The Costa Rican minimum wage is set on a sliding scale depending on an employee’s skill level or educational qualification.

Minimum wage ranges from 9,598.73 CRC per 8-hour workday for unskilled workers to 12,537.91 CRC per day for specialized workers.

The monthly minimum wage ranges from 10,652.48 to 682,607.00 CRC per month depending on the employee’s skill and education level.

Daily wage rates

• Unskilled workers: ₡10,652.48 ($17.20)
• Semi-skilled workers: CRC 11,583.80 ($18.71)
• Skilled workers: CRC 11,797.05 ($19.05)
• Specialized worker: CRC 13,914.32 ($22.47)
• Superior specialization worker: CRC 21,593.60 ($34.87)

Monthly wage rates

• Generic unskilled worker: CRC317,915.58 ($513.36)
• General semi-skilled worker: CRC 342,027.40 ($552.30)
• Generic skilled worker: CRC 359,544.27 ($580.59)
• General highly skilled: CRC 403,764.18 ($651.99)
• Technical worker with diversified education qualification: CRC 376,776.77 ($608.41)
• Technical worker - Superior Education: CRC 464,335.93 ($749.80)
• Technical worker with higher education diploma: CRC 501,500.15 ($809.81)
• Technical worker with university bachelors: CRC 568,819.86 ($918.52)
• Technical worker with graduate qualification: CRC 682,607.23 (1,102.26)

For customers of Remote, all employee payments will be made in equal monthly installments on or before the last working day of each calendar month, payable in arrears.

Note that a 13th salary or 13th month salary payment in Costa Rica is mandated by law. The 13th salary must be paid by the 20th of December and will be equal to one month’s pay. The payment is commonly known in Costa Rica as Aguinaldo Salary.

We can help you get a new employee started in the Costa Rica fast. The minimum onboarding time we need is only 6 working days.

Our team ensures your employees are onboarded and paid as quickly as possible while keeping your business compliant with all local employment legislation. The minimum onboarding time begins after the employee submits all required information onto the Remote platform. The onboarding timeline is also dependent upon registration with local authorities.

For all non-nationals of the country of employment, the Right to Work assessment (if applicable) will add three extra days to the total time to onboard. There may be extra time required if we need to follow-up on the right to work assessment. Please note, payroll cut-off dates can impact the actual first day of employment. Remote has a payroll cut-off date of the 10th of the month unless otherwise specified.

Employees are entitled to two weeks of paid vacation annually once they have worked with an employer for an entire year. Many Costa Rican employers increase the number of allotted days off per year as a benefit for the employee.

Employees can take nine paid public holidays off and non-Catholics are entitled to paid time off to observe religious holidays such as Yom Kippur, Eid-el-Fitr, etc.

Whenever the following holidays fall on any day other than a Monday, employees will take the following Monday off in place of the holiday.

• Juan Santamaria,
• Annexation of Nicoya,
• Mother’s Day, and
• The Assumption of Mary

And should an employee be required to work on a public holiday, the employer will provide a replacement holiday within 15 days.

Employees are entitled to sickness benefits from both the employer and the social security office, provided they’ve made the latter’s required contributions.

For the first three days of an illness, employees can draw a sickness benefit equivalent to their full wages, with 50% paid by the employer and 50% paid by the social security office.

The employee will draw wages equivalent to 60% of their normal wages from the fourth day, paid by the social security office.

Female employees are entitled to 4 months of maternity leave, starting a month before delivery, and compensated at a 100% rate, paid 50:50 by the employer and the social security office.

A 2022 law now provides paid paternity leave to all biological fathers in Costa Rica. During the first four weeks after the birth of a child, a father may take two days of paid leave each week. The costs are again shared 50:50 between the employer and the CCSS.