LimaPeru
Lima is a U.S. Foreign Service post in Peru, in the State Department's Western Hemisphere bureau, with a 15% hardship differential and 10% post allowance (COLA). The current U.S. travel advisory for Peru is Level 2, exercise increased caution. It is a designated R&R post. Daily life runs on Spanish. Bidders will find 4 international schools for mission families and gray, humid winters under coastal fog; mild sunny summers. Almost no rain. This post report brings together allowances, schools, safety, weather, flights, embassy holidays, and anonymous community reviews from Foreign Service families who have served in Lima.
Lima is a foodie capital on Pacific cliffs, nine million people, world-top-10 restaurants, and a US-East-Coast time zone that keeps family calls and remote work humane. The garúa fog is real; so is everything the food writers say.
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Climate & weather
Temperature range, F
Rain days
Air quality, monthly PM2.5 (ug/m3)
Green under 12 (good) · amber to 35 (moderate) · red above (unhealthy for sensitive groups)
Real data: Open-Meteo archive (2022-2024 daily, temperature, rain, daylight) and Open-Meteo air quality API (CAMS, hourly PM2.5 2022-2025), aggregated to monthly normals.
Public holidays 202614 national holidays
Real data: Nager holidays API. Local and religious observances vary; the embassy publishes the official combined holiday schedule.
Pay & allowances
Paycheck simulator
What Lima's allowances actually do to your pay, estimate only
| Base salary | $100,000 |
| Hardship differential (15%)taxable, % of base | $15,000 |
| COLA (10%)non-taxable, % of spendable income | $4,850 |
| Estimated annual total | $119,850 |
Estimate only, for planning purposes; figures may not reflect the most recent DSSR updates. COLA is applied to spendable income (approximated here at 48.5% of salary, the official tables vary by salary and family size). Grade/step fills from the official Overseas Schedule (includes Overseas Comparability Pay); taxes and premium-pay caps are not modeled. Allowance rates: allowances.state.gov, fetched 2026-09-21. Verify current rates in the DSSR and with your HR office before making career decisions.
Community & mission
Community ratings COMMUNITY-REPORTED
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What do these categories mean?
- Housing
- Community average (1-5) for assigned housing: size, condition, commute, and how the housing pool compares to expectations. Housing type (government-leased, compound, apartments) is on each post page.
- School rating
- Community average (1-5) of how families rated the schools their kids actually attended: academics, support for arriving mid-year, special needs, and how happy the kids were. Reviewers' grade levels vary, read individual reviews for your kids' ages.
- Morale
- Community average (1-5) for overall post morale, the intangible sum of community, leadership, workload, and whether people would bid it again. Often the number seasoned bidders read first.
- Internet (community rating)
- How livable the internet actually felt (1-5): reliability and VPN-friendliness, not just headline speed. Can diverge from the measured Mbps, outages and throttling show up here first.
- Spouse / partner employment
- Community average (1-5) of how realistic it is for an accompanying spouse or partner (EFM) to work at this post. It reflects three paths: jobs inside the mission (EFM positions), local-economy work (depends on the bilateral work agreement and language), and remote work for a U.S. employer (depends on time zone and internet). 1 ≈ career pause likely · 5 ≈ multiple realistic options.
- Healthcare
- Community average (1-5) for healthcare at post: local care you would actually use, English-speaking providers, and how much falls back on regional medevac, a real factor for families and chronic conditions.
Foreign Service overlay
- Housing
- Apartments in Miraflores/San Isidro; houses in La Molina near FDR
- EFM employment
- Big mission with steady EFM openings; telework-friendly time zone.
- Allowances source
- allowances.state.gov (public) · fetched 2026-09-21
- Allowance trend (4 cycles)
- Diff.2023: 15% â–¼COLA2023: 5% â–²
Housing and EFM notes are crowdsourced from the community, never from internal systems.
Location
- Local time right now
- --:--:--
- Coordinates
- -12.05, -77.04
- Region
- Western Hemisphere
- Elevation
- 139 m (456 ft)
Life at post
The parts the fact sheet leaves out
Getting away
Nonstop routes for R&R, long weekends, and getting home · 0 R&R trips at this post · official R&R relief point: Miami, Florida
Cheapest weekend round trips · typical fares
Also nonstop
Family visiting? US passport holders enter visa-free, stays up to 90 days.
~$ = typical round-trip economy fare, refreshed monthly, plan with it, don't book with it. Routes fetched from Wikipedia (Airlines & destinations), 2026-09-04.
Paracas dunes and islands, Cusco and the Sacred Valley a short flight away, surf breaks inside the city, and a world-class food crawl every single weekend. The Amazon is ninety minutes by air.
Food & groceries
- The food scene
- Ceviche, lomo saltado, world-top-50 restaurants at every price point, spectacular produce year-round.
- Hard to find
- Very little, Lima has almost everything; specific US brands just cost more.
