Lithuanian Citizenship by Naturalisation (2026)

Who This Page Is For

Naturalisation is the route for people with no Lithuanian ancestry. You came here to work, to study, to be with someone, or because you liked it — and now you want the passport. This page tells you what that actually takes.

If you have Lithuanian ancestry, close this page. A grandparent or great-grandparent who held Lithuanian citizenship before 15 June 1940 puts you on the restoration route: no residence requirement, no exams, and — if your case fits — you keep the passport you already hold. A parent or grandparent who was Lithuanian by ethnicity, with no citizenship paperwork at all, puts you on the simplified route for people of Lithuanian descent: also no residence requirement and no exams. Both are years shorter and cost far less. Spend an hour on your family tree before you spend ten years on this.

Everyone else reads on. Naturalisation is governed by Article 18 of the Law on Citizenship, and it is the hardest door into Lithuanian nationality by a wide margin.

The Ten-Year Rule

The conditions sit in Article 18(1) and they are cumulative. You need all seven. Work down the table and answer each one about your own facts before you read the next; on four of them a "no" ends the route rather than delaying it, and the row says so.

If you can answer yes to all seven, you have a real application. The work from here is documentary and procedural rather than a question of eligibility: prove the residence, hold the permanent residence status steady, sit the exams, file, and wait.

If you failed on one of the four conditions where a "no" ends the route, no amount of preparation fixes it this year. The residence clock can only be waited out. The renunciation condition is a decision, not an obstacle — and if it is the one stopping you, read whether permanent residence is enough before you plan your life around a passport you may not want on those terms.

One shorter clock exists. Article 18(2) puts a stateless person born in Lithuania on five years instead of ten. That is the only reduction inside Article 18. It is not available to anyone who holds another nationality.

What Counts as Continuous Residence

This is the most useful paragraph in the whole statute for anyone with a job that involves travel.

Article 2(18), in the state's own words

A person is considered to have resided in Lithuania without interruption for one year if, during that year, they lived in Lithuania for at least six months. The period a person has resided in Lithuania is broken by time served under a custodial sentence imposed by a court.

Two consequences, and they run in opposite directions.

The forgiving one. Continuous does not mean you never left. A year in which you spent six months in Lithuania and six months elsewhere is a full year on the clock. Long overseas assignments, a season of work abroad, months with family in another country — none of that resets you to zero, provided each individual year clears the six-month bar. The test is applied year by year, not as an average over the decade.

The unforgiving one. A year in which you were in Lithuania for less than six months is not a year you can count. And the only thing that breaks the period outright — that takes the accumulated time away rather than skipping a year — is time served under a custodial sentence imposed by a court. That is the single interruption the definition names.

The residence must also be lawful throughout, under Article 18(1)(1). Time spent in Lithuania without valid status is not residence for this purpose, whatever your passport stamps say.

The Two Exams

Article 18(1)(3) and 18(1)(4) require two separate passes: the state language exam and the exam on the basics of the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania. They are administered by the National Agency for Education (Nacionalinė švietimo agentūra, NŠA), not by the Migration Department. What the language exam involves, and what level it corresponds to, is covered on our Lithuanian language page.

Who does not have to sit them

Article 18(4) lists the exemptions, and they are broader than most guides admit. Neither exam applies to:

• people aged 65 or over;
• people with a working-capacity level of 0–55%;
• people of old-age pension age with a high or medium level of special needs;
• people with severe chronic mental and behavioural disorders.

Children under 18 are additionally exempt from the lawful-source-of-support condition in Article 18(1)(5).

If you are 65 or older, that single line removes the two hardest requirements from your application. It is worth reading twice, because a great many people in that position assume the exams are the reason they cannot apply.

Two figures no official source publishes

No official source publishes the exam fee, and none publishes the pass mark. Ask NŠA directly, in writing, before you budget or prepare. Ask for the current fee, the pass mark, the exam format and the next sitting dates. That is a short email, and it is the only way to get an answer you can rely on.

