Bulgaria is set to join the euro as of January 2026, becoming the 21st European Union member to adopt it. Here’s how they did it.
Back in 1999, 11 European countries ditched their national currencies and joined together to form the eurozone.
Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal and Spain were the first adopters of the single currency, which was a long-stated goal of the European Union.
EU members are expected to enter the eurozone once they meet certain requirements -- known as convergence criteria -- but many have fallen short, either by accident or by design.
Denmark, for example, has a cast-iron opt-out from euro membership, as did the United Kingdom before Brexit. Other countries like Sweden, Hungary and Czechia deliberately fail to meet the currency’s requirements for varying political reasons.
Bulgaria, however, has long wanted to join the eurozone but a failure to bring inflation down sufficiently has delayed its accession for a number of years. Until this week, when the European Central Bank announced that the Balkan country is now ready.
That is because Bulgaria was able to show that prices are stable, public finances are sustainable, interest rates are in good shape and exchange rates are not fluctuating too much.
Essentially, the euro countries need prospective members to show a clean bill of health, so there is a lower risk of the currency being dragged down by the bad finances of a new member.
Pending a decision by eurozone finance ministers in July, that means Bulgaria will become the 21st EU member of the currency in just over six months' time. The last time this happened was in 2023, when Croatia joined.
It took Croatia 10 years since obtaining EU membership to adopt the currency, it will have taken Bulgaria nearly 20 to do the same.
The next country that may join the eurozone could be Romania, as it is the only EU member yet to adopt the currency that actually wants to. However, its monetary policy has failed to achieve what is needed to be granted membership.
Government officials want to join the so-called euro waiting room in 2026. Once that happens, a country’s currency must be pegged to the euro and not fluctuate too much for a two-year-long period.
If that is achieved then the ECB can do a final health check and finance ministers from the existing members must vote on whether to accept a new member. Under a best case scenario, Romania would only join in 2029.
By a strange quirk of geopolitics, there are six non-EU countries that use the euro. Andorra, Monaco, San Marino and Vatican City have all adopted it as part of monetary agreements with the bloc.
However, Kosovo and Montenegro both adopted the currency unilaterally as both countries used to use the German Mark, which stopped being legal tender after Germany itself started using the euro.
Kosovo’s usage was to some extent achieved with the help of the European Central Bank, which helped get euros into circulation, whereas Montenegro’s position has in the past been condemned by EU officials.
Both countries are aiming to join the EU proper and it is still unclear how using the euro before that process is complete will affect their membership prospects.
EU enlargement is supposed to be a priority policy up until 2030 and given that Montenegro is one of the most advanced candidate countries waiting in the queue, it might be that the former Yugoslav state becomes the next formal eurozone member.
