Ordinary naturalisation — other nationals (10-year track) (Art 6 n.1)

PT-NAT-02 is the residual ("catch-all") ordinary-naturalisation track of Portuguese nationality law: it governs every foreign national who is neither a citizen of a Comunidade dos Países de Língua Portuguesa (CPLP) Member State nor a citizen of a European Union Member State. Under the regime in force since 19 May 2026, an applicant on this track must hold ten years of legal residence in Portugal (against seven years for CPLP and EU nationals on the sister route PT-NAT-01) before applying for naturalisation by concession (concessão da nacionalidade por naturalização) under Article 6.º n.º 1 of Lei 37/81.

This is a discretionary concession granted by the Government (the law uses "O Governo pode conceder" — "the Government may grant"), not an attribution of original nationality. A person naturalised on this route acquires adquirida (acquired) nationality producing effects from the date of registration of the act (Art 12.º), not originária (original) nationality ex tunc from birth (Art 11.º). The practical consequence — load-bearing across the descent routes — is that a PT-NAT-02 naturalised citizen is not a "português originário", so their descendants cannot use the grandchild/great-grandchild originária attribution channels reserved to descendants of original Portuguese nationals.

The route is the principal naturalisation pathway for the large non-Lusophone migrant population in Portugal (for example nationals of India, Nepal, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, China, the United States, and other non-CPLP, non-EU states), and it is the eventual citizenship horizon for holders of the ARI ("Golden Visa") residence permit who are not EU/CPLP nationals (see PT-INV-01). Because the residence clock under LO 1/2026 runs from the issuance date of the residence title (not the application date), and because AIMA residence-title backlogs are substantial, the effective time-to-naturalisation on this route frequently runs beyond the nominal ten-year statutory minimum.

LO 1/2026 substantially raised the bar on this route in two ways relative to the prior LO 2/2018 era: (1) it doubled the residence requirement from a uniform five years to ten years for non-CPLP/non-EU nationals; and (2) it expanded the integration battery from a language-and-criminal-record test to a nine-limbed cumulative set of conditions including a culture/history/symbols test, a fundamental-rights-and-political-organisation (civics) test, a solemn declaration of adherence to democratic rule-of-law principles, and proof of capacity to ensure one's own subsistence.

To qualify for naturalisation on PT-NAT-02 the applicant must cumulatively satisfy the nine alíneas of Art 6.º n.º 1, assessed at the moment of the application ("no momento do pedido"), not at any earlier date:

1. alínea a) — Majority / legal capacity. The applicant must be of full age (or emancipated) under Portuguese law at the moment of application.
2. alínea b) — Residence: TEN YEARS legal residence. The applicant must have resided legally in Portuguese territory for at least ten years. This is the defining feature of PT-NAT-02 (versus seven years for CPLP/EU nationals on PT-NAT-01). The clock runs from the date of issuance of the residence title (reversing the LO 1/2024 application-date counting). "Legal residence" requires a valid residence title/status; periods of irregular stay do not count.
3. alínea c) — Language AND culture/history/symbols. The applicant must demonstrate sufficient knowledge of the Portuguese language (minimum A2 CEFR, certified by CIPLE / CAPLE at the Universidade de Lisboa, or by recognised equivalents such as Portuguese school-leaving certificates) and knowledge of Portuguese culture, national history and national symbols. No CPLP language presumption is available on this route — the PT-NAT-02 applicant must prove the language component affirmatively, unlike a CPLP national on PT-NAT-01.
4. alínea d) — Civics (new, LO 1/2026). Knowledge of fundamental rights and duties and of the political organisation of the Portuguese State.
5. alínea e) — Solemn declaration (new, LO 1/2026). A solemn declaration of adherence to the principles of the democratic rule of law (Estado de direito democrático).
6. alínea f) — Criminal bar (rectified). The applicant must not have been finally convicted to effective imprisonment exceeding three years ("pena de prisão efetiva superior a 3 anos", per Declaração de Retificação 17/2026/1) for an enumerated category of crime (terrorism; violent or especially violent crime; highly organised crime; crime against State security; aiding illegal immigration). This bar operates as a rebuttable presumption under Art 6.º n.º 14.
7. alínea g) — Security threat. The applicant must not represent a danger or threat to national security or defence.
8. alínea h) — UN/EU restrictive measures (new placement, LO 1/2026). The applicant must not be subject to United Nations or European Union restrictive measures within the meaning of Lei 97/2017 (this restriction was relocated here from the now-revoked Art 13.º suspensão de procedimentos — see PT-XCT-03).
9. alínea i) — Subsistence (new, LO 1/2026). The applicant must demonstrate the capacity to ensure his/her own subsistence.

