Apply for citizenship

Cit­i­zen­ship makes you an equal cit­i­zen of our coun­try with all the rights and oblig­a­tions of a Ger­man citizen.

New process­es

No con­sul­ta­tion appoint­ment required!
No appoint­ment required to apply!
You can now send the nat­u­ral­iza­tion appli­ca­tion direct­ly by post or drop it in a sealed enve­lope in your letterbox

Nat­u­ral­iza­tion procedure
  • Use the ↗ Quick Check to check whether you meet the requirements.
  • Com­pile the required doc­u­ments
  • Sub­mit the com­plete appli­ca­tion in writ­ing by post.
    Postal address
    Pub­lic order and cit­i­zens’ office
    Cit­i­zen­ship office
    Kaiser­allee 8, 76133 Karlsruhe
  • You will be informed in writ­ing after your appli­ca­tion has been checked.

Apply­ing for citizenship

A claim to nat­u­ral­iza­tion exists if the require­ments spec­i­fied in the law are met. If there is no enti­tle­ment to nat­u­ral­iza­tion, dis­cre­tionary nat­u­ral­iza­tion may be con­sid­ered.

Fur­ther infor­ma­tion for for­eign nationals

↗ Apply­ing for nat­u­ral­iza­tion with nat­u­ral­iza­tion enti­tle­ment
↗ Apply­ing for nat­u­ral­iza­tion with­out enti­tle­ment to nat­u­ral­iza­tion
↗ Apply­ing for nat­u­ral­iza­tion for the spouse or reg­is­tered part­ner of a per­son with Ger­man citizenship

Cer­tifi­cate of citizenship

A cit­i­zen­ship cer­tifi­cate is issued on appli­ca­tion as bind­ing proof of Ger­man cit­i­zen­ship.
Fur­ther infor­ma­tion
↗ Apply for a cit­i­zen­ship card

This page was last updated: 2025-02-05