Austria document photos online

Austria's neutrality wasn't won on a battlefield but written into law: after a decade of four-power Allied occupation, the Austrian State Treaty was signed on 15 May 1955, and on 26 October that year parliament voluntarily enshrined "perpetual neutrality" in the constitution to persuade Soviet troops to leave. That single document restored full sovereignty, became the country's national day, and shaped the identity stamped into every Austrian passport since. Today that passport opens 188 destinations visa-free and ranks among the world's most powerful, a quiet testament to a nation that traded military alliances for diplomatic reach.

• Passport power Austria's passport ranks joint 4th on the 2025 Henley Passport Index, granting visa-free or visa-on-arrival access to 188 destinations worldwide.
• Citizenship Since September 2020 Austria lets descendants of those who fled Nazi persecution reclaim citizenship by simple declaration, with no requirement to renounce their current passport, extending eligibility to children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren alike.
• Currency Austria's old schilling, introduced in 1925 and nicknamed the "Alpine dollar" for its stability, never truly expired: the national bank still exchanges schilling banknotes and coins for euros indefinitely, with no deadline.
• Euro switch When Austria adopted the euro, the schilling was locked in at the oddly precise rate of 13.7603 schilling to one euro before notes and coins vanished from tills in early 2002.
• Neutrality Austria's full independence was restored by the 1955 State Treaty only after it agreed to declare "perpetual neutrality" in its constitution, a Cold War bargain that still keeps the country out of military alliances.
• Oldest mine The salt mines at Hallstatt have been worked for roughly 7,000 years, making them the world's oldest, and a wooden staircase found in the tunnels dates back about 2,800 years.
• EU & travel Austrians voted 67% in favour of joining the European Union in a 1994 referendum, entered the EU in 1995, and now travel borderless across the Schengen Area they fully joined in 1997.
• Oldest restaurant St. Peter Stiftskulinarium in Salzburg was first documented in 803 AD, more than 1,200 years ago, and is widely regarded as the oldest restaurant in the world.
• Vienna icon The Wiener Riesenrad, built in 1897 for Emperor Franz Joseph's golden jubilee, is the world's oldest operating Ferris wheel and was rebuilt within three years after burning in 1944.