Cyprus spouse visa

The Cyprus spouse visa is a residence permit for the married or civil union partner of a Cypriot citizen. Officially, it is a permit for family members of Cypriot citizens. It grants the right to reside in Cyprus after a successful application to the Migration Department, provided all eligibility criteria are met.

You do not automatically get residence rights if married or in a civil union with a Cypriot citizen. You need to apply for the spouse visa and meet several criteria.

Two forms carry the application. MCYE is for a family member who will work in Cyprus, MCYV for one who will not. Both were last revised in March 2026, and both are covered in more depth on our page about Cyprus permanent residence by marriage.

This permit is only for the family member of a Cypriot citizen. If your sponsor holds a Cyprus work permit or a student permit rather than Cypriot citizenship, the route is family reunification, which costs €200 and takes up to nine months to examine. Start with our guide to the Cyprus Pink Slip and temporary residence permits. If your spouse is an EU citizen who is not Cypriot, the route is MEU2, covered on our Yellow Slip page.

The short version:

• Fees are €80 or €50 depending on the permit type, plus €70 to register in the Aliens Register the first time.
• The Migration Department examines a complete application within four months.
• Your Cypriot spouse has to attend the submission with you.
• There is no minimum income figure and no language test.

Who can apply for a Cyprus spouse visa?

The eligibility criteria are the following:

• You must be legally married or in a civil union with a Cypriot citizen.
• You must have a clean criminal record.
• You must not be considered an unwanted person, such as someone threatening public order or health.
• You must hold a valid travel document and enter the Republic lawfully.

The department treats four groups as family members of a Cypriot citizen. Spouses and civil union partners come first. Then the parents of a minor Cypriot citizen, provided no court has removed their parental care or contact rights. Then the children of a Cypriot citizen or of the Cypriot citizen's spouse, under 21 or dependent. Last, dependent parents and grandparents of either spouse.

What are the requirements for a Cyprus spouse visa?

You need proof of marriage or civil partnership to a Cypriot citizen, a clean criminal record, proof of adequate income, and other documents. You need to apply with the Migration Department of the Deputy Ministry of Migration and International Protection, pay a fee, and provide biometric data.

Financial requirements

There is no minimum income figure for the Cyprus spouse visa. What the department asks for is proof of stable or satisfactory income covering both of you, and it names what it will look at: recent social insurance contributions from the Social Insurance Services, a pension, bank accounts including their movement rather than a single closing balance, rent received, dividends and interest on deposits.

The income of the Cypriot spouse counts alongside yours. You need medical cover on top of income, and the next section explains what counts.

Language proficiency

No language test applies to this permit. None applies to the citizenship route that follows from it either: form M125, Cypriot citizenship through marriage or civil partnership, carries no language condition.

Greek is tested on the other citizenship route. Naturalisation by years of residence, form M127, has required Greek at B1 level and a pass of at least 60% in an examination on the political and social reality of Cyprus since the Civil Registry (Amendment) Law of 2023 came into force on 19 December 2023.

Medical examination

Before arrival, you need to get a blood analysis confirming that you do not suffer from infectious diseases like HIV, syphilis, and hepatitis B and C; and a chest X-ray to show that you do not suffer from tuberculosis (TB). Upon arrival, you need to undergo a new blood analysis and a chest X-ray, during which a Cypriot doctor will certify that you are free from infectious diseases and TB, as previously mentioned.

The procedure for the spouse visa application

The procedure is as follows:

• You enter the Republic on a valid travel document, then apply for registration in the Aliens Register and for the residence permit. There are two ways in. You get a visa from a Cyprus embassy or consulate, or your Cypriot spouse applies to the Migration Department for an entry permit on your behalf. Nationals of the countries on the Republic's visa-exemption list need neither, and may enter for a stay of up to 90 days. The same 90 days in any 180-day period applies if you hold a double or multiple entry Schengen visa or a Bulgarian, Croatian or Romanian national visa.
• You file at the district Aliens and Immigration Unit of the Cyprus Police for the district where you live. If you live in the Nicosia district, you file at the Migration Department headquarters, 90 Archbishop Makarios III Avenue in Nicosia. Book the appointment by email to the district unit at least one month before your current permit or entry visa runs out. Send one request for the whole family, not one per person. The reply comes within five working days.
• Your Cypriot spouse attends with you. The Migration Department requires the Cypriot citizen to be present at submission, so an application filed by the foreign spouse alone will not be taken.
• You pay the fees.
• You provide biometric data (fingerprints, a photograph, and a signature). Children under six give a photograph only.
• Your application is examined, and you receive a reply. If your application is rejected, you will be given reasons for rejection.

