Why Bali, and why not?
A holiday in Bali and a life in Bali are two very different things
The magic is still there when you live here — the warmth, the ceremonies, the food, the feeling that time moves differently. But underneath that is a whole other layer. The real texture of daily life. The one you only discover when you stop checking out of the hotel and start checking your kids into school.
If you’re reading this, you’ve probably already had the conversation. Maybe more than once. Stuck in traffic. Lying awake doing the maths. Watching the kids fight over a screen and thinking: there has to be another way to do this.
That feeling isn’t random. It means something.
But Bali isn’t for everyone. The families who struggle here are almost always the ones who arrived with the holiday version in their heads — and met the real one without warning.
This page gives you the full picture. The good stuff, the hard stuff, and the things nobody puts in the brochure — because you deserve to know before you get on the plane, not after.
I’ve helped over 500 families from 55 countries make this move. The ones who thrive all have one thing in common: they got the right information first. [Book your free call] and let’s find out if Bali is your family’s next chapter — before you spend another year wondering.
The Real Reasons Families Move Here
Health Reset
This is one thing people don’t always think about before they arrive, but it becomes one of the most talked-about benefits once they’re here. Bali has an extraordinary wellness culture. Yoga studios on almost every corner. Excellent organic cafes and health food options at very accessible prices. Fresh tropical fruit markets. Affordable massage and bodywork, think $10 to $15 for a proper hour-long massage. Breathwork, sound healing, Ayurvedic practitioners, naturopaths. All of it available, all of it affordable.
Many families who arrive tired and run-down describe Bali as a health reset they didn’t know they needed. The sunshine, the food, the movement, the pace: it adds up fast.
Cost of Living
In most Western countries, a private pool is a luxury. A cleaner who comes every day is a luxury. Eating out four nights a week is a luxury. In Bali, these things are accessible on a middle-class income. A well-staffed villa with a pool costs a fraction of what a modest house back home in Australia, the UK, or Europe costs. Families consistently tell us they feel wealthier in Bali, not because they earn more, but because their money goes so much further.
Time Freedom
A good villa in Bali typically comes with at least one member of staff, sometimes two or three. No more spending weekends on laundry and cleaning. Affordable babysitting means date nights actually happen again. More time to work on yourself, your business, your relationship, your health. The mental load that modern family life usually carries just… lifts. Families talk about this a lot. They came for the lifestyle and stayed because they got their family back.
Endless Summer
Year-round warmth and sunshine does something to people. Families arrive tired and within a few weeks there is a visible change. More time outside, better sleep, children who are active and dirty at the end of the day in the best possible way. Don’t underestimate this factor when you’re weighing up the move. The research on sunlight and mood is very solid.
Life Closer to Nature
Rice fields outside your window. Weekend trips to waterfalls. Surfing before school. The volcano is visible on a clear morning. Kids here grow up differently. More outdoors, more active, more comfortable in the natural world. That is hard to put a dollar figure on but parents notice it.
Diverse Schooling Option
Bali has an unusual concentration of international schools for an island its size. IB and Cambridge curriculum schools, Australian curriculum, progressive nature-based schools like Green School, Montessori options, small creative schools with tight-knit communities. We have documented over 80 schools on the island for expat families. There is a lot to explore, and the right fit depends entirely on your child and your family.
Many families from non-English-speaking countries move to Bali specifically so their children grow up learning English. Others are drawn by the diversity in the classroom, kids from 30 different countries learning alongside each other is not unusual here.
“I have 4 children and finding the right school for them is our number one priority. The school guide consolidates what would be hours of research if I tried to do it myself.”
Lauren Bird, Fiji
Get The Bali School Guide
Expat Community
One of the biggest worries before the move is whether you’ll be lonely. Bali has a large, genuinely welcoming expat community. Facebook groups like Moms in Bali or Retire in Bali are very active. School communities connect fast. People look out for each other because everyone remembers what it was like to arrive and not know anyone. Most families are surprised by how quickly they feel settled.
“We have been here for 3 months and settling in nicely. The Balinese folk are so friendly, warm, and engaging, always willing to help. The friends Simone connected us to are amazing. Life’s a box of chocolates, and we just love chocolate!”
Kelvin, Retiree from Australia
Your Base for Adventure
The island itself offers an incredible range of adventures at affordable prices, from budget surf trips to luxury island escapes. And when you live in Bali, Southeast Asia opens up in a way it never does from home. Lombok is a 45-minute flight or a fast boat. Komodo is a weekend trip. Singapore, Bangkok, Japan: all within a few hours. School holiday trips become genuinely extraordinary.
Balinese Culture
The Balinese are genuinely warm people. Not in a customer-service way. In an actual human way. They love children. They will stop and talk to your kids. They will invite you to ceremonies and mean it. Living inside a functioning Hindu culture, with its offerings and music and festivals and rituals, changes how your children understand the world. We hear this from parents again and again.
