Italian citizenship by residence (naturalisation)
Naturalisation is the route of those who have no claim by blood or by marriage, or whose claim by descent is closed by the 2025 reform. Article 9 of Law 91/1992 allows the State to grant citizenship, by decree of the President of the Republic, to a foreigner who has lived legally in Italy for a period which depends on their position. The grant is discretionary: the applicant must satisfy the conditions, and the Ministry of the Interior then assesses the integration, the income and the absence of obstacles. There is no naturalisation without residence in Italy, with one exception described below.
The periods of residence
The law sets a different period for each category. All of them are counted as legal residence, which means registration in the population register of an Italian comune with a valid residence permit for the whole period, without interruptions.
- Two years, for a foreigner whose parent or grandparent was an Italian citizen by birth, and for a foreigner born in Italy. The 2025 reform reduced this period from three years to two, as a counterweight to the limits placed on recognition by descent.
- Five years after the adoption, for a person adopted by an Italian citizen as an adult.
- Five years of service for the Italian State, in Italy or abroad, with no residence requirement.
- Four years, for a citizen of a member State of the European Union.
- Five years, for a stateless person or a refugee.
- Ten years, for any other foreigner.
A British citizen has been a non-EU national for the purposes of this article since 1 January 2021, and falls within the ten-year rule unless a shorter category applies. A person who also holds the citizenship of a member State, as many people in Northern Ireland do through Irish citizenship, falls within the four-year rule. A referendum held on 8 and 9 June 2025 proposed to reduce the ten years to five. It did not reach the quorum, and the ten-year term stands.
The second paragraph of article 9 allows the grant of citizenship, without any residence, to a foreigner who has rendered outstanding services to Italy or whose naturalisation is of exceptional interest to the State. The decree follows a resolution of the Council of Ministers and the opinion of the Council of State. It is not an application a private person makes.
The two-year route for descendants
This is the category which concerns families in the United Kingdom most, because it is the route left open to a descendant whose line is closed by article 3-bis. The great-grandchild of an Italian emigrant, or the grandchild of a grandparent who became British before the next generation was born, cannot be recognised by descent. The same person, as the child or grandchild of an Italian citizen by birth, can be naturalised after two years of legal residence in Italy.
Two points decide whether the route is realistic. The first is the residence permit. A British citizen needs a visa to live in Italy for more than ninety days in any period of one hundred and eighty, and the permit obtained with it, for work, study, family reasons or elective residence, is what makes the residence legal. The permit for people awaiting the outcome of a citizenship application, provided for by circular 32/2007, is issued to those who apply for recognition by descent at a comune, not to those who intend to be naturalised. The page on visas sets out the options. The second point is the proof of the ancestor’s citizenship by birth, which is made with the same Italian certificates used for recognition by descent, with the difference that the naturalisation of the ancestor abroad does not close the route.
Your great-grandfather was born in Sicily and emigrated to Cardiff in 1920. Your grandfather was born there in 1926, and your great-grandfather became British in 1931. Nobody applied before 27 March 2025. The line by descent is closed under article 3-bis: no parent or grandparent of yours held exclusively Italian citizenship, since your grandfather was British by birth in Wales as well as Italian through his father, and none of them lived in Italy as a citizen. You are nonetheless the grandchild of an Italian citizen by birth. If you move to Italy with a permit for elective residence or for work, you can apply for naturalisation after two years of legal residence, with the B1 certificate and the income required.
Five years of service for the Italian State
A foreigner who has served the Italian State for at least five years, in Italy or abroad, can be naturalised without any residence in Italy. In the United Kingdom this concerns the locally employed staff of the Embassy, of the three consulates, of the Italian Cultural Institute and of the other offices of the Italian State, after five years of service. The application is lodged through the consulate, and the oath is taken before the consular officer.
What the Ministry examines
The conditions of article 9 are the threshold. The Ministry of the Interior then assesses the application on its merits, and three elements carry weight.
The first is the knowledge of Italian. Since 4 December 2018 every applicant under articles 5 and 9 must hold a certificate of Italian at level B1 of the Common European Framework or higher, issued by one of the certifying bodies recognised by the Ministry: the University for Foreigners of Siena, the University for Foreigners of Perugia, Roma Tre University, the Dante Alighieri Society and the University for Foreigners of Reggio Calabria. A diploma from an Italian school or university replaces the certificate. Holders of the EU long-term residence permit and those who signed the integration agreement are exempt, as are, after judgment 25/2025 of the Constitutional Court, people whose age, illness or disability prevents them from learning the language, with a certificate from a public health service.
The second is the income. The Ministry asks for a lawful income over the three years before the application which reaches the thresholds it fixed in its circular of 5 January 2007: 8,263.31 euro a year for the applicant alone, 11,362.05 euro with a dependent spouse, increased by 516.46 euro for each dependent child. The income of the household counts.
The third is the absence of obstacles: criminal convictions in Italy or abroad of the kind listed in article 6 of the law, pending proceedings, and reasons connected with the security of the Republic. Criminal record certificates are required from the country of origin, from every country of citizenship and from the countries where the applicant has lived. For a British applicant this means the police certificate issued by ACRO, legalised with the apostille and translated.
Procedure, time and oath
The application is lodged online through the citizenship portal of the Ministry of the Interior, with the documents attached and the contribution of 250 euro paid to the State under article 9-bis. The Prefecture of the place of residence verifies the file and takes the applicant’s statements. The Ministry decides within twenty-four months of the application, a term which can be extended to thirty-six months under article 9-ter. The decree is issued by the President of the Republic on the proposal of the Minister of the Interior.
The decree has no effect until the oath. Under article 10 the person must swear allegiance to the Republic and observance of the Constitution and the laws within six months of the notification of the decree, before the mayor of the comune of residence or, for those abroad, before the consular officer. A decree not followed by the oath within the six months lapses. Citizenship is acquired from the day after the oath, and from that day the minor children who live with the new citizen in Italy acquire it too, under article 14, if they have been resident in Italy for at least two years or since birth.
If your line is closed by descent and you are considering residence in Italy, send us the family line and your circumstances. The written assessment tells you whether you fall within the two-year category, which visa makes the residence legal, and what the file for naturalisation will require.