line. See the IT route without a degree.

Only pay that is contractually guaranteed and unconditional counts toward these lines. A discretionary bonus does not close a gap; a thirteenth month written into the contract does. If your offer sits a few hundred euro under the line, that is a contract problem with a contract fix, not a refusal you have to accept.

What the three gates make you eligible for

• Degree recognised, job fits the degree, salary at or above €50,700: EU Blue Card under § 18g, no labour market approval, and permanent residence in 21 months with B1 German.
• The same, but salary between €45,934.20 and €50,700 with a shortage occupation or a degree under three years old: Blue Card with BA approval.
• Degree recognised, any qualified job, salary below the Blue Card lines: skilled worker permit under § 18b, with BA approval and no fixed threshold under 45.
• A recognised vocational qualification of at least two years instead of a degree: the same logic under § 18a, without the Blue Card.
• No job offer yet: no work visa at all. The Chancenkarte (§ 20a) is a job-search permit, not a work permit, and it is the standard answer when gate two is the one you cannot clear from India.

bay.in provides structured documentation of publicly available immigration procedures for general information. It does not assess individual cases and does not provide legal advice within the meaning of the German Legal Services Act (Rechtsdienstleistungsgesetz, RDG). For a binding review of your situation, contact the competent German mission, the Ausländerbehörde, or a qualified adviser.