Valid passport

A passport is important both when you are travelling and when you need to confirm your identity, that is, to show who you are. A valid passport is a passport that has not expired. The expiry date of the passport must therefore not have passed.

Your passport states how long it is valid. Swedish authorities do not accept that the validity period is extended with a stamp or sticker. If you have such a passport, you need to apply for a new one to be able to enter Sweden.

Who must have a valid passport?

As a main rule, you need to have a valid passport if you are applying for or extending

• a residence permit
• a residence card
• a residence status
• a visa.

You do not need to have a valid passport to stay in Sweden if you have

• refugee status
• status as a person eligible for subsidiary protection
• temporary protection under the Temporary Protection Directive
• a permanent residence permit.

You always need to have a valid passport if you are travelling between countries.

Read about entry and exit rules on the Swedish Police Authority’s website External link.

Passport control

If you are applying for a permit to stay in Sweden, you usually need to submit a copy of your valid passport along with your application. You then need to present your passport during a personal visit or through a digital passport check.

The passport check involves us checking, among other things, that the passport

• is authentic
• is issued by a competent authority
• is valid (has not expired)
• is signed by you
• belongs to you.

You may also be asked questions about how you obtained the passport. The passport's value as an identity document may be affected if you have not applied for, or collected, the passport personally. If, for example, you applied online or through a representative and had it sent to you, you may need to show more documents to confirm your identity.

If you have not signed your passport

For the passport to be approved, it must be signed, meaning it must contain your signature. If you have received a passport without signing it, you should go back to the authority that issued the passport and ask them for help to sign the passport correctly. You can also have your signature witnessed and certified by a notary public, which is someone commissioned to help the public verify and certify the truth of information. Please arrange this before you apply. If your passport lacks a signature when we check it, you will need to have your passport checked again. This may mean you have to wait longer for a decision.

Passports that are not approved

Passports issued in most countries around the world are accepted as both a travel document and an identity document in Sweden.

There may be passports that are not approved as either a travel document or an identity document in connection with an application. This may be because the country's authorities are not deemed capable of issuing passports that are secure enough for the Migration Agency to trust them.

Passports from certain countries may be approved as travel documents but are not always sufficient as identity documents. In that case, you may need to supplement with other documents, depending on the type of permit you are applying for.