Required documents

The Migration Department publishes two document lists, and which one applies to you depends on how you get to Cyprus rather than on the stage you have reached. The first is for a spouse whose Cypriot partner applies for an entry permit before they arrive. The second is for a spouse already lawfully in Cyprus who registers and applies for a first permit here.

Route 1: entry permit, registration and first residence permit

Gather the following before you travel:

• Valid passport: a copy of your passport or other travel document, with at least two years left to run from the date the application goes in.
• Cypriot spouse's identification: a copy of your spouse's Cypriot passport or ID card. The original must be presented at submission.
• Marriage or civil union certificate: the official certificate for your union.
• Non-marriage certificate: proof that you were free to marry, from the authority in your country of origin, where your country issues one. The Cypriot spouse needs a matching certificate from the Wedding Registrar only if the two of you married abroad. If you married in Cyprus, skip it.
• Initial medical certificates: original blood test results showing you are negative for HIV, syphilis, and hepatitis B and C, plus a chest X-ray for tuberculosis (TB), from your country of origin.
• Criminal record certificate: an original certificate from your country of origin, or from your country of residence where that is a different country.
• Proof of income: documents showing stable or satisfactory income for you and your Cypriot family member, as described above.

After you arrive in Cyprus, add:

• Cypriot medical certificates: a new set of blood tests and a chest X-ray done in Cyprus, certified by a doctor of the Republic.
• Proof of health cover: either a full private medical policy covering in-patient care, out-patient care and transportation of remains, which insurers sell as Plan A, or a GESY registration certificate plus a separate policy covering transportation of remains. GESY registration on its own is not accepted, because GESY does not cover repatriation.
• Passport and entry documentation: a copy of the passport page showing your last arrival in the Republic and the visa you used, together with your original Entry Permit (form M70).
• Social insurance registration certificate: your registration with the Social Insurance Services, as an employee or as a self-employed person, where you will be working.

Route 2: registration and first residence permit from inside Cyprus

If you are already in Cyprus lawfully, the list changes in three places. The passport rule is different, no M70 is involved, and the medical tests are done here from the start.

• Valid passport: a copy of your passport or other travel document, valid for at least six months beyond the period of residence you are asking for.
• Cypriot spouse's identification: a copy of the Cypriot passport or ID card, original presented at submission.
• Passport page showing your last arrival in the Republic and the visa you used.
• Marriage or civil union certificate, and the non-marriage certificates on the same conditions as route 1.
• Medical certificates: blood tests for HIV, syphilis and hepatitis B and C, plus a chest X-ray for TB, certified by a doctor of the Republic.
• Criminal record certificate from your country of origin or country of residence.
• Proof of health cover on the Plan A or GESY-plus-repatriation basis set out above.
• Proof of income for you and your Cypriot family member.
• Social insurance registration certificate, where you will be working.
• Children's documents: the birth certificate of any child, with the child's Cyprus identity card or Cyprus passport where the child is a Cypriot citizen.
• Proof of where you live: the title deed of the home, or the rental agreement together with rent payment receipts and recent utility bills from the Electricity Authority of Cyprus or the Water Board. The bills may be in the owner's name or in the tenant's name.

If the title deed has not been issued yet, submit the contract of sale, the receipts for the payments made under it, and the Department of Lands and Surveys stamp on the contract. That stamp is the Land Registry's own record of the sale and the repeal of stamp duty does not touch it.

For contracts signed on or after 1 January 2026, no stamp duty is payable to the Tax Department. For contracts signed before 2026, we settle the duty there before the file goes in.

Certifying and translating your documents

Public documents issued in another state carry an apostille under the Hague Convention of 5 October 1961. Documents from a state that has not ratified that Convention carry diplomatic ratification instead. Documents that are not public documents are certified by a certifying authority of that state, a notary public for example, and a copy is ratified the same way as the original.

Everything you file has to be in Greek or English. Anything in another language needs a certified translation. This is the most common reason a file is handed back at the counter.

Processing time

The processing time is four months, provided you complete the application correctly and submit all the required documents. An incomplete file extends it.

Government fees

• Residence and employment permit for paid work: €80 to issue or renew, and the same €80 where you change employer.
• Residence and employment permit for unpaid work: €50 to issue or renew.
• Residence permit with no employment: €50 to issue or renew.
• Registration in the Aliens Register: €70, charged on first registration only. Renewals do not repeat it.

The €70 registration is what gets you an ARC number, the identifier Cyprus assigns to foreign residents.

Renewing your permit

Apply to renew at least one month before your current permit expires, and book the appointment with that deadline in mind rather than the expiry date itself. Biometric data is collected again on renewal.

A change of employer needs a fresh application for the residence and employment permit at the same €80. The €70 registration fee is not charged a second time.

Leaving Cyprus and coming back

Once your permit is issued, you re-enter Cyprus on the permit and a valid passport, provided you have not stayed outside the Republic for more than three months.

