Moving to Sweden

Can you move to Sweden?

The answer depends on your passport. Sweden sorts everyone into three groups, and the group decides whether you need a permit at all. Start there, because everything else follows from it.

• Nordic citizens from Denmark, Finland, Iceland and Norway need no permit. You move, then register with Skatteverket.
• EU, EEA and Swiss citizens need no permit either. To stay longer than three months you need uppehållsrätt (right of residence), which means you work, study, run a business or support yourself.
• Everyone else, British and American citizens included, needs a residence permit from Migrationsverket. As a rule it must be granted before you travel.

If you are moving from the UK or the USA, the rules that differ for you are on moving to Sweden from the UK and moving to Sweden from the USA.

The routes into Sweden

There is no general permit for moving here. You apply for one specific reason, and the reason decides the requirements, the money you must show and how long the permit runs.

Some occupations on Migrationsverket's list have a lower salary floor of SEK 28,725 a month. Researchers and doctoral students have their own permit with its own rules.

Every route is decided by Migrationsverket. You apply online and pay the fee when you send the application. The rules behind the decisions are collected on our page about laws and rules.

If you have no job offer and no family here

This is the hardest position to be in, and it is worth saying plainly. Three doors are open, and all three ask something of you before you travel.

• Looking for work. You need a degree at advanced level, SEK 13,000 for every month you apply for, and comprehensive health insurance. The permit runs for a maximum of nine months.
• Studies. Admission to a full-time programme gives you a residence permit, and a degree from a Swedish university then qualifies you for the permit to look for work here.
• Your own business. You must own at least 51 per cent of the company and show SEK 200,000 for yourself for two years.

What does not exist matters just as much. Sweden has no retirement visa, no digital nomad visa and no permit for remote work for a foreign employer. Migrationsverket's list of work permits has no such category.

A visitor's residence permit for longer than 90 days is for visiting, not for settling. It does not give you the right to work, and a work permit is applied for from outside Sweden.

The order things happen in

The sequence is nearly the same whichever route you take. Doing the steps out of order is what costs people months.

• Pick your route and check that you meet its requirements on paper.
• Check your passport. A permit is never granted for longer than the passport is valid.
• Get the thing your route needs: a signed offer of employment, a letter of admission, or a partner here who meets the maintenance requirement.
• For a work permit, the employer advertises the job in Sweden and across the EU/EEA for at least ten days and lets the trade union comment.
• Apply online from outside Sweden and pay the fee.
• Give your fingerprints and photo at a Swedish embassy or consulate when Migrationsverket asks for them.
• Wait for the decision. If it is a yes you get an uppehållstillståndskort (residence permit card), which you need when you travel.
• Move, then report your move to Skatteverket if you are staying twelve months or more.

The steps after you land, from personnummer to BankID, are set out in our guide New to Sweden.

What it costs and how long it takes

• Work permit or permit to look for work: SEK 2,200 for an adult.
• Studies: SEK 1,500 for an adult and SEK 750 for a child.
• Moving to a partner or relative: SEK 2,000 for an adult and SEK 1,000 for a child.
• Family joining an employee: SEK 1,500 for an adult and SEK 750 for a child.

The processing times are Migrationsverket's own figures for complete applications, and they change month by month. A missing document is the most common reason a case takes twice as long as the published time.

Then comes the cost of actually living here. What rent, food and travel come to city by city is on our page about the cost of living in Sweden.

Mistakes that cost people the move

• Coming as a tourist and applying for a work permit from inside Sweden. Migrationsverket rejects that, even with a job offer in hand. The exception is narrow: you must have travelled here specifically to meet the employer, the job must be in a shortage occupation and the salary must reach the salary floor.
• Counting the 90 days wrong. It is 90 days in any 180-day period, and days in every Schengen country count.
• A passport that is too old. It must have been issued less than ten years before you arrive and stay valid for at least three months after you leave the Schengen area.
• Starting work before the permit is granted. Working without a permit is a risk for you and for the employer.
• An employer who skips the ten-day advert. The application then fails on a step you do not control, so ask about it early.
• An incomplete application. The published processing times apply to complete applications only.

The first weeks after you arrive

The permit gets you into the country. The personnummer is what makes daily life work.

• Report your move in person at a Skatteverket service centre. A stay of twelve months or more means you are entered in the population register and get a personnummer.
• Shorter stays get a samordningsnummer (coordination number) instead.
• Order a Skatteverket ID card once you have your personnummer.
• Open a bank account and get BankID. Almost every service in Sweden assumes you have it.
• Register with a vårdcentral (local health centre) and learn how 1177 works.
• Ask your kommun (municipality) about svenska för invandrare (SFI), the free Swedish tuition.

The whole order, step by step, is in our guide New to Sweden, and the fiddliest part, the bank, has a page of its own: opening a bank account in Sweden.

Staying for good: permanent residence and citizenship

Most permits run for a fixed time. Two things turn a stay into something lasting, and both take years.

A permanent uppehållstillstånd (PUT, permanent residence permit) comes after time on a temporary permit. You must be able to support yourself and lead an orderly life.

The citizenship rules changed on 6 June 2026. The main rule is now 8 years of hemvist (the time you have lived in Sweden), proof that you can support yourself, and knowledge of Swedish and of Swedish society. Some groups need fewer years.

The conditions in detail are on our pages about the permanent residence permit and the citizenship test.

We describe what the rules say. What applies in your own case is for Migrationsverket to decide, and for a legal assessment you need a lawyer.

Common questions about moving to Sweden