OuagadougouBurkina Faso
Ouagadougou is a U.S. Foreign Service post in Burkina Faso, in the State Department's Sub-Saharan Africa bureau, with a 25% hardship differential and 42% post allowance (COLA). The current U.S. travel advisory for Burkina Faso is Level 4, do not travel. It is a designated R&R post. Daily life runs on French. Bidders will find 1 international school for mission families and summers to 102°F, winters to 63°F, ~86 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 Ouagadougou.
What stands out
How Ouagadougou differs from the other 255 posts, worked out from the data on this page.
- In its favour: 42% COLA, higher than 80% of posts
- Worth knowing: Level 4 travel advisory: crime, terrorism, kidnapping and health
- Worth knowing: About 87 unhealthy-air days a year, worst in Dec to Feb
- Worth knowing: Hottest month averages highs of 102°F
Against Washington, DC
The same measurements, taken the same way, for the city most bidders are leaving.
- Hottest month averages 102°F, 14° hotter than a Washington summer
- Coldest month averages lows of 63°F, 35° milder than a Washington winter
- Rain on only 86 days a year, against 124 in Washington
- Everyday prices run about 63% below US levels
- About 87 unhealthy-air days a year, against 2 in Washington
Served in Ouagadougou? Leave an anonymous review, the next family bidding on Ouagadougou 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.
Embassy holidays 2026 (official)21 closure days
local US federal
Real data: official embassy holiday schedule ↗. Observed-at-post dates; religious holiday dates are subject to lunar confirmation.
Pay & allowances
Paycheck simulator
What Ouagadougou's allowances actually do to your pay, estimate only
| Base salary | $100,000 |
| Hardship differential (25%)taxable, % of base | $25,000 |
| COLA (42%)non-taxable, % of spendable income | $20,370 |
| Estimated annual total | $145,370 |
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
- De facto work arrangement: by established reciprocal practice, family members may apply for a permit to work in Burkina Faso.Status changes, and the HR officer at post has the final word. State's list ↗
- Language training
- French is an FSI Category I language: about 30 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
- 12.37, -1.52
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
- Elevation
- 296 m (971 ft)
Life at post
The parts the fact sheet leaves out
Getting away
Nonstop routes for R&R, long weekends, and getting home · official R&R relief point: Paris, France
Cheapest weekend round trips · typical fares
Also nonstop
Family visiting? US passport holders need a visa in advance (Visa services suspended per Wikipedia). Yellow fever certificate required for all arrivals.
~$ = 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
- Malaria (CDC)
- All areas (P. falciparum); prophylaxis recommended for all travelers
- Yellow fever (CDC)
- Vaccine recommended for all travelers; certificate required for all arrivals.
Security & context
- Official U.S. travel advisory
- Level 4: Do Not Travel Read the full advisory ↗Risks the advisory names: crime, terrorism, kidnapping and health.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
- No blocking measured: WhatsApp, Signal and Telegram connect normally in network tests from Burkina Faso.Measured by OONI volunteers over the last 60 days, country-wide. A network test, not a legal statement.
- Power & plugs
Plug type: C/E · 220V 50Hz , US plugs won't fit, bring adapters. Phone and laptop chargers are fine on 220V; only US-only appliances (hair dryers, kitchen gear) need a transformer.
- Household help
- Pets
- Quarantine: none
- APHIS lists only an international health certificate; confirm specifics with Burkina Faso authorities.
- Official import requirements for Burkina Faso (USDA APHIS) →
Getting around & fitting in
- Getting around
- Rules of the road (and the bar)
- Drives on the rightRoad deaths 31/100k (US ~14)
- Language
- French
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 Burkina Faso · page updated May 07, 2026
Burkina Faso’s Persons and Family Code states that “any behavior likely to promote homosexual and similar practices is prohibited and punishable by imprisonment of two to five years and a fine of two million (2,000,000) to ten million (10,000,000) francs.” Same-sex civil unions or marriages are not recognized by the government, nor do gay and lesbian advocacy organizations receive official recognition by the government. See our Gay and Lesbian Travelers page and section 6 of our Human Rights report 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
- West African CFA franc · 585.46 XOF/USD. Has held steady against the dollar over 24 months (+3% vs. USD). A weakening currency stretches a dollar salary further; a strengthening one quietly shrinks it.
- Local inflation
- -0.6% CPI inflation (2025). High inflation means posted prices age fast, and COLA reviews chase reality.
- Overall price level
- Local prices run about 37% 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-5
- $22,700
- Grades 6-8
- $24,600
- Grades 9-12
- $25,250
A higher away-from-post rate of $92,950 applies for grades 9 to 12. 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.
The Ouagadougou 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 Ouagadougou
Closest overall profiles across all metrics, worth a look before you finalize a list.