Argentine citizenship

The older rules. Under Argentina's citizenship law, a federal judge where you live decides. You need 2 years of continuous residence. Courts have held that your migration status does not decide whether you meet that test.

The 2025 decree. Decree 366/2025, an emergency decree, rewrote the law. It took effect on 29 May 2025. Applications already in court before then stay in that court, under the rules in force when they began. For new applications, the decree moved the decision to Migraciones, which opened an online procedure on 6 October 2025. It asks for 2 years of continuous legal residence, as a temporary or permanent resident, right before you apply. You may not leave the country at all in that time. Time on a precaria does not count. According to one appeal court, the decree also removed the prosecutor and the public notices, and set up no appeal route made for citizenship decisions.

The courts. Courts have set parts of the decree aside in individual cases. The national electoral court declared Decree 366/2025 null in the case of "Yang, Liping", reported on 30 June 2026. Its effect beyond that case is contested.

The appeal. The government appealed. The electoral court admitted the appeal on 24 September 2026, and the case is now before the Supreme Court. No date has been set for a decision. Congress has not repealed the decree. A decree of this kind falls only if both chambers of Congress reject it.

What this means. Lawyers disagree. Some say Migraciones can no longer grant citizenship. Others say each ruling binds only its own case, and the decree still applies to everyone else. The Migraciones online citizenship page still offered to start an application when we checked.

Which authority decides a new application is contested. Choosing between a court and Migraciones is a legal decision. Talk to the lawyer before you file.

Children born abroad to a parent born in Argentina can opt for Argentine citizenship. This is citizenship by option. It is an administrative procedure, not a court case, and the 2025 decree did not change its substance.

There is no oath and no minimum period of living in Argentina. Abroad, you opt in person at an Argentine consulate. In Argentina, you opt before RENAPER, the national registry. In the City of Buenos Aires the city civil registry handles it, and it asks for an address in the city.

At a consulate. You bring your birth certificate, apostilled or legalised, and a valid foreign ID, which is mandatory over 18 years. You also bring your Argentine parent's Argentine birth certificate. The consulate charges a fee, but its page does not state the amount.

In the City of Buenos Aires. Adults bring their own birth certificate, legalised, apostilled and translated by a sworn translator, and the birth certificate of the Argentine-born parent. The fee is ARS 10,000 (about USD 6 at ARS 1,540 on 6 October 2026) per ID card.

After you opt abroad. The consul registers the option and tells RENAPER within 30 days.

Who it reaches. The option is for children of parents born in Argentina. Our sources describe no direct route for grandchildren. If your parent became Argentine by option or by naturalisation, it is unclear whether this route applies. In either case, ask the lawyer.

A residence option too. Children of Argentines born abroad are also listed as a direct category of permanent residence. That listing covers parents who are Argentine by birth, by naturalisation or by option. If your parent was born in Argentina, the Route Finder shows both options you may fit.

Naturalisation is citizenship through living in Argentina. Which rules apply to you depends on where and when you file, and that is disputed today.

Through a court. You file with the federal judge where you live. The proceedings are free by law. A prosecutor takes part, public notices run in a local newspaper, and you take an oath before the judge. Under these rules, the residence period can be waived if your spouse or child is an Argentine by birth. The Migraciones online procedure has no path for this waiver, and whether it survives the decree is unclear.

Through Migraciones. You start online, from inside Argentina, as a temporary or permanent resident. The starting documents are your Argentine ID card, an Argentine criminal-record certificate, proof of your occupation or means of support, and a certificate of your tax or labour number. Migraciones may ask for more.

What can stop an application. Having no honest occupation or means of living. Being prosecuted for a crime under Argentine law. A sentence of more than 3 years in prison for an intentional crime, unless it was served and 5 years have passed. If any of these could apply to you, talk to the lawyer first.

No timeline. We do not give one. There is no reliable current figure for either route, and in reported cases the dispute over who decides has added time.

The lawyer's part. A lawyer is not legally required to apply. But choosing a court or Migraciones is a legal decision today, and so is any challenge to the decree. A lawyer can choose the venue with you. Be wary of unlicensed intermediaries and of anyone selling fast citizenship.

The 2025 decree also created a route to citizenship through a relevant investment, with no minimum period of residence. A Ministry of Economy agency is to assess applications, and Migraciones takes the final decision.

The government has announced the programme, but it is not open. No applications are being accepted, and no exact opening date has been announced. We found no published rule that sets the price, the fees or the bond terms. No official agent has been appointed, as far as published sources show.

The route rests on the same decree the courts are disputing. One court has already declared the investment ground invalid in its own case. A bill in Congress would ban naturalisation in exchange for payment or investment.

Prices reported in the press are announcements, not published rules, so we do not show them. Paying does not guarantee citizenship. We take no deposits for this route and sell nothing for it. Do not send money to anyone who promises citizenship through it.

Argentina accepts dual nationality. New citizens generally do not have to give up their old nationality. Whether your own country lets you keep yours depends on its law, so check before you apply.

Argentine nationality cannot be renounced, according to a court ruling about citizens born in Argentina. Whether the same holds for naturalised citizens is not settled in our sources. Citizenship obtained by fraud can be revoked.

Inside Argentina, a dual national from a country without a dual-nationality agreement is treated only as Argentine. If you enter on your foreign passport, you can stay up to 180 days. To leave after that, you need Argentine documents. New citizens are also entered on the electoral register.

The passport. The Argentine passport gives visa-free or visa-on-arrival access to about 168 destinations. One widely cited passport index ranks it around 15th.

It does not give visa-free travel to the United States. Argentina is not in the US Visa Waiver Program, so Argentines need a visa for the US. The government has said it aims to join by early 2027. That is a target, not a date. Recent US visa refusal rates for Argentines have been above the limit the programme sets.

Whether naturalised citizens get the Mercosur right to live and work in neighbouring countries is unclear. One source says it applies to citizens by birth. Do not plan on it without advice.

We have not yet covered how to apply for the passport itself.

No Spanish test, civics exam or integration course appears in the citizenship law, its regulation or the Migraciones list of starting documents.

In practice, some federal courts have asked for Spanish-language ability, relying on a law that has been repealed. A judge may expect you to communicate in Spanish, and practice varies by court.

There is no language test for residency either. Our Spanish pages can help with the Spanish you will need.