Citizenship Documents Checklist

Identity Documents

The foundation of your citizenship application is proving who you are. The Home Office needs to verify your identity beyond any doubt before granting British citizenship.

The guidance says that if you were issued with a biometric residence permit you must provide or use it, even if it has expired, alongside one of the documents below.

• Your passport: The passport of your country of nationality. If you have held more than one during your time in the UK, include them: old passports carrying UK visas and entry stamps help you reconstruct your travel history.
• Or another accepted identity document: A national identity card, a Home Office travel document, a Home Office entitlement card, a Home Office application registration card letter, your birth certificate, your photocard driving licence, or a bank, building society or credit card statement issued to you in the last 6 months.
• Your biometric residence permit, if you had one: Biometric residence permits stopped being issued at the end of 2024 and immigration status is now held online as an eVisa. An old card can still be used for 24 months after the expiry date printed on it, provided you still hold that status, and an expired one can only be used until the end of 2026. See GOV.UK on eVisas.
• Translations: A document that is not in English needs a certified translation, carrying the translator's credentials and a statement that it is a true and accurate translation.

You do not send countersigned photographs. Everyone applying enrols their biometric details, meaning fingerprints and a photograph, for identity verification. The Home Office may be able to reuse biometrics given for an earlier immigration application, and will tell you how to enrol after you submit. There is no upper age limit, and an application can be rejected as invalid if biometrics are not enrolled when requested.

Immigration Status Evidence

The requirement is that you are free from immigration time restrictions on the date of application, and, on the 5-year route, for the 12 months before it. In practice that means holding indefinite leave to remain (settlement) or settled status. The guidance lists what you can give to show it:

• Your 16-digit unique application number for the grant of indefinite leave, also known as settled status. This includes settled status under the EU Settlement Scheme.
• Your unique application number or a share code if you have an eVisa showing indefinite leave to remain. Get a share code from the View and Prove service on GOV.UK. A share code lasts 90 days, so generate it close to the point you need it.
• Your biometric residence permit or another document confirming your right to remain permanently, usable for 24 months after the printed expiry date while you still hold that status, and if expired, only until the end of 2026.
• Your passport showing permission to remain permanently, or the Home Office letter granting it.

One thing that has become easier: since 28 June 2022, someone who holds indefinite leave to enter or remain can be treated as meeting the lawful residence requirement without further enquiry. The guidance says the Home Office may assume you meet it without making further enquiries where indefinite leave has been granted.

Continuous Residence Evidence

The qualifying period is 5 years before the date the application is received, or 3 years for someone married to or in a civil partnership with a British citizen. You must also have been physically present in the UK on the day exactly 5 years (or 3 years) before the application is received. Absences must not exceed 450 days across the 5 years, or 270 days across the 3 years, and not more than 90 days in the final 12 months in either case. See our timeline from settlement to citizenship for full details on qualifying periods.

The application does not ask you to upload a file of bills. It asks for your absences, and GOV.UK says to give as much detail as you can from your own records, adding that the Home Office will check its records and fill in any gaps or make corrections. The documents below are what people use to reconstruct that history accurately, and to answer a query if one comes:

• Council tax bills or statements: Annual council tax bills or a council tax account summary showing your name and address for each year of the qualifying period. This is one of the strongest forms of residence evidence.
• Tax records: P60 end-of-year certificates, tax returns, or letters from HM Revenue and Customs, downloadable from your personal tax account on GOV.UK.
• Bank statements: UK bank statements showing regular transactions in the UK. These help fill gaps where other evidence is thin. You do not need to provide every statement, but enough to cover periods where other evidence is limited.
• Employer letters: Letters from current and previous UK employers confirming your dates of employment. These should be on company letterhead and signed by a senior person.
• Utility bills: Gas, electricity, water, or broadband bills in your name at UK addresses during the qualifying period.
• NHS records: Letters confirming registration with a doctor, or hospital correspondence.

English Language Evidence

You must prove you have English language ability at CEFR B1 level or above in speaking and listening. For full details on accepted tests and exemptions, see our English language tests guide.