Marriage to a Lithuanian Citizen

Marriage does not remove the requirements. It shortens the clock, and in one narrow case it removes an exam.

Article 19 sets out two marriage routes. Read the third column carefully — the difference between them is not just the number of years.

Seven years, not seven months. Article 19(1) asks for the past seven years of living together with your spouse in Lithuania. Marriage abroad, or a marriage where one of you lives elsewhere, does not build the clock. Three years off the ordinary route is real, but it is not a shortcut in the sense people mean when they use the word.

The language exam is not in the Article 19(2) list. That asymmetry is in the statute, not our reading of it: Article 19(2) names the exam on the basics of the Constitution and does not name the state language exam. If you fall inside that narrow provision — spouse of a deportee, a political prisoner, or their child born in exile — confirm the point with the Migration Department in writing before you spend a year on language preparation you may not need.

Renunciation and the Oath

This is the part of the page that decides whether the rest of it matters to you.

You are trading a passport, not adding one

Article 18(1)(6) gives three ways to satisfy the condition, and only three. You are stateless; or you are a citizen of a state whose law strips your citizenship automatically when you acquire another; or you declare in writing that you will renounce your other citizenship once Lithuanian citizenship is granted. Article 18(5) removes the condition for refugees. There is no fourth option and no discretion in the text.

So if you hold a US, UK, Indian, Nigerian, Brazilian or any other passport that does not fall away by itself, naturalising in Lithuania means signing a written statement that you will give it up. Not a formality you deal with later, not a box the authorities forget about — the declaration is a condition of the grant.

Sit with this before you start the ten years. The passport you hold now carries your right to live in the country you came from, your right to return to family there, and often your right to work there without a visa. Lithuanian naturalisation asks you to give that up in exchange for EU citizenship.

For some people that is an obvious trade. For anyone with elderly parents abroad, property abroad, or a career that depends on the other nationality, it is not. Decide it at the start of the ten years, not at the end. And note the contrast: on the restoration route the renunciation requirement can fall away entirely, which is why we send readers with ancestry there first.

The oath

Article 23(1) requires a person granted citizenship by naturalisation to swear an oath to the Republic of Lithuania, publicly and solemnly. The same requirement applies to grants by the simplified procedure, by way of exception, by return of citizenship, and under international treaties. Article 23(2) sets the text.

Two exclusions in Article 23(1): the requirement does not apply to persons found legally incapable in the relevant field, nor to children under 18.

Restoration is not in that list. Article 23(1) names the simplified procedure, naturalisation, exception and return. It does not name restoration (atkūrimas). People restoring citizenship do not swear the oath. People naturalising do.

The deadlines

Article 23(4) gives you a window measured from the entry into force of the President's decree:

The two-year window is the one most naturalisation applicants land in, and it is not generosity — it is the time the state allows for you to actually complete the renunciation you promised in writing.

Cost and Time

The fee is the easy part. Naturalisation costs €120 in state fee, according to the Migration Department's published fee list for citizenship services, a page last updated 24 November 2025. That is the same €120 charged for restoration, for the simplified procedure, for a grant by exception and for the return of citizenship. On the same list, renunciation of Lithuanian citizenship costs €60 — worth knowing, since this route commits you to renouncing something.

How long

Here is the honest shape, and where the published numbers stop.

When Citizenship Is Refused

Article 22 is the bar, and it is not discretionary. Citizenship is not granted by naturalisation, by the simplified procedure or by way of exception, and is not restored, to a person who:

• prepared, attempted or committed international crimes;
• prepared, attempted or committed crimes against the Republic of Lithuania;
• was convicted of a serious or grave intentional crime, whether in Lithuania or abroad.

The bar reaches across routes: the same Article 22 blocks restoration and the simplified procedure. If it applies to you, no route in the statute is open. And Article 18(1)(7) makes being clear of Article 22 an express condition of naturalisation, which means it is checked, not assumed.

Your Children

Article 27(1) carries a child along with a parent who acquires or restores citizenship — but with a condition attached that surprises people.