Remote Work Lifestyle
Strong home internet in most expat areas, excellent co-working spaces, and a time zone that suits remote work across Asia-Pacific. For many families, the ability to keep their existing remote income while dramatically cutting living costs is what makes the move financially possible. There is also a buzzing entrepreneurial community here for those who want to build something new.
“We needed to move for work to be closer to our developers in APAC. The real value wasn’t just the planning documents, it was the customised consultations and local contacts. This tailored approach helped our small business land smoothly. A truly flexible and affordable service.”
Bertrand, Canada
Best Areas to Live
Canggu
A popular hub for entrepreneurs, remote workers, and families. Many expats now choose nearby areas like Pererenan, Seseh, and Cemagi for a quieter lifestyle while staying close to Canggu's cafés, co-working spaces, gyms, schools, and amenities. The biggest drawback is traffic, which can be significant.
Sanur
A calmer, family-friendly coastal town about 30 minutes from the airport. Known for its relaxed pace, reef-protected beach, dedicated beachfront path, and strong community feel. Popular with families and retirees looking for a more laid-back lifestyle.
Ubud
Set in the rice terraces and jungle about an hour north of the airport, Ubud is the cultural and artistic heart of Bali. A slower pace, a thriving healthy food scene, and a deeply spiritual atmosphere. Popular with nature lovers, yogis, retirees, and families drawn to a more grounded lifestyle. Note it is hilly, it is far from the beach, and it is not recommended if regular surfing is on your agenda.
Uluwatu
The most southerly point of the island, with spectacular clifftop views, world-class surf, and some of the island's best beaches. The Bukit attracts surfers but also a growing community of families and those drawn to health, yoga, and conscious living. It is drier than the rest of Bali, more upmarket in feel, and more remote from schools and services. Worth knowing before you commit.
Not sure which area is right for your family?
That is one of the most common questions we help families work through. The answer depends on your lifestyle, your children’s ages, your school shortlist, your work situation, and honestly, what kind of daily life you are trying to create. Book a free call and we can help you figure it out.
“We had an inquiry call six months before we decided to move our lil family of four…..and WOW. It is the most insanely detailed set of guides. Simone thought of EVERYTHING- a thoughtfully detailed pre-departure check list for the months, weeks, and days leading to the move.
The recommended businesses and contacts in her guide is a treasure trove of wonderful and TRUSTWORTHY people. We are so grateful!“
Grace and Brad from USA
Book A Call
Understanding The Island
4.4M
Population
5,600
km² area
17k+
Indonesian islands
Bali is a small island, about 5,600 square kilometres, sitting inside the Indonesian archipelago of over 17,000 islands. It looks tiny on a map but don’t let that fool you. A volcanic mountain spine runs across the middle of the island east to west, and deep river gorges cut through north to south. Getting from south Bali to the north coast can take two hours or more depending on traffic. The geography matters, especially when you’re choosing where to live.
The island has a population of around 4.4 million people. South Bali is where most expats settle, across a cluster of different areas like Canggu, Sanur, and Uluwatu that each feel quite distinct from one another.
Bali is the only Hindu island in Indonesia; the version of Hinduism practiced here blends elements of Buddhism and local animist traditions. The result is a living spiritual culture unlike anything else in Asia. Offerings on the ground every morning. Ceremonies that close roads. The sound of gamelan floating through the rice fields at dusk. This isn’t decoration. It’s daily life.
The Balinese organise their world around a philosophy called Tri Hita Karana, which roughly translates as three causes of wellbeing. It shapes how they relate to their gods, to each other, and to the natural world around them. Spend any real time here, and you start to understand why the Balinese genuinely seem like some of the happiest, most grounded people on earth. It rubs off on you, slowly, whether you notice it or not.
The Honest Truth About Life in Bali
Traffic is a genuine daily frustration
There is no sugarcoating this. Bali’s roads were not built for the number of vehicles now on them. Many popular areas on the island can be genuinely gridlocked during school run times. A 5km journey can take 45 minutes. Most expats end up on scooters, which is faster but comes with its own risks, especially with kids. You adjust, you time your days differently, but it never fully goes away as a feature of island life. Being late for an appointment because of the traffic becomes the norm.
Jam karet is real
Rubber time or jam karet is a real thing here. Things run late in Bali. The tradesperson says they’ll arrive at 9am, they show up at 11. A ceremony closes your road without warning. An appointment gets moved with short notice. If you’re coming from a culture where punctuality is a virtue, this will test your patience in the early months. Most long-term expats eventually find their relationship with time genuinely changes, which some people appreciate and others never quite get used to.
