MoscowRussia
Moscow is a U.S. Foreign Service post in Russia, in the State Department's Europe & Eurasia bureau, with a 35% hardship differential and 20% post allowance (COLA). The current U.S. travel advisory for Russia is Level 4, do not travel. Daily life runs on Russian. Bidders will find summers to 77°F, winters to 12°F, ~134 rain days/yr. This post report brings together allowances, schools, safety, weather, flights, embassy holidays, and anonymous community reviews from Foreign Service families who have served in Moscow.
What stands out
How Moscow differs from the other 255 posts, worked out from the data on this page.
- Note: 35% hardship differential, higher than 91% of posts
- Note: Away-from-post schooling is funded at every grade, K to 12
- Worth knowing: Level 4 travel advisory: terrorism, civil unrest and wrongful detention
- Worth knowing: WhatsApp, Signal and Telegram blocked in most network tests
- Worth knowing: About 52 unhealthy-air days a year, worst in Feb to Mar
- Worth knowing: No spouse work agreement on State's list
Against Washington, DC
The same measurements, taken the same way, for the city most bidders are leaving.
- Hottest month averages 77°F, 11° cooler than a Washington summer
- Coldest month averages lows of 12°F, 16° colder than a Washington winter
- About as many rainy days as Washington (134 a year)
- Everyday prices run about 65% below US levels
- About 52 unhealthy-air days a year, against 2 in Washington
Served in Moscow? Leave an anonymous review, the next family bidding on Moscow gets a real answer.
Write a reviewSnapshot
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 202613 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 Moscow's allowances actually do to your pay, estimate only
| Base salary | $100,000 |
| Hardship differential (35%)taxable, % of base | $35,000 |
| COLA (20%)non-taxable, % of spendable income | $9,700 |
| Estimated annual total | $144,700 |
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 2026-11-02. Verify current rates in the DSSR and with your HR office before making career decisions.
Community & mission
Community ratings COMMUNITY-REPORTED
Loading community ratings
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
- Family members working locally
- Not on State's list: Russia has neither a bilateral work agreement nor a de facto arrangement listed, so working on the local economy is generally not open to family members. Jobs inside the mission are separate.Status changes, and the HR officer at post has the final word. State's list ↗
- Language training
- Russian is an FSI Category III language: about 44 weeks of full-time study to reach professional working proficiency.Applies to language-designated jobs; whether yours is one is in the bid list. FSI ↗
- Allowances source
- allowances.state.gov (public) · fetched 2026-11-02
Housing and EFM notes are crowdsourced from the community, never from internal systems.
Location
- Local time right now
- --:--:--
- Coordinates
- 55.76, 37.62
- Region
- Europe & Eurasia
- Elevation
- 140 m (459 ft)
Life at post
The parts the fact sheet leaves out
Getting away
Nonstop routes for R&R, long weekends, and getting home
Cheapest weekend round trips · typical fares
Also nonstop
Family visiting? US passport holders need a visa in advance.
~$ = typical round-trip economy fare, refreshed monthly, plan with it, don't book with it. Routes fetched from Wikipedia (Airlines & destinations), 2026-11-01.
Health
Security & context
- Official U.S. travel advisory
- Level 4: Do Not Travel Read the full advisory ↗Risks the advisory names: terrorism, civil unrest and wrongful detention.Real data: travel.state.gov, fetched 2026-11-02
- Earthquake exposure
- Low seismicity, 0 quakes of M5+ within 300 km since 2000.Real data: USGS earthquake catalog.
- What crime looks like
- Governance & daily freedom
- Relations with the US
Home & daily life
- Messaging apps
- WhatsApp, Signal and Telegram are blocked or disrupted in most tests (80% of 99,734, 85% of 135,859, 85% of 95,120). Plan on a VPN or an alternative.Measured by OONI volunteers over the last 60 days, country-wide. A network test, not a legal statement.
- Power & plugs
Plug type: C/F · 230V 50Hz , US plugs won't fit, bring adapters. Phone and laptop chargers are fine on 230V; only US-only appliances (hair dryers, kitchen gear) need a transformer.
- Household help
- Pets
- Quarantine: none
- Cert must be issued and APHIS-endorsed within 5 days of travel; exam up to 14 days prior; max 5 pets.
- Official import requirements for Russia (USDA APHIS) →
Getting around & fitting in
- Getting around
- Rules of the road (and the bar)
- Drives on the rightDriving age 18Drinking age 18Road deaths 12/100k (US ~14)
- Language
- Russian
Tell the posts page what you speak to filter all posts by your languages. It is never shown to anyone.
LGBTQ+ travelers
Official State Dept guidance for Russia · page updated December 29, 2025
Russian law bans distributing "LGB propaganda,” and the Russian Supreme Court has declared the so-called “international LGB movement” an extremist organization. It is considered a crime to support the human rights of gay and lesbian people in Russia. Discrimination based on sexual orientation is widespread in Russia. Acts of violence and harassment targeting gay and lesbian individuals occur. Government officials have made derogatory comments about gay and lesbian persons and violence against them continues. There have been credible reports of arrest, torture, and extrajudicial killing of gay and lesbian persons in Chechnya conducted by Chechen regional authorities.
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
- Russian ruble · 80.31 RUB/USD. Has strengthened sharply against the dollar over 24 months (+18% vs. USD). A weakening currency stretches a dollar salary further; a strengthening one quietly shrinks it.
- Local inflation
- 8.7% CPI inflation (2025). High inflation means posted prices age fast, and COLA reviews chase reality.
- Overall price level
- Local prices run about 35% of US prices overall (World Bank PPP, 2025). Imported and expat-favorite goods usually cost more than this average suggests.US 100%
Schools & reviews
Schools
Education allowance
The yearly maximum State reimburses per child. Office of Allowances, effective 11/01/2026.
- Grades K-1
- $47,800
- Grades 2-3
- $49,550
- Grades 4-5
- $50,600
- Grades 6-8
- $51,750
- Grades 9-10
- $52,850
- Grades 11-12
- $54,350
A higher away-from-post rate of $88,150 applies for every grade. That is the rate that funds boarding school, and the Office generally sets it above the at-post rate only for grades it does not consider adequately served locally.
No school details yet for Moscow. Served here with kids? The review form asks which schools you used and how support needs went; your answer builds this section.
The Moscow 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
Anonymous by default · countingReviews publish through the Post Report form and appear here immediately. Loading the latest...
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.
Keep exploring
Posts like Moscow
Closest overall profiles across all metrics, worth a look before you finalize a list.