One passport, 31 countries

What it lets you do

• Live anywhere, for as long as you likeNo visa and no residence permit to apply for. Stay up to 3 months with just your passport. After that you need to be working, studying or able to support yourself with health insurance, and some countries ask you to register at the town hall.
• Work for any employer, or for yourselfNo work permit and no sponsor. You can take a job, start a business or work remotely from anywhere in the 31 countries.
• Study at local feesEU students are treated like local students, which usually means the same tuition fees. In some countries that’s very little.
• Retire in the sunIf you have enough income and health insurance, you can retire to Spain, Portugal, Italy or anywhere else in the 31 countries without a retirement visa.
• Settle for goodAfter 5 years living legally in another EU country, you get the right to live there permanently.
• Get help from any EU embassyOutside the EU, if your own country has no embassy where you are, any other EU country’s embassy must help you on the same terms as its own citizens.
• Skip the visitor queuesYou use the EU passport lane at the border. You don’t register in the EU’s new Entry/Exit System, and you won’t need ETIAS, the online travel permit the EU is bringing in for visitors.
• Have a say locallyLiving in another EU country, you can vote in local and European Parliament elections there.

If you’re American, Canadian, Australian or a New Zealander

Today you’re a visitor in Europe. You can stay in the Schengen area for at most 90 days in any 180, and you need a visa to live, work or study there for longer. Getting one usually means a job offer, a sponsor or proof of a lot of savings, country by country.

With an EU passport those limits go. You could spend a year in Lisbon, take a job in Berlin, then retire to the Italian coast, without asking anyone’s permission. You keep your current passport too: the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand all allow dual citizenship.

If you’re British

Since Brexit, UK citizens are visitors in the EU. That means the 90-days-in-180 limit, registering fingerprints and a photo in the Entry/Exit System at the border, and soon ETIAS. Working or retiring in the EU needs a visa.

An EU passport gives you back what you had before 2021, and you stay British. An Irish passport is a special case: Irish citizens already have full rights in the UK too, so nothing changes at home.

What it doesn’t do

• It isn’t a free pass to benefits. To stay longer than 3 months somewhere new, you need to be working, studying or able to support yourself, with health insurance.
• It doesn’t change your taxes by itself. Tax usually follows where you live. US citizens still file US tax returns wherever they live.
• Some countries ask things of their citizens. A few have military service for some citizens living there. Each country page says if this applies.
• Passing it on depends on the country. Some let you pass citizenship to children born abroad without limits; others stop after one generation abroad. Each country page explains.