Visa and residence permit

Who this guide is for

• EU, EEA and Swiss citizens: no visa and no permit. After three months you register at the town hall: it is all in the guide on residency.
• Non-EU family members of an EU or Italian citizen — spouse, registered partner, children, dependent parents: you have your own, simpler route, explained further down.
• British citizens: since Brexit you are non-EU. The exception is anyone already living in Italy before 2021, who keeps the rights of the Withdrawal Agreement.
• Everyone else: this guide is step one. Without a residence title you cannot take up residency, and without residency almost everything else stalls.

1. The visa, before you leave

There are two families of visa. The Schengen visa (type C) covers stays of up to 90 days: tourism, business, visits. The national visa (type D) is for staying longer, and it is the one you need to move.

You apply for the type D visa at the Italian consulate in the country where you live, before you travel. You cannot apply from Italy. Even if you can enter without a visa for 90 days — from the United States, Canada or Australia, for example — moving here still requires a type D visa.

The purpose of the visa decides the type of permit you will get, and changing it later is hard or impossible. Entering as a tourist to look for work on the spot generally does not let you convert your stay.

Purpose	For whom	What it takes, in essence
Employment	Anyone with a job offer from an employer in Italy	The nulla osta requested by the employer, usually within the annual quotas (decreto flussi)
Self-employment	Professionals, entrepreneurs, freelancers	Professional requirements, resources and the certifications the activity calls for
Family reunification	Anyone joining a family member who lives legally in Italy	A nulla osta requested by the family member in Italy, with adequate income and housing
Study	Students enrolled on a course or at a university	Enrolment, means of support, health insurance
Elective residence	People living on their own income: pensions, rent, investments	Stable, substantial income and housing. You may not work
Digital nomads and remote workers	People working remotely for clients or companies outside Italy	Since 2024, outside the quotas: a minimum income — sources cite around €28,000 a year —, experience, housing and health insurance

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs website has a questionnaire that tells you, from your nationality, country of residence and purpose, which visa to apply for and which documents to bring. Each consulate then has its own lists and waiting times: check them there, because the consulate decides.

2. Within 8 working days: the permit application

Once you are in Italy, the residence permit application must be filed within 8 working days of arrival. It is a legal deadline (article 5 of the Consolidated Immigration Act) and you should not let it slip.

With the postal kit or at the questura

For the most common purposes — work, family, study — you apply with the postal kit: a yellow envelope you collect and send from post offices with a Sportello Amico desk. For other purposes you go straight to the questura, the provincial police headquarters. The consulate tells you which applies when it issues the visa, or the questura will.

Fill in the kit carefully: a wrong form comes back and costs you weeks. Many patronati — free advice centres run by trade unions and associations — and some town halls help you fill it in at no cost.

The receipt counts as your permit

At the post office you receive a receipt with a code. Keep it with your passport: until the card arrives, it is what shows your stay is legal, and it lets you do much of the rest, from residency to joining the public health service.

Then comes the appointment at the questura for fingerprints and a photo. With the receipt code you can follow your file on the Polizia di Stato website, which also tells you when the card is ready to collect.

3. Short stays: the declaration of presence

If you come to Italy for less than 90 days — to look for a home before the move, for instance — you do not need a permit, but the law asks for a declaration of presence within 8 days of arrival.

In two cases it is already done. If you enter Italy from a country outside the Schengen area, the entry stamp in your passport counts. If you stay in a hotel or other licensed accommodation, the accommodation registers you. Otherwise — if you arrive from another Schengen country and stay with friends or in a flat — you make the declaration at the questura.

The declaration of presence does not allow you to work and does not turn into a permit.

4. The integration agreement

Anyone entering for the first time who is over 16 and applies for a permit of at least one year signs an integration agreement with the State.

On signing you receive 16 credits. Within three months you are called to a free civic orientation session: miss it and you lose 15. Within two years, extendable by one, you must reach 30 credits, earned mainly by showing Italian at A2 level and knowledge of civic life. Courses and certificates add credits; criminal convictions and serious administrative penalties take them away.

It is less threatening than it sounds, but take it seriously: anyone who falls to zero credits risks having the permit revoked. Italian courses at the CPIA, the public adult-education centres, are free and count towards the agreement.

5. Renewal

You renew through the same procedure, usually the postal kit, and the questura checks that the conditions still hold: work or income, housing, family.

Being late does not automatically mean refusal, but an expired permit with no application filed makes you irregular, with the risk of expulsion. While you wait, the renewal receipt counts, together with the old permit.

6. The long-term permit

After five years on a regular permit you can apply for the EU long-term residence permit (permesso UE per soggiornanti di lungo periodo). You need:

• 5 years of continuous legal residence. Absences count: more than 6 months in a row, or more than 10 months in total over the five years, break the period, unless there are serious documented reasons;
• income at least equal to the annual assegno sociale (the state social allowance), higher if the permit also covers family members;
• suitable housing;
• Italian at A2 level, through a test at the prefettura or a recognised certificate.

It does not expire like an ordinary permit: it is open-ended, and only the card needs updating. No more renewals every one or two years. The contribution is €100. It is the step that makes life here stable, and after 10 years of legal residence you can apply for citizenship.

Family members of EU citizens

If you are the spouse, registered partner, child or dependent parent of an EU citizen living in Italy — or of an Italian citizen — you do not follow the ordinary permit route.

After three months you apply at the questura for the residence card for family members of an EU citizen: it is valid for five years and, if the conditions still hold, becomes permanent. The entry visa, if you need one, is free and follows a facilitated procedure. Your right comes from your family member's: it is the simplest route of all, but you have to apply for it.

Common mistakes

• Entering on a tourist visa expecting to change it once here. The type of visa decides the permit.
• Letting the 8 working days pass after arrival without applying.
• Losing the receipt, or not keeping it with your passport: until the card arrives, it is your only proof of legal stay.
• Applying for renewal at 60 days as older guides say: it is now 90.
• Booking a trip to another Schengen country while waiting for the card.
• Confusing permit and residency: the questura issues the permit, the town hall registers your residency. You need both, in that order.