2026 guide for French expats and retirees
No visa, but seven steps: from leaving France the right way to your health cover and taxes in Portugal.
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Moving to Portugal from France takes no visa: as an EU citizen, you can live in Portugal on your French ID card for three months, and stay longer if you work, study or have enough money of your own, such as a pension. In 2024, 29,009 French citizens were living in Portugal.
What you do need is paperwork: a tax number (NIF), the EU registration certificate (CRUE) from your Câmara Municipal, health cover (the S1 if you draw a French pension) and a clear answer on where your pension is taxed. This guide takes you through the 7 steps, from your last French tax return to Portuguese citizenship.
Moving from France in 6 numbers (2026)
Yes to all five? You can move without any visa.
Your spouse or children are not EU citizens? They have a route of their own, with a residence card from AIMA (see below). A doubt about your case? Ask us in a free call.
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No. As an EU citizen, you enter Portugal with your French ID card or passport, with no visa, and can live there for up to three months with no other formality. To stay longer, you need to work (employed or self-employed), study, or have enough money of your own and health cover. Then you register at your Câmara Municipal: no visa, no residence permit, no AIMA appointment.
The same rights cover citizens of the other EU countries, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland. Our guide to Portugal residency for EU citizens goes into detail.
Your spouse or partner, your children under 21 or dependent on you, and your dependent parents can live in Portugal with you, whatever their nationality. They enter with their passport and need a visa only if EU rules require one for their nationality; that visa is free and fast-tracked.
After three months, within 30 days, they ask AIMA for a residence card as family of an EU citizen, with their passport, proof of the family link and your registration certificate. AIMA has up to three months to issue it, and it is valid for five years.
Give your new address abroad to your tax office, from the secure messaging of your online account. In the spring after the year you leave, your return covers all your income from 1 January to the day you left (give that date), and any French income received after it. From then on, as a non-resident, France taxes only your French-source income, as far as the tax convention allows (a private-sector pension goes to Portugal: see Taxes), and the non-residents' tax office (SIPNR) handles your file. With no French income, you have nothing to file in France.
The register of French nationals abroad (registre des Français établis hors de France) is not compulsory, but strongly recommended once you settle abroad for more than six months. Registering is free, done online and valid five years, and it makes identity papers, school grants for your children and consular help in an emergency easier.
It also lets you join the consular electoral list: you then vote from Portugal, at a consular polling station or by proxy, in presidential elections (the next is due in 2027), legislative and European elections and referendums. Municipal elections need the list of a French commune, and you are on one list at a time.
In Portugal, the consular services are the consular section of the French Embassy, Rua Santos-o-Velho 5 in Lisbon, by appointment only.
Your French pensions keep being paid when you live abroad, to a Portuguese account or to your French one: tell your pension funds your new address quickly. Some schemes ask for a life certificate (certificat de vie) every year: you now send one for all of them, online through the Ma retraite à l'étranger service of your pension account or the Mon compte retraite app. If it arrives late, your pension can be suspended. Solidarity allowances such as the ASPA stop when you live outside France.
You draw a French pension and won't work in Portugal? Ask your basic pension fund for the S1 form before you leave (see Healthcare), and tell your health insurance fund that you are moving.
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From your new address at the French tax office to your Portuguese tax return. Each step says what to do and what it costs. In a free AnchorLess account, you tick them off one by one and get expert help where you need it.
No visa to apply for. Check that you will work, study or live on your own means, give your new address to the tax office and your pension funds, ask for your S1 if you draw a French pension, and register with the consulate once you are there.
Talk to us for freeYour Portuguese tax number: landlords, banks and the tax office ask for it. Get it at a tax office or a Loja do Cidadão (by appointment), or from France through a representative. As a resident of an EU country, you need no tax representative.
Get my NIFYour own Portuguese IBAN for rent, bills and a salary in Portugal, opened remotely before you move, once you have your NIF. Your French pension can be paid into it.
Open my accountYour address goes on your registration certificate. Rents on new leases had a median of €10.17 per m² in Portugal in the second quarter of 2026, €15.24 in Greater Lisbon. Have the lease checked before you sign.
Review my leaseOr find your home with usAfter three months in Portugal, you have 30 days to register at the Câmara Municipal where you live, with your ID card or passport and a sworn statement that you work, study or have enough means. You get the EU registration certificate (CRUE), valid five years. Then update your NIF address.
Update my NIF address (€99)Working in Portugal? You need a social security number (NISS): the online request is free. Still in France, or would rather not deal with it in Portuguese? We register you with Social Security for you, 100% online, with your account password. For public healthcare, get your SNS user number at your health center. Drawing a French pension? Hand in your S1 at the Segurança Social where you live.