With the application still pending, check the receipt you were given when you paid the fees. It carries a stamp allowing re-entry, and that receipt is what you travel on. If you have lost it, or it is not stamped, apply to the department for a re-entry permit before you leave and explain why you have to travel. As a rule, these are granted only for serious reasons such as medical ones.

A Cyprus residence permit is not a travel document for the rest of Europe. Our guide to travelling with a Cyprus residence permit sets out the position country by country.

If the department questions your marriage

Section 7A of the Aliens and Immigration Law, Cap. 105, gives the Director of the Migration Department the power to find that a marriage is one of convenience. The Director takes that decision after consulting an Advisory Committee made up of representatives of the Ministry of Justice and Public Order, the Social Welfare Services, the District Officer of the district where the couple lives, and the Registrar Officer.

The Director may call both spouses to interview, together or separately, and may question anyone able to give information. Expect to be interviewed apart from your spouse. That is routine and not, by itself, a sign that the application is in trouble.

The law lists what points towards a marriage of convenience:

• The couple do not live under the same roof.
• How long the spouses knew each other, and how many times and how often they met before the marriage or civil union.
• No proper contribution to the obligations arising from the marriage.
• Contradictory statements about their names, addresses, nationality or occupation, about how they first met, or about other significant personal information.
• The spouses have no common language, or none that the Director is satisfied they both understand.
• Money was paid for the marriage, other than a dowry in countries where paying one is customary.
• Either spouse has contracted a marriage of convenience before, or has a history of problems with their residence in the Republic.
• Forged documents were submitted.
• Any other information raising a reasonable suspicion.

If the Director makes that finding, the consequences are severe. The foreign spouse is barred from remaining in the Republic, the residence permit is cancelled or not renewed, deportation is ordered under section 14, and the marriage produces no legal effect for the purposes of that Law.

Section 7D goes further. A foreign national or a Cypriot citizen who contracts a marriage of convenience, or contributes in any way to one being contracted, commits an offence punishable by up to five years in prison, a fine of up to €20,000, or both.

Appeals

In case of rejection of the application, the applicant will receive a letter stating the reasons for rejection.

A refusal is challenged by a recourse to the Administrative Court under Article 146 of the Constitution. The deadline is 75 days from the day the decision was published or, where it was not published, from the day it reached you. Miss it, and the decision stands whatever its merits, so the letter should go to an immigration lawyer the week it arrives.

The court reviews the legality of the decision rather than retaking it. If the recourse succeeds, the department examines the application again. An appeal from the first-instance judgment goes to the Administrative Court of Appeal.

There is no departmental appeal for this category. The 20-day hierarchical recourse to the Minister that Cap. 105 provides belongs to the family reunification chapter, which covers third-country sponsors rather than spouses of Cypriots.

Rights and privileges of the Cyprus spouse visa

The spouse visa includes several benefits, for example:

• Residence in Cyprus with no time limit, for as long as the marriage or civil union lasts, the conditions keep being met, and the permit is renewed on time.
• Free access to the labour market, including self-employment. The right is exercised once your residence and employment permit is issued, and an employer taking you on needs no permit to employ third-country nationals from the Department of Labour.
• Registration with GESY and the access to public healthcare that comes with it.
• A route to Cypriot citizenship on form M125 once you have completed three full years of marriage or civil partnership.

Note what is not on that list. This is a temporary residence permit, and the Migration Department publishes it as one. The permanent statuses available in Cyprus are long-term resident status after five years, the Immigration Permit categories and the routes for family members of EU citizens. Marriage to a Cypriot is not one of them.

Responsibilities of Cyprus spouse visa holders

The Cypriot spouse visa gives you some duties. You need to:

• Live with your spouse. The department treats a couple who are not under the same roof as a warning sign, and it asks about it.
• Obtain medical insurance or register with GESY (the national health system).
• Maintain a clean criminal record to prevent public order issues.
• Renew the permit before it expires, and report a change of employer.

If the marriage ends by divorce, annulment or the death of your Cypriot spouse, you apply as another family member of a Cypriot citizen and the right you get is personal to you. The department looks for a marriage that lasted a long time, a shared long-term legal or financial commitment, shared parental responsibilities, and an immigration record with no issues.

From spouse visa to Cypriot citizenship

Form M125 is the citizenship application for the foreign spouse or civil partner of a Cypriot citizen. You may file it after three full years of marriage or civil partnership.

If the couple lives in Cyprus, the department checks two things in addition to the three years: residence in the Republic of Cyprus for at least six months in each of those years, and a total stay across the three years of not less than two years. A couple permanently resident abroad applies on the three years alone.

The fee is €300. There is no language examination on this route. Our guide to getting Cypriot citizenship covers M125 alongside naturalisation by residence and citizenship by descent.