Conditions for obtaining Dutch citizenship

1. You are 18 years of age or older 

2. You have lived in the Netherlands with a valid residence permit for 5 consecutive years or more. You have also always renewed your residence permit on time.

3. You hold an asylum residence permit for an indefinite period. This means you first held a fixed-term asylum residence permit for 5 years. When that expired, you applied for and were granted a residence permit for an indefinite period. You can only become a Dutch citizen if you hold a residence permit for an indefinite period.
   
   Please note. The European Asylum and Migration Pact came into force on 12 June 2026. From that date onwards, you will no longer be able to apply for a permanent asylum residence permit, even if you have already held a fixed-term residence permit for 5 years.
   
   The permanent asylum residence permit has been abolished. From now on, everyone will be issued with an asylum residence permit. This is valid for 3 years. When this permit expires, you must renew it and you will be issued with a new asylum residence permit for 3 years. When that expires, you can renew it again for a further 3 years. You can therefore no longer obtain an asylum residence permit for an indefinite period. Furthermore, it is currently not possible to naturalise with an asylum residence permit. Do you already hold a permanent asylum residence permit? If so, you will retain this permit after 12 June. You will still be able to naturalise with it.
   
   It is possible that, in the long term, it may become possible to naturalise with an asylum residence permit. The agreements reached by the parties in this

   government
   (VVD, CDA and D66) state that it must be possible to naturalise with a temporary asylum residence permit. However, two additional conditions are specified which you must then meet: you must have held an asylum residence permit for six years in order to be eligible for naturalisation, and you must be able to speak and understand Dutch at
   B1 level
   . The agreements reached by the political parties have not yet been enshrined in law. Only once the conditions in the law have been amended will it be possible to naturalise with an asylum residence permit. And for that to happen, a process to amend the law must first be initiated. That has not yet happened. It is therefore not clear at present when these changes will come into effect. Nor, consequently, from when you will be able to naturalise with an asylum residence permit.
    

4. You have undergone civic integration. This means that you can sufficiently speak, read, write and understand Dutch. You can also get by in Dutch society. To prove that you have undergone civic integration, you must have obtained an civic integration diploma. You can only become a Dutch citizen if you have a civic integration diploma.

5. You are not a danger to society or safety in the Netherlands

6. You promise to speak a 'verklaring van verbondenheid' (declaration of commitment) at the meeting where you become a Dutch citizen. In that declaration, you say that you know that the laws of the Netherlands with all the rights and the duties also apply to you. And that you respect them and abide by them.

According to Dutch law, everyone in the Netherlands has a first name and a last name. Does your name consist of a series of names, i.e. a series of names without one first name and one last name? Then if you want to become Dutch, you have to choose one of those names as your last name.