Have it done for meYou are a Portuguese tax resident after more than 183 days in Portugal in 12 months, or sooner with a home you intend to keep as your habitual residence. File your IRS return every year, from 1 April to 30 June. The France–Portugal convention decides which country taxes each income: a private-sector pension in Portugal, a civil-service pension in France.
Book a tax consultation (€249)File my IRS| Official step | Cost |
|---|---|
| Registration certificate (CRUE) at the Câmara, over 25 | €18 |
| The same, requested online | €15 |
| Social security number (NISS), requested online | Free |
| Driving license registration at IMT | Free |
| Register of French nationals abroad | Free |
Under 25, the certificate costs €15 at the counter and €12.50 online (details).
There is no visa to wait for: you can move as soon as your home is ready. The deadlines to keep are in Portugal: your license registered with IMT within 60 days of settling, and your CRUE within 30 days after your first three months. Ask for your S1 before you leave: it is better, though it can still be asked later.
The Certificado de Registo de Cidadão da União Europeia, or CRUE, formalizes your right to live in Portugal. You need it if you stay more than three months, and you ask for it at the Câmara Municipal of the area where you live, within 30 days after your first three months. It carries your name, your address and the date of registration.
That is the whole list in the law and on AIMA's page: no lease, no bank statements, no NIF required. A family member who is an EU citizen too gets a certificate of their own, with proof of the family link.
Over 25, €18 at the counter or €15 online; under 25, €15 at the counter or €12.50 online; €7.50 under 6; free for a baby under one year (AIMA's 2026 fee table). The certificate is valid five years, or for your planned stay if it is shorter. Not registering in time can cost a fine of €400 to €1,500, halved when it is negligence.
Once you have it, change the address of your NIF to your Portuguese home: for the tax office, a new address counts only once you have reported it, and a change of tax residence status must be reported within 60 days. Our CRUE guide walks you through the appointment.
Your European Health Insurance Card (EHIC) is for temporary stays: it covers the care that becomes medically necessary during a stay, not a new life in Portugal. Once you live there, your cover depends on your situation:
With an S1, you can still come back to France for any care, covered under French rules. Once you are no longer a French tax resident, CSG and CRDS stop on your French pensions, and a health contribution is taken instead: 3.2% on the basic pension and 4.2% on supplementary pensions for a private-sector employee's pension. If you work in Portugal, none is taken from your pension. Working, you can also join the CFE on top of Portuguese social security, to avoid waiting periods and lost pension quarters when you return to France.
Any foreign national living legally in Portugal can get an SNS user number (número de utente), given at your first visit to a public health center or hospital. For the SNS to cover your care, your record needs your ID, your Portuguese NIF, your full address in Portugal and a valid residence document. You can then register with the health center of your area. Our healthcare guide goes further.
A French mutuelle (complémentaire santé) tops up what the French Assurance maladie pays. With an S1, your care in Portugal follows Portuguese rules, and your care in France French rules. No official rule says what a mutuelle pays once you live abroad: each contract has its own, so ask yours before you leave. You can cancel an individual contract at any time after its first year.
In Portugal, private health insurance (seguro de saúde) covers what its contract lists, within its limits. Conditions you already have are covered unless the contract excludes them, and it usually does; some covers start only after a waiting period. A "plano de saúde" is not insurance but a discount card on a network of providers. In 2025, an individual policy cost on average €452 per insured person (ASF, the insurance supervisor). Our guide to insurance in Portugal lists the main insurers.
You become a Portuguese tax resident if you spend more than 183 days in Portugal, in a row or not, in any 12-month period, or fewer days if you have a home there that you intend to keep and live in as your habitual residence. You are then resident from your first day of presence, and you file your IRS return online every year from 1 April to 30 June, for the year before. Report a change of residence status to the tax office within 60 days.
In France, once your tax home is no longer there, you are taxed only on your French-source income, as far as the tax convention allows.
France and Portugal signed a tax convention on 14 January 1971, amended by an addendum signed in Lisbon on 25 August 2016. For pensions, it draws a clear line:
The NHR regime is closed: nobody who becomes a tax resident from 2025 can get it. Its successor, the IFICI, taxes income from qualifying jobs (research, higher education, highly qualified professions in some companies, startups) at 20% for 10 years, and its exemption of foreign income leaves pensions out. In France, the non-residents' tax office (SIPNR) answers on how the convention applies to you.
Our tax lawyers answer your questions in a 40-minute call (€249), and our certified accountants file your Portuguese IRS. IFICI or NHR? We review your options too.