- The community packing list
- Very little is essential, specific US brands, favorite kids' snacks, and a good light-therapy lamp for fog season.
Health
Good private clinics (Anglo-Americana and peers); most care handled in-country. High-end dental and elective care are a bargain.
- Malaria (CDC)
- Areas under 2,500 m east of Andes incl Iquitos; A-P, doxycycline, mefloquine, or tafenoquine
- Yellow fever (CDC)
- Vaccine recommended for some areas.
Security & context
- Official U.S. travel advisory
- Level 2: Exercise Increased Caution Read the full advisory ↗Real data: travel.state.gov, fetched 2026-09-21
- Earthquake exposure
- High seismicity, 145 quakes of M5+ within 300 km since 2000.Real data: USGS earthquake catalog.
- What crime looks like
- Phone-snatching and theft are the daily concern, keep it off the street. Violent crime concentrates away from expat districts.
- Governance & daily freedom
- Turbulent democracy, presidents change often, but daily life is unaffected and speech is free.
- Relations with the US
- Friendly, with deep trade and cultural ties.
Home & daily life
- Power & plugs
Plug type: A/B/C · 220V 60Hz , outlets look American but carry 220V , phone and laptop chargers are fine (they handle 100-240V), but US-only appliances like hair dryers will fry without a transformer.
- The housing you'll actually get
- Miraflores and San Isidro apartments with ocean or park views for most; La Molina houses near FDR for school families. Buildings are modern with real amenities, housing rarely disappoints here.
- Household help
- Widespread: housekeepers run $300-450/month, and live-out nannies with references circulate constantly through the mission community.
- Pets
- Quarantine: None with paperworkStart prep: ~1 month
- Health certificate validity window is short; time the vet visit carefully. Simple import, excellent affordable vets, and dog-crazed parks, the Miraflores malecón is a golden retriever runway.
- Official import requirements for Peru (USDA APHIS) →
Getting around & fitting in
- Getting around
- Traffic is the boss. Most people use drivers or apps (Uber and Cabify are cheap); brave souls self-drive. Crossing town at rush hour is a lifestyle decision, choose housing by commute.
- Rules of the road (and the bar)
- Drives on the rightDriving age 18Drinking age 18Road deaths 13.6/100k (US ~14)
- Language
- Spanish
Tell the posts page what you speak to filter all posts by your languages. It is never shown to anyone.
- Spanish, full stop, daily life runs on it, and post language training pays off immediately. English works at FDR and the fancy restaurants.
- Expat & community scene
- A large mission and international business community; social life orbits restaurants, obviously. The winter gray dampens moods, the Andes are the antidote.
LGBTQ+ travelers
Official State Dept guidance for Peru · page updated August 20, 2026
There are no legal restrictions on same-sex sexual relations or the organization of events focused on sexual orientation in Peru. Same-sex marriage is illegal in Peru and same-sex marriages from other countries are not recognized. Two same-sex parents are not allowed to be listed on the birth certificate for a child born in Peru. See our Gay and Lesbian Travelers Information page and our Human Rights report s for further details.
Same-sex spouse and MOH accreditation is decided post by post and is not published publicly. Community reviews are the best read on how it works here in practice, and glifaa (LGBTQ+ employees of foreign-affairs agencies) maintains member resources.
Money & prices
- Local currency
- Peruvian sol · 3.38 PEN/USD. Has strengthened against the dollar over 24 months (+10% vs. USD). A weakening currency stretches a dollar salary further; a strengthening one quietly shrinks it.
- Local inflation
- 1.5% CPI inflation (2025). High inflation means posted prices age fast, and COLA reviews chase reality.
- Overall price level
- Local prices run about 51% of US prices overall (World Bank PPP, 2025). Imported and expat-favorite goods usually cost more than this average suggests.US 100%
Medications & prescriptionsADHD stimulants: OK with prescription
- ADHD stimulants (Adderall, Ritalin class)
- OK with prescription. Personal quantities with a prescription are routine.
- Other controlled classes (benzos, opioids, sleep meds)
- Standard prescription rules for controlled classes; keep the Rx handy.
- Refills on the ground
- Lima pharmacies are well stocked; many US brands have local equivalents.
Curated snapshot, not legal advice: rules change and enforcement varies. Verify every medication by substance name with the INCB listing and post's health unit before you bid, and again before you pack. Community reviews keep the refill reality current.
Things to do5 picks from people who lived there · links open Google Maps
Schools & reviews
Schools
FDR is a destination school, IB, a huge campus, real depth in sports and arts, with Markham and Newton as strong British/IB alternatives. School-run traffic dictates neighborhood choice.
The Lima directory is brand new. Served here? Pass along the pediatrician or dry cleaner the next family will need.
Free with an account, no Premium required. Recommendations only, never ratings.
Community reviews
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Deep researchCurated links for going past what fits on one page
External sites open in a new tab. PostCompass links out rather than scraping, public data stays with its source and its context.
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