A child under 14 acquires citizenship when their parent does, only if the child is not a citizen of another state. A child aged 14 to 18 acquires it only with their own consent, and under the same condition.

That second clause is the trap. If your child already holds another nationality — which, if you are naturalising rather than restoring, they almost certainly do — Article 27 does not carry them. They face the same renunciation logic you do.

Children are, however, exempt from two things in their own right: under Article 18(4) a child under 18 does not need to show a lawful source of support, and under Article 23(1) a person under 18 does not swear the oath.

The full picture for children — birth registration, Article 14 citizenship at birth, adoption, and the dual-citizenship rules for children — is on our citizenship for your child page.

Is Permanent Residence Enough?

It is the question worth asking before the ten years start. For a large number of readers, the answer is that you may not need citizenship at all.

Permanent residence is already a condition of naturalisation under Article 18(1)(2) — you must hold it when you apply and when the decision is taken. Which means everyone on this route reaches permanent residence years before they reach the ten-year mark. The real question is what the last stretch buys you, and what it costs.

What citizenship adds:

• An EU passport and full freedom of movement across the EU/EEA
• The right to live and work in any member state, not only Lithuania
• The vote in national elections
• Status that cannot lapse through absence or paperwork
• Article 14: citizenship passes to children born after you hold it

What it costs you that residence does not:

• Your current passport — Article 18(1)(6) renunciation
• The full ten-year clock rather than the shorter path to permanent residence
• Both exams, unless Article 18(4) exempts you
• A public oath under Article 23
• €120, plus exam fees

Permanent residence asks for no renunciation and no oath. You keep the passport you were born with, you live and work in Lithuania indefinitely, and most of the day-to-day benefit of citizenship is already yours. What you do not get is the EU-wide mobility and the political rights.

No qualifying period for permanent residence is stated on this page: the source for this cluster is the Law on Citizenship, and that period lives in the residence legislation — a different statute. See our residence permit guide for the residence side, and confirm the current period with the Migration Department.

A test worth applying honestly. Write down the one thing you want that permanent residence does not give you. If it is EU-wide mobility or the vote, naturalisation is the right project. If it is security or belonging, ask whether it is worth the passport you would have to surrender — because permanent residence already delivers a great deal of both.

Why Applications Fail

Eight ways a naturalisation case dies. Every one of them comes out of a condition in Articles 2, 18, 19, 22 or 23 — not from anecdote.

Counting ten years that are not there. Article 18(1)(1) asks for the past ten years, lawfully and continuously. Time in Lithuania without valid status is not lawful residence, and years scattered across two decades are not the past ten.

A year with less than six months in the country. Article 2(18) treats a year as unbroken only if you spent at least six months of it in Lithuania. One thin year is one year you cannot count, and people rarely notice until they add up the travel.

Letting permanent residence lapse mid-decision. Article 18(1)(2) requires the right of permanent residence when you apply and when the decision is taken. Renewals that slip while the file is under examination take the application with them.

Assuming you can keep the other passport. Article 18(1)(6) offers three ways through and no fourth. Unless you are stateless, your citizenship lapses automatically by its own law, or you are a refugee under Article 18(5), you sign a written declaration to renounce.

Not checking the Article 18(4) exemptions. The opposite failure: people who never apply because of the exams, when at 65 or over, or with a 0–55% working-capacity level, neither exam applies to them at all.

Treating marriage as a shortcut. Article 19(1) is seven years of living together with your spouse in Lithuania, with both exams and the renunciation condition intact. Article 19(2)'s five years is limited to spouses of deportees, political prisoners and their children born in exile.

Missing the oath deadline. Article 23(4) gives 2 years from the decree if you declared you will renounce another citizenship, and 6 months in the other cases. The decree is the start of a deadline, not the end of the process.

An Article 22 conviction nobody raised early. A serious or grave intentional crime, in Lithuania or abroad, bars the grant outright — and bars restoration and the simplified procedure too. Disclose it to an adviser at the start, not after ten years.

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