Cost of living in Sao Tome and Principe
60.0 with the United States at 100
Prices in Sao Tome and Principe are 40% cheaper than the United States, and it ranks 80th of 204 countries by price level (dearest first). Figures are for 2024.
Against New Zealand it is 33% cheaper.
Compared with its region
Sao Tome and Principe against the Sub-Saharan Africa countries closest to it on price level.
- Sao Tome and Principe 60.0
- Comoros 58.3
- Seychelles 57.4
- Cabo Verde 54.1
- South Sudan 51.6
- Gabon 48.3
- Congo, Dem. Rep. 46.7
- Burundi 45.7
- Equatorial Guinea 45.5
SOURCE·World Bank — International Comparison Program·PPP conversion factor for household final consumption, and the official market exchange rate. CC BY 4.0.·REVIEWED AUG 2026
What is dear and what is cheap
No category breakdown is published for Sao Tome and Principe. Eurostat's category price levels cover Europe and a handful of others; Sao Tome and Principe is outside that programme, so this site has a national figure and no basket detail. Rather than borrow a plausible number from a neighbour, the gap is left where it is.
What this figure is, and is not
- It is an index, not a price. 60.0 means the general level of consumer prices, with the US at 100. It is not a shopping bill and this site never quotes one.
- It is national, not city. Sao Tome is almost certainly dearer than this. National averages cannot answer a city question.
- It is not your budget. What you actually spend depends on rent, transport and habits far more than on the national average.
How the price level is worked out
- The World Bank publishes a purchasing power parity for household consumption — how much local currency buys the same basket as one US dollar — and the official market exchange rate for the same year.
- The price level is simply PPP ÷ exchange rate × 100. If a basket needs 1.50 New Zealand dollars per US dollar of purchasing power but the market hands you 1.65 New Zealand dollars for that dollar, New Zealand's prices sit at 1.50 ÷ 1.65 = 91% of the US level.
- Nothing is modelled, smoothed or estimated. You can reproduce every number on this site from two public figures.
- Where Eurostat also publishes a price level for the same country and year, the two are compared and the gap is printed — including when they disagree.
SOURCE·World Bank — International Comparison Program·PPP conversion factor for household final consumption, and the official market exchange rate. CC BY 4.0.·REVIEWED AUG 2026
SOURCE·World Bank ICP PPPs + Eurostat price level indices·price levels derived as PPP ÷ exchange rate, see method·REVIEWED AUG 2026