To buy a home in Portugal, you need a NIF: the taxes on the purchase are paid under it. Three taxes apply:
| Tax | When | Rate |
|---|---|---|
| IMT, the property transfer tax | Once, when you buy | 0% to 7.5% |
| Stamp duty (Imposto do Selo) | Once, when you buy | 0.8% |
| IMI, the municipal property tax | Every year | 0.3% to 0.45% |
IMT and stamp duty are worked out on the price or the taxable value of the property (valor patrimonial tributário), whichever is higher, and stamp duty is paid before the deed. On the mainland, a home you buy to live in permanently pays no IMT up to €106,346 in 2026; above, the rate rises by brackets from 2% to 8%, then becomes a single 6% above €660,982 and 7.5% above €1,150,853. A second home pays from 1%, and IMT is not the same in Madeira and the Azores.
IMI is due every year from whoever owns the home on 31 December, on its taxable value: each municipality sets its rate between 0.3% and 0.45%. It is paid in May, or in two or three instalments when it is over €100 or €500. Our guides to buying a house in Portugal as a foreigner, to mortgages and to home insurance go further.
In Portugal, an inheritance pays 10% stamp duty on what is located in Portugal: a home, money in a Portuguese bank, a car registered there. Your spouse or de facto partner, descendants and ascendants (children, grandchildren, parents, grandparents) are exempt. The death is reported to the tax office (Finanças) by the end of the third month after it.
France can tax the same inheritance, under article 750 ter of its tax code:
France and Portugal have no convention sharing out inheritance tax: their tax convention covers income tax, and their 1994 agreement on inheritance only exempts gifts and bequests to the two States, their local authorities and public bodies. When France taxes assets located abroad, it deducts the tax already paid on them there, up to the French tax on those assets. If you die in Portugal, your heirs file the French return within 12 months, with the non-residents' tax office (SIPNR). A notary can tell you what your heirs would pay in each country.
Your French driving license is valid in Portugal until the expiry date printed on it, and exchanging it for a Portuguese one is optional. But once you live in Portugal, you must register it with IMT within 60 days: it is free, at the IMT counter of your area, with your ID, your registration at the Câmara Municipal and your license.
An old license with no expiry date must be exchanged for a Portuguese one within two years of settling in Portugal.
French plates are for visitors: once you live in Portugal, your car must go on Portuguese plates. Within 20 working days of its arrival, you file a customs vehicle declaration (DAV) online on the Portal das Finanças, with its inspection and its technical approval from IMT.
Because you are moving your residence, you pay no vehicle tax (ISV) on it if you are over 18, lived in France for at least six months, and owned the car there for at least six months before you moved, bought in France with its taxes paid. Ask for this exemption within 12 months of your move: it covers one car per person, once every ten years, and you cannot sell, rent or lend the car for 12 months after it gets its Portuguese number. Otherwise, the ISV is paid within 10 working days of its assessment.
IMT then issues the registration certificate, and the car is registered at a Conservatória do Registo Automóvel. From then on, it pays a yearly road tax, the IUC: from 2027, in April, or in two or three instalments when it is over €100 or €500. Buying in Portugal instead? See our guides to buying a car and to car insurance.
After five years in a row of legal residence, you have the right of permanent residence, with no more conditions of work or means. Absences of up to six months a year don't break the five years, nor does one absence of up to 12 months for a serious reason (pregnancy, illness, studies or a posting abroad). On request, AIMA issues a certificate of permanent residence within 15 days. You lose the right only after more than two years away in a row.
After seven years of legal residence (since Lei Orgânica 1/2026; it was five), you can apply for Portuguese citizenship. Your years can be added up if they fall within nine years. You also prove, by a test or a certificate, that you know the Portuguese language and culture, history and national symbols, and the rights and duties of citizens; you declare your adherence to the rule of law, show you can support yourself, and must have no conviction that bars it. The new test is still to be set by regulation.
You keep your French citizenship: French law does not ask a French citizen who acquires another nationality to give up French nationality, and Portugal does not ask you to give it up either.
You won't be alone: 29,009 French citizens lived in Portugal in 2024, according to AIMA's yearly report, and 3,650 residence documents went to French citizens that year. On 1 January 2025, 21,036 people were on the French Embassy's consular register, 26% of them dual nationals.
Four schools in Portugal are in the AEFE's directory of homologated French schools. The Lycée français Charles-Lepierre in Lisbon (over 2,000 pupils, run directly by the AEFE) and the Lycée français international de Porto (about 1,300 pupils) teach from nursery school to the last year of lycée (terminale), as does Redbridge School in Lisbon; L'École trilingue in Lisbon is a nursery school. Registering with the consulate helps when you apply for a French school grant (bourse scolaire).
