When a colonial charter is completed, the new lands officially come under your nation’s authority but what you do with them is entirely up to you. EUV offers several options for how to manage freshly colonized territories, each with its own strategic implications:

Create a New Colonial Subject – Establish a semi-autonomous entity that governs the territory on your behalf. If the region has low market access, this also creates a new market, helping the colony develop economically.

Play as the Colonial Subject – Step into the shoes of your new colony, guiding its growth and carving out a unique destiny separate from its mother country. Similar to the first option, if market access is low, a new market center is created.

Integrate into an Existing Colonial Subject – If the new province borders one of your existing colonial subjects, you may fold it into their domain, strengthening and consolidating their power.

Retain Direct Control – Keep the land as part of your core empire, allowing you to exploit its resources directly but also requiring more active management and of course less control.

Colonial subjects in EU5 are not restricted to the New World. They can be established anywhere across the globe reflecting the truly global reach of empire-building during this era.

The choice is yours…

Depending on where you colonize, sending pops to your newly established colonies may be necessary to fully utilize the resources there. You can do this through the Send People to the Colonies cabinet action, unlocked as an advance in the Age of Discovery.

In fertile but barely populated locations, population growth will be faster than back at home, leading to huge population growth opportunities that you can also increase with the settlement building. This building is not limited to colonies but requires a location to have below 5% population capacity, a requirement that will be more prevalent in new world locations.