Accepted evidence includes:

• A secure English language test: A test from one of the five approved providers, which GOV.UK names as Trinity College London, the IELTS SELT Consortium, LanguageCert, Pearson and PSI Services. It must be the secure test approved for immigration purposes, not a general academic version, and it must be taken at an approved test centre. You do not send a certificate: you give the unique reference number on the application form. A result is only valid for 2 years from the date of the test.
• A previous B1 qualification used for settlement: If your indefinite leave to remain was granted on the basis of a B1 qualification, that meets the naturalisation English requirement too, and no further test is needed.
• A UK degree taught in English: A UK academic qualification equivalent to a Bachelor's, Master's or doctorate, taught in English. Provide the degree certificate.
• A degree from outside the UK: If it was taught or researched in a majority English-speaking country, you need an Academic Qualification Level Statement from Ecctis, formerly UK NARIC, confirming it is equivalent to a UK qualification. If it was taught or researched anywhere else, you need that statement and an English Language Proficiency Statement from Ecctis showing the degree was taught in English.
• National of a majority English-speaking country: GOV.UK publishes the list, and it is fixed: Antigua and Barbuda, Australia, the Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, the British overseas territories, Canada, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Ireland, Jamaica, Malta, New Zealand, St Kitts and Nevis, St Lucia, St Vincent and the Grenadines, Trinidad and Tobago, and the USA. A country having English as an official language does not put it on the list.
• Aged 65 or over, or a long-term condition: The guidance says you must demonstrate both knowledge of language and life in the UK unless you are aged 65 or over, or have a long-term physical or mental condition that prevents you from doing so.

One trap catches people who settled under the EU Settlement Scheme. That route did not test knowledge of language and life, so the guidance warns that anyone who settled that way has to meet both requirements before applying to naturalise, and provide the evidence with the application.

Life in the UK Test

You must pass the Life in the UK test before applying for citizenship. Our study guide can help you prepare. Include the following in your application:

• The test reference number. The guidance says you give the reference number from your pass and do not normally need to send the certificate. For a test taken on or after 17 December 2019 the reference is in the results email, in the form HOM/010114/123456/123456789. For a test taken before that date it is at the top of the results letter and is 7 digits long.
• The confirmation letter, for older passes. If you passed before 1 October 2019, you provide the letter you were given confirming it.

The test costs £50 and is 24 questions in 45 minutes, booked in advance at one of over 30 test centres in the UK. There is no limit on how many times you can take it, but the fee is payable each time. If you have an eVisa, the share code is the identity evidence you use to take the test.

A pass does not expire. If you passed it for an earlier settlement application, it counts for citizenship as well.

Referee Declarations

You need two people to act as referees for your citizenship application. The requirements for each referee are different and specific.

The professional referee

• Can be of any nationality
• Must be a professional person, for example a minister of religion, a civil servant, or a member of a professional body such as an accountant or a solicitor

The second referee

• Must hold a British citizen passport
• Must be either a professional person or over the age of 25

Rules that apply to both

• Each must have known you for at least 3 years
• Neither can be related to you
• Neither can be related to the other referee
• Neither can be your solicitor or the agent representing you on this application
• Neither can be employed by the Home Office

The guidance says a referee who has been convicted of an imprisonable offence in the last 10 years is not usually accepted, and that checks may be carried out to confirm that referees have no unspent convictions, are qualified to act, and that their signatures are genuine. It also notes that knowingly or recklessly giving false information is a criminal offence under section 46(1) of the British Nationality Act 1981, punishable by up to 3 months in prison, a fine of up to £5,000, or both.

