Requirements, timing and how the application works, including the 2025 change that affects your children
Italian citizenship by marriage works in the opposite direction from citizenship by descent. Descent is recognised: the state confirms a status you already held. Marriage is granted: you apply for something you do not have, and the administration decides whether to give it. That difference shapes everything: the evidence you file, the conditions that must survive until the decree is signed, and the fact that a marriage which ends before that moment ends the application with it.
Italian nationality by marriage is governed by article 5 of Law 91/1992, and applies equally to civil unions registered in Italy (Law 76/2016). The 2025 reform left article 5 untouched, but changed something that matters a great deal to applicants with children.
For citizenship by marriage Italy sets two clocks, and only one runs at a time: two years of legal residence in Italy after the marriage if you live here, or three years from the marriage if you live abroad. Both are halved if the couple has children, natural or adopted.
Two refinements decide many cases. If your spouse became Italian after the wedding, the clock runs from the date they swore the oath. And if you spent three years married abroad and then moved to Italy, prefectures accept that the requirement matured abroad, so you can apply on arrival: settled administrative practice rather than statutory text, published by the prefectures themselves.
Legal residence means registration with the anagrafe of an Italian municipality after lawful entry, not just living here with a permit: a gap in the registration is a gap in the residence. A marriage celebrated abroad must be transcribed into the Italian civil records before you apply, and this routinely delays files by months.
Since December 2018 you must also certify Italian at level B1 (article 9.1). It applies to EU citizens and family residence card holders too; the exemptions are an EU long-term residence permit or a signed integration agreement. What is not required is money: there is no income threshold for article 5. That is the clearest difference from naturalisation by residence, where proof of adequate income over three years is a hard requirement. Article 6 sets the criminal bars: certain final convictions preclude the grant unless there has been rehabilitation.
This feature of article 5 has no equivalent elsewhere in Italian citizenship law, and applicants underestimate it. The marriage or civil union must still exist when the decree is adopted: not when you apply, but when it is signed, possibly two or three years later. Dissolution, annulment and cessation of civil effects all end the application, and so does personal separation, even without divorce.
The practical consequence is about sequencing rather than law: where a relationship is under strain and the file is otherwise ready, the timing of the application is a decision worth taking deliberately.
Applications are filed online on the Ministry of the Interior portal, with SPID or CIE; there is no paper alternative. The fee is €250 plus a €16 stamp, not refunded if the application fails. The core documents are a full birth certificate, criminal record certificates from your country of origin and any other country of residence, the transcribed marriage certificate, the B1 certificate and the receipts, all legalised or apostilled and translated. Criminal record certificates are valid for six months.
If you live in Italy, the prefecture of your province decides; if you live abroad, the file goes through the consulate and is decided centrally in Rome. The time limit is 24 months, extendable to 36, for applications since 20 December 2020 (48 months for earlier ones). These are real deadlines, and delay beyond them can be challenged.
Before a refusal, the administration must send a notice of the grounds, and you can file written observations. That stage is worth more than most applicants realise: correcting a misunderstanding then is far easier than litigating afterwards. If granted, you must swear the oath within six months of notification; citizenship takes effect the day after.
People search for an Italian passport marriage route as though the passport were what is granted. It is not. The decree confers citizenship; the oath makes it effective; your civil records are registered in the Italian municipality; and only then does the passport become a matter of applying for a document you are already entitled to.
Article 5 was not amended in 2025; article 14 was, and that is the provision that used to make this route work for whole families at once. Under the old rule, minor children living with a parent who became Italian became Italian too. The reform added a condition: at the date of the parent's acquisition, the child must have been legally resident in Italy for at least two continuous years, or since birth if under two.
For a spouse naturalising while the family lives partly abroad, or who moved recently, this is a genuine trap: the parent becomes Italian and the children do not, and the discovery usually comes after the oath. Some commentators argue that for minors born abroad and resident in Italy the effect is close to an implied repeal of article 14, but that debate does not help a family that has already sworn. Check the children's residence before filing.
One further point: citizenship acquired by marriage can be revoked after a final conviction for terrorism or subversion offences (article 10-bis). It has no application to ordinary cases.
A straightforward file, with uninterrupted registration, a transcribed marriage, a B1 certificate and no criminal history, is an administrative exercise, and paying for representation adds little.
We work from primary sources: Law 91/1992 and its regulations, the ministerial directive on prefectural competence, and published prefectural practice, which varies between provinces more than applicants expect. Avv. Marco Mesina, a member of the Milan Bar (Ordine degli Avvocati di Milano), coordinates the administrative procedure and, where necessary, court action, including answers to notices of intended refusal and challenges to delay. And we look past the decree: most people acquiring citizenship through a spouse already live here or plan to, and where and when you register settles your tax position, a decision better taken before arrival than after.
The statutory term is twenty-four months from filing, extendable to thirty-six, for applications made from 20 December 2020. Add the time needed to transcribe a foreign marriage, obtain and legalise documents, and, at the end, to be given an appointment for the oath.
No. You may apply from abroad three years after the marriage, or eighteen months if the couple has children. Living in Italy shortens the wait to two years, or one with children, but it is not a condition of the route.
No. There is no income requirement for citizenship by marriage. That requirement belongs to naturalisation by residence, where it is one of the most frequent grounds of refusal.
Personal separation is enough to prevent the grant, even without divorce, because the marriage must still be in existence when the decree is adopted. Dissolution, annulment and cessation of the civil effects have the same result.
Only if, at the date of your acquisition, they were legally resident in Italy for at least two continuous years, or since birth if they are under two. That condition was added in 2025 and is the most common unpleasant surprise on this route.
Yes. The B1 requirement applies to EU nationals and to holders of a family residence card. The exemptions are narrow: an EU long-term residence permit, or a signed integration agreement.
It depends on the stage and the ground. If you have received a notice of intended refusal rather than a decision, there is a window to file observations, and that is where the case is usually won or lost. If a refusal has issued, the question is whether to challenge it or to reapply later.
Italy does not require it. Whether your own country does is a question of its law, not Italy's.
Avv. Marco Mesina
Founder, Move to Dolce Vita · Avvocato, Milan Bar (Ordine degli Avvocati di Milano)
Marco is an Italian tax lawyer who advises individuals and families relocating to Italy on tax regimes, residency, citizenship, real estate and succession planning. Before founding Move to Dolce Vita he worked at Watson Farley & Williams, Withers and Deloitte in Milan.