Plastic and rubbish is a real issue
Bali’s waste management infrastructure has not kept pace with its tourism growth. On some beaches and roadsides, plastic is visible and it’s confronting, especially if you’re used to clean streets at home. There are active community efforts working on this, including beach clean-ups and local government initiatives, and things have improved in some areas. But if environmental cleanliness is a dealbreaker for your family, this is something to experience firsthand before committing.
Island life has limits
ou can get most things in Bali, but not everything. Specialty items, certain foods from home, specific medications, some children’s products, all of these may require importing or planning ahead. For very serious medical issues, the standard advice is to fly to Singapore, which is about 2.5 hours away. There are good international clinics and GPs in the main expat areas and they are genuinely affordable, making routine healthcare very accessible. But complex or specialist care is not reliably available locally. This needs to be in your plan. Good health insurance with evacuation cover is not optional.
The visa situation requires proper attention
Indonesia’s immigration rules change. What was true two years ago may not be true today. There are multiple visa pathways depending on your situation, whether you’re a family with a working parent, a retiree, a remote worker, a business owner. Getting this wrong is costly and stressful. This is one of the areas where getting proper guidance from the start pays for itself many times over.
Noise and ceremonies don't follow a schedule
Bali has a very full ceremonial calendar. Nyepi, the Balinese new year, is a 24-hour blackout where the entire island goes silent and you are genuinely not allowed outside. Other ceremonies can involve loud music at unexpected hours. Roosters are everywhere and they do not wait for your alarm clock. Construction in Bali goes up fast and without much notice. Most people find they stop noticing after a while. But if you need very controlled quiet in your life, this is worth factoring in.
Distance from family is genuinely hard
This is the one that catches people off guard more than anything else. You are prepared for the traffic. You are not always prepared for how much you miss your mum at Christmas. Flights from Bali to Australia are manageable, 3 to 6 hours depending on the city. Flights to Europe or the US are long and expensive. Time zones make spontaneous calls difficult. If you have elderly parents or young nieces and nephews back home, the weight of being far away is real. It is worth having an honest conversation about this before you go, not to talk yourself out of it, but so you have a plan.
The expat bubble is easy to get stuck in
It is completely possible to live in Bali for years and barely interact with actual Balinese life. International school, expat cafes, expat friends, expat Facebook groups. Some people find this perfectly comfortable. Others find it starts to feel hollow after a while. The families who seem to get the most from Bali are usually the ones who made an effort to step outside it, to learn some Bahasa, to go to the ceremony they were invited to, to let their kids play with the neighbourhood children. This is not a criticism, it’s just worth being intentional about.
Founder’s Note
We are not here to talk you into this. Our job is to help you make a clear-eyed decision.
The honest truth is that Bali is not for everyone, and even for the people it is right for, it takes real adjustment. The challenges below are the ones that come up most often. They are not deal-breakers for most families, but they are real, and going in informed makes all the difference.
These lists are just a snapshot. When you work with us, we go much deeper. We prepare our clients for the specific situations they are likely to encounter based on their family, their neighbourhood, their visa situation, and their lifestyle. We also give you practical solutions, not just warnings, and that is a big part of what we do.
Learn more about Simone
- Don’t over-research
There is more information about Bali online than you could read in a lifetime, and a lot of it is out of date, inaccurate, or written by people who spent two weeks there on a wellness retreat. The most useful thing you can do is come and see for yourself, ideally with school visits, neighbourhood drives, and conversations with families who actually live here. - Have your finances properly sorted before you arrive
Know your monthly budget. Understand the exchange rate and how it affects your real income. Don’t arrive in Bali on the assumption that everything will be cheap because that depends enormously on how you live. - Get your visa right from the start
This is not nice to have. The wrong visa situation creates stress, expense, and in some cases forces families to leave the island and re-enter. Get proper advice before you arrive. - Don’t lock yourself into a long lease before you’ve lived in an area
Bali looks different from inside a 12-month lease than it does from a short-stay villa. Rent somewhere month by month for the first few months if you can, then commit once you know where you actually want to be. - Lean into it
The families who struggle in Bali are often the ones who kept one foot at home, who compared everything to how it was before, who held back from the community, waiting to see if it was going to work out. The families who thrive are the ones who have decided to really be here.
Bali is not the right move for every family. But for the families it is right for, it genuinely changes their lives in ways they didn’t expect.
If you value time over convenience, experience over stuff, warmth and community over city infrastructure, and you’re willing to accept that some things here are just going to be different, Bali has a way of delivering more than you came for.
We’ve worked with over 500 families from more than 55 countries. Families who’d never been to Bali before they booked their flights. We’ve worked with families who’d visited 20 times. We’ve worked with retirees, solo professionals, couples, young families with babies, and families with teenagers navigating final school years. Every situation is different.
If you want to talk through your specific situation, that’s exactly what the free discovery call is for.
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