All nine limbs are cumulative: failure of any single condition defeats the application. TC Acórdão 1133/2025 (preventive review of the precursor Decreto AR 17/XVII) struck the originally proposed automatic ≥2-year criminal bar and the indeterminate "comportamentos" opposition ground, but did not strike the new alíneas d), e) or i); these survived constitutional review and are operative.

• Proof of ten years of legal residence: residence-title history evidencing continuous legal residence from the issuance date of the first qualifying title. Time spent irregularly, or before a valid residence title was issued, does not count toward the ten years.

• Language certificate: CIPLE A2 (CAPLE, Universidade de Lisboa) or a Ministry-of-Education-recognised equivalent; an adapted assessment is available for illiterate applicants. (CIPLE mechanism is unchanged by LO 1/2026.)

• Solemn declaration (alínea e): a declaration of adherence to democratic rule-of-law principles, in a form to be specified by the Regulamento.

• Criminal record: Portuguese and (where applicable) foreign criminal-record certificates; the alínea f) bar is a rebuttable presumption assessed by the Ministério Público weighing the nature and circumstances of the crime, time elapsed, rehabilitation, and concrete circumstances of genuine effective integration (Art 6.º n.º 14).

• Security / restrictive-measures screening (alíneas g) and h)): clearance against national-security and UN/EU restrictive-measures records.

1. Application. The applicant files the naturalisation request with the Instituto dos Registos e do Notariado (IRN) through the Conservatória dos Registos Centrais (CRC) in Lisbon — the single national registry competent for nationality acts (the RNP / Registo Nacional de Pessoas Coletivas does not apply; one national registry handles nationality). Filing is via the IRN electronic platform (irn.justica.gov.pt).
2. Residence evidence and AIMA. Legal residence is established by the residence-title history; AIMA (Agência para a Integração, Migrações e Asilo, I.P.) is the residence authority whose title issuance starts the ten-year clock. AIMA backlogs (commonly cited at 12–18 months for title processing) extend the effective time-to-naturalisation beyond the statutory ten-year minimum.
3. Integration assessment. Language certification (CIPLE/CAPLE), culture/history/symbols and civics knowledge, and the solemn declaration are assessed per the (pending) Regulamento mechanics.
4. Ministério Público screening. The MP assesses the criminal bar as a rebuttable presumption (Art 6.º n.º 14) and may form a view on the security and restrictive-measures conditions.
5. Decision. Naturalisation is a discretionary Government concession ("O Governo pode conceder"), in practice exercised through the Ministro da Justiça. Satisfaction of the technical conditions does not compel a grant.
6. Registration. A favourable decision is registered at the CRC; acquired nationality produces effects from the registration of the act (Art 12.º).
7. Appeals. Decisions are challengeable before the administrative courts, with ultimate appeal to the Supremo Tribunal Administrativo (STA) — not the civil courts / Supremo Tribunal de Justiça (the administrative-jurisdiction route has applied since LO 2/2006). The administrative judge confines the executive to implementing, not supplementing, the organic-law conditions (STA Proc. 0219/10.6BEPRT).

The operative instrument is Lei n.º 37/81, de 3 de outubro (the Nationality Act / Lei da Nacionalidade), as amended and republished by Lei Orgânica n.º 1/2026 (the 13.ª versão of the consolidated text per pgdlisboa). Nationality is the exclusive, non-delegable legislative competence of the Assembleia da República (CRP Art 164.º f) — reserva absoluta), exercised only by organic law (CRP Art 166.º n.º 2); the executive and its Regulamento may implement but never supplement or restrict the statutory conditions (STA Proc. 0219/10.6BEPRT, 14-02-2019).

The substantive provision is Art 6.º n.º 1 of Lei 37/81. Its chapeau empowers the Government to grant naturalisation to foreign nationals who cumulatively satisfy the listed alíneas. The residence-duration condition is alínea b), which after LO 1/2026 reads (in substance) that the applicant must have resided legally in Portuguese territory for at least seven years in the case of nationals of CPLP States or of EU Member States, and at least ten years in all other cases. PT-NAT-02 is the "ten years / all other cases" limb of alínea b).

The remaining eight alíneas apply identically to PT-NAT-02 and PT-NAT-01; the only structural differences between the two routes are (i) the residence figure in alínea b) and (ii) that the CPLP language presumption in Art 6.º n.º 10 — which deems CPLP nationals to satisfy the language component of alínea c) — is not available to PT-NAT-02 applicants, who must affirmatively prove the language component along with all the other integration elements.

Two related provisions complete the framework:

• Art 6.º n.º 14 (new, LO 1/2026) converts the criminal bar in alínea f) into a rebuttable presumption (presunção ilidível) assessed by the Ministério Público.
• Declaração de Retificação n.º 17/2026/1 rectified the criminal-threshold wording in alínea f), replacing the erroneously enacted "pena de prisão igual ou superior a 2 anos" with the corrected "pena de prisão efetiva superior a 3 anos".