Good Character Evidence

The Home Office assesses whether you are of "good character" as part of every citizenship application. You do not need to provide a police certificate proactively, but you must declare the following on the application form:

• Criminal convictions: All convictions, in the UK and abroad, whether or not they are spent, because nationality decisions are exempt from section 4 of the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974. Someone resident in Northern Ireland declares only unspent convictions. Cautions work the other way round: only unspent cautions have to be declared. Pending prosecutions must be declared. Failing to declare a conviction is considered on the ground of deception as well.
• Civil penalties: Any civil penalties for employing illegal workers or for immigration offences.
• Bankruptcy or insolvency: Any current or past bankruptcy, individual voluntary arrangement, or debt relief order.
• Tax affairs: Deliberate evasion of tax, or an open dispute with HM Revenue and Customs. Deception in dealings with any government department is treated as a character matter in its own right.

The full published rules are in the good character caseworker guidance. Advice about an individual record is regulated: the form AN guidance itself says nationality advice should only come from a person working for an organisation registered with, or exempted by, the Immigration Advice Authority. Our guide to applying alone or with a solicitor covers what that involves. See also our citizenship refusal reasons guide for more detail.

Marriage and Relationship Documents

If you are applying as the spouse or civil partner of a British citizen on the spouse visa route (the 3-year route), you need additional documents:

• Marriage or civil partnership certificate: If it is not in English, include a certified translation.
• Your spouse or civil partner's current passport, or their naturalisation or registration certificate: Evidence that they are a British citizen. The guidance names this specifically for section 6(2) applications.
• Evidence of ongoing relationship: The Home Office does not usually ask for relationship evidence at the citizenship stage, but if there is any doubt, having joint bank accounts, joint tenancy agreements, or photographs together can help.

Tracking Your Absences

The application asks for every absence from the UK during the qualifying period, with dates. GOV.UK says to give as much detail as you can using your own records, such as emails or boarding passes, and that the Home Office will check its records and fill in any gaps or make corrections.

To compile this accurately:

• Check passport stamps for entry and exit dates
• Review airline or travel booking confirmations
• Check bank statements for foreign transactions that pin down travel dates
• If you used eGates and have no stamps, you can request your personal information, including travel history, from the Home Office. Allow time for it

The limits are 450 days across the 5-year period, or 270 days across the 3-year period, and no more than 90 days in the final 12 months in either case. The guidance says only whole days count: the day you leave and the day you return are not counted as absences, so leaving on 22 September and returning on 23 September is not an absence at all.

There is discretion to disregard absences above the limits, and the guidance publishes the ranges. Absences up to 480 days on the 5-year route, or 300 days on the 3-year route, are normally disregarded. Beyond that, up to 900 days on the 5-year route or 540 on the 3-year route may be disregarded where you meet all other requirements and have established your home, family and a substantial part of your estate in the UK, with longer residence expected as the absences grow. For absences over 730 days on the 5-year route, or over 450 on the 3-year route, the guidance asks you to explain whether they were caused by Crown or designated service abroad, by the unavoidable nature of your work, by exceptional or compelling occupational or compassionate reasons, or by being unable to return during a global pandemic. It says absences beyond 900 days, or 540 on the 3-year route, would only very rarely be disregarded.

Putting Your Application Together

Most people in the UK apply online, which means the documents are uploaded or scanned at a UK Visa and Citizenship Application Services appointment, where fingerprints and a photograph are taken. Anyone in the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man or a British overseas territory uses the paper form AN, and it can also be used by post from elsewhere. The guidance warns that an application sent without its supporting documents or the correct fee is returned unprocessed, and that the form gives space to say what you have supplied and why anything is missing.

1. Identity evidence, including a biometric residence permit if you were ever issued one
2. Evidence that you are free from immigration time restrictions (unique application number, share code, or the grant letter)
3. Your English language evidence, or the unique reference number for a secure English language test
4. Your Life in the UK test reference number
5. Your full list of absences, with dates
6. The two referee endorsements
7. Marriage or civil partnership certificate and your spouse's evidence of British citizenship, on the 3-year route
8. The fee. Naturalisation costs £1,839 in total: £1,709 to apply and a £130 citizenship ceremony fee. See our British citizenship costs guide

Keep your own copy of everything you send. And note one point the guidance makes that surprises people: a nationality application gives you no immigration status while it is being considered, so you must still hold valid permission to be in the UK until you have a decision and have attended your ceremony.

Questions and answers