On May 3, 2025, Portugal’s President signed the revised Nationality Law, doubling the residency requirement for most foreign nationals from five years to ten. The law passed parliament on April 1 with a 152-64 vote and now awaits formal publication in the Diário da República before taking effect.
For anyone who moved to Portugal — or was planning to — with citizenship in mind, this is a significant change. How much it affects you depends largely on why you wanted to move here in the first place.
What’s Changed
The Portuguese parliament has approved legislation extending the residency period required for naturalization from five to ten years. This What’s Changed
The core change is straightforward: the residency requirement for naturalization has doubled from five years to ten for most foreign nationals. There are two exceptions:
- EU citizens and CPLP nationals (citizens of Portuguese-speaking countries, like Brazil or Mozambique): seven years
- Everyone else (Americans, Brits, Canadians, and most others): ten years
A civics knowledge test will also likely be introduced as part of the naturalization process. That’s reasonable and broadly in line with what other EU countries require.
The clock now starts when AIMA issues your residence permit — not when you apply. This reverses a 2024 amendment that had been introduced specifically to protect applicants from AIMA’s own processing delays. Reverting it means that time spent waiting for the state to process your paperwork no longer counts toward your residency requirement.
What Hasn’t Changed
The visa routes that bring people to Portugal are untouched. The D7, the D8 Digital Nomad Visa, the D2 Entrepreneur Visa, the Golden Visa — all still available, with the same requirements as before. Portugal still offers some of the most accessible residency pathways in the EU, and that remains true after this law.
Once you’re a resident, the day-to-day picture is largely unchanged:
- Access to the public healthcare system
- The right to live and work in Portugal
- Access to Portuguese universities and schools
- The ability to buy property, open accounts, sign leases
- Full legal protections
Your first residence permit is valid for two years, then renews for three. At the five-year mark, permanent residency becomes available — more on that below.
How Different Groups Are Affected
Retirees: Probably Fine
If you’re retiring to Portugal, this change likely won’t impact you much. What most retirees really want is the lifestyle, safety, and access to Portugal’s public healthcare system—all of which you get with a D7 visa (or any other residency visa).
Citizenship is nice to have, but it’s not the main draw. If your move was always intended to be permanent with no plans to relocate elsewhere, the extended timeline is simply a minor inconvenience rather than a dealbreaker.
That said, it would have been nice to have the option to move elsewhere after five years if you wanted to.
Digital Nomads and Remote Workers: It’s Complicated
Digital nomads face a trickier situation because, by definition, they want mobility—and Portugal’s physical stay requirements have always been restrictive.
During temporary residency, you can’t be out of the country for more than six consecutive months or eight non-consecutive months during the validity of your permit (two years for the first permit, three for the second). That’s tough for true nomads. However, once you hit permanent residency at the five-year mark, the rules loosen up significantly.
For remote workers who’ve traveled the world and are now ready to settle down, Portugal remains attractive. But this is typically a younger demographic (20s to 50s) who may have plans to eventually move to other EU countries. The ten-year commitment becomes more burdensome when you’re potentially tied to one job for a decade, limiting career opportunities.
The flexibility to move between EU countries exists even without Portuguese citizenship—it just becomes easier with permanent residency. But it doesn’t provide the same freedom as having an EU passport.
Workers: A Major Setback
One of the legislation’s explicit goals was to prevent people from coming to Portugal, working for five years, getting citizenship, and then moving to Germany or Ireland for higher wages.
For low-skilled workers: If that was your plan, Portugal just became significantly less appealing. Living and working in Portugal for 10-15 years means giving up substantial earning potential compared to higher-wage EU countries. However, Portugal remains one of the easiest entry points into the EU, partly due to its low minimum wage requirements. For someone in India or Bangladesh, 15 years in Portugal may still be more attractive than staying home—but if better options exist, they’ll likely choose those instead.
For highly skilled workers: This change significantly impacts Portugal’s ability to attract top talent. When Ireland and Germany can offer higher salaries and better career opportunities, Portugal’s main advantages were the five-year citizenship path, lifestyle benefits, and lower cost of living. Highly skilled workers have more mobility and options, making them less likely to commit to a decade in Portugal when other opportunities exist.
Families: Age Matters
For families, the impact depends heavily on your children’s ages.
If you’re moving for lifestyle—safety, quality of life, bilingual education—nothing has changed. Portugal still delivers on all of that from day one.
The problem arises for families with children aged six and older. One of the biggest perks of Portuguese citizenship is that your children could study at universities across the EU—France, Germany, Ireland—paying EU rates instead of international fees. That’s a massive financial advantage, potentially saving tens of thousands of euros.
But if your child is already six years old, by the time you get citizenship 10+ years later, they’ll be past university age. They’ll either need to pay international fees or you’ll need to find another solution.
If you have toddlers or infants, you’re fine. If your kids are in primary school or older, the citizenship benefit for education is essentially off the table.
Golden Visa Holders: Extended Timeline, Extended Investment
Portugal’s Golden Visa requires either a €500,000 investment or a €250,000 donation. In return, you only need to spend seven days per year in Portugal to maintain residency.
If you’re using it as a backup plan—a safety net in case your home country becomes unstable—nothing changes. Your residency remains available whenever you need it.
If citizenship was the main goal, this hurts. You’re now holding your investment in Portugal for 10+ years instead of five, tying up your capital for twice as long.
The Golden Visa will likely remain popular because Portugal is one of the few EU countries still offering one (Spain and Malta have scrapped theirs). Greece offers citizenship after seven years, but you need to carefully compare investment options and ask yourself: Would I make this investment even without the citizenship benefit?
There’s also a trust issue. Golden Visa holders have endured significant challenges—taking risks to invest in Portuguese companies they know little about, only to face 2-3 year application processing times. Now the rules are changing suddenly. Even if Portugal remains a good deal on paper, this instability may make potential investors more cautious about committing.
The Bottom Line
If you’re moving to Portugal because you actually want to live there—yes, absolutely. The lifestyle, healthcare, safety, and permanent residency benefits remain intact. The extended citizenship timeline is simply part of the journey.
If you wanted a fast track to EU citizenship to move elsewhere—no, this is a major setback. You’re better off exploring other options or reconsidering whether you’re truly committed to Portugal long-term.
The five-year citizenship path was Portugal’s secret weapon. It separated them from countries with stronger economies but harder visa requirements. Now that advantage is gone.
Portugal is still easier to enter than most EU countries, and it still offers an excellent quality of life at a reasonable cost. But it’s no longer the obvious choice it once was. The question you need to ask yourself is simple: Am I willing to commit to actually living in Portugal for a decade, or was I just looking for the easiest path to an EU passport?
Your answer to that question will tell you everything you need to know about whether this change matters to you.
Thinking about Moving to Portugal?