Prices are about a fifth lower than in France: in 2025, the price level of household consumption was 86.6 in Portugal and 110.3 in France, for an EU average of 100 (Eurostat). Pay is lower too: the minimum wage, €920 a month paid 14 times a year, comes to €1,073 a month over 12 months in 2026, against €1,867 in France (gross, Eurostat). Rents on new leases had a median of €10.17 per m² in Portugal in the second quarter of 2026, up 10.2% in a year: €15.24 in Greater Lisbon, €11.56 in the Algarve (INE).
Our guides go into detail for Lisbon, Porto, the Algarve and Madeira, with salaries in Portugal and the costs of retiring in Portugal.
The rules, amounts and fees in this guide were checked on 23 October 2026 against the law and the official portals:
Written by Brenda L., relocation expert at AnchorLess. Tax rules depend on your situation: this guide is not tax advice.
No visa: a valid French ID card or passport is enough to enter and to stay three months. To stay longer, you work, study or have enough money of your own with health cover, and you register at your Câmara Municipal within 30 days after your first three months, for the EU registration certificate (CRUE).
Along the way you need a NIF (tax number), health cover (the S1 if you draw a French pension) and, if you work, a social security number (NISS).
Yes. Your spouse or partner, your children under 21 or dependent, and your dependent parents can live with you whatever their nationality. They need a visa only if EU rules require one for their nationality, and it is free and fast-tracked. After three months, within 30 days, they ask AIMA for a residence card as family of an EU citizen, valid for five years.
Within 30 days after your first three months in Portugal. You bring your ID card or passport and sign a statement that you work, study or have enough means. It costs €18 at the counter or €15 online if you are over 25, and the certificate is valid five years. Not registering can cost a fine of €400 to €1,500.
Your tax office (your new address and departure date, from your online account), your pension funds and your health insurance fund. Registering with the consulate, on the register of French nationals abroad, is optional but recommended: it is free, online, valid five years, and lets you join the consular electoral list to vote from Portugal.
Yes: living abroad doesn't stop your French pensions, paid to a Portuguese or a French account. Tell your pension funds your new address, and send the yearly life certificate, one for all your schemes, through the Ma retraite à l'étranger service or the Mon compte retraite app. Solidarity allowances such as the ASPA stop when you live outside France.
Under the France–Portugal tax convention, a private-sector pension is taxable only where you live: in Portugal, at the ordinary IRS rates, once you are resident there. A public-sector pension (State, local authorities, public bodies) is taxable only in France, unless you are also Portuguese.
The NHR regime is closed to anyone who becomes resident from 2025, and the IFICI does not cover pensions.
Possibly in both. Portugal charges 10% stamp duty on what is located there (a home, a Portuguese bank account, a car), but your spouse or de facto partner, descendants and ascendants are exempt. France taxes your assets in France, and everything an heir receives if that heir lives in France and has for six of the last ten years; and all you leave if you are still a French tax resident.
The two countries have no convention sharing out inheritance tax, but France deducts the tax paid abroad on assets located abroad. A notary can tell you what your heirs would pay.
If you draw a French pension and don't work, ask your basic pension fund for the S1 before you leave and hand it in at the Segurança Social where you live: you are covered in Portugal, and in France for any care. Once you are no longer a French tax resident, a health contribution (3.2% on a private-sector basic pension, 4.2% on supplementary pensions) replaces CSG and CRDS. If you work in Portugal, Portuguese social security covers you. Otherwise, take out cover with the CFE or a private insurer.
Yes, on the consular electoral list, which you can join when you register with the consulate: presidential (the next is due in 2027), legislative and European elections and referendums, at a consular polling station or by proxy. Municipal elections need the list of a French commune, and you are on one list at a time.
On average, yes, about a fifth: in 2025, the price level of household consumption was 86.6 in Portugal and 110.3 in France, for an EU average of 100 (Eurostat). Pay is lower too: the minimum wage comes to €1,073 a month over 12 months in 2026, against €1,867 in France. Rents are rising: the median on new leases was €10.17 per m² in the second quarter of 2026, up 10.2% in a year, and €15.24 in Greater Lisbon.
Yes: four schools are in the AEFE's directory of homologated French schools. The Lycée français Charles-Lepierre in Lisbon, the Lycée français international de Porto and Redbridge School in Lisbon teach from nursery school to terminale; L'École trilingue in Lisbon is a nursery school.
Yes. EU citizens can apply for Portuguese citizenship after seven years of legal residence (since Lei Orgânica 1/2026), with a test or certificate of Portuguese language and culture. French law does not ask a French citizen who acquires another nationality to give up French nationality.
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