temporary stay for the purpose of family reunification
Residency route facts
Identity
| Official name (local) | privremeni boravak u svrhu spajanja obitelji as of 2026-08-15[9] The Act's own term, heading above art. 63. |
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| Official name (English) | temporary stay for the purpose of family reunification as of 2026-08-15[3] The Ministry's own English page title. |
| Legal basis | Zakon o strancima (NN 133/20, 114/22, 151/22, 40/25, 55/26), čl. 63.–69. u vezi s čl. 59., 61. i 89.; Pravilnik o boravku državljana trećih zemalja, čl. 6. i 9.; Uredba o načinu izračuna i visini sredstava za uzdržavanje (NN 14/21, 3/26), čl. 2. as of 2026-05-27[8][11] Art. 63 sets who may be reunited and with whom, and its paragraph 2 was substituted by NN 55/2026 and paragraphs 3 and 4 by NN 40/2025; art. 64 defines close family members; art. 65 and 66 the exemptions for the families of Croatian citizens and of protection holders; art. 67 children born in Croatia; art. 68 marriages of convenience; art. 69 autonomous stay. Art. 61(1) and (5) set the term. Ordinance art. 6(2)(1), as substituted by NN 43/2026, lists the accepted proofs of means. |
| Instrument type | residence permit as of 2026-08-15[5] Granted as temporary stay; the holder is issued a biometric residence permit. |
Who can apply
| Nationals not served by this route | EU, EEA, EFTA as of 2026-08-15[5] The temporary-stay chapter applies to third-country nationals; family members of EEA nationals are governed by a separate chapter. |
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| Minimum age | Not established from a qualifying source No minimum age is stated for the applicant. Croatia does not impose the minimum-age condition for spouses that Directive 2003/86/EC permits, so far as the retrieved text shows. |
| Criminal-record condition | Yes as of 2026-08-15[1][9] The general condition in art. 59(1)(5) applies on a first application, and the Ministry's document list for a family-reunification application repeats it: proof of no final conviction in a country of residence of more than one year immediately before arriving in Croatia. |
Permit terms
| Initial duration | up to 2 years as of 2025-03-07[10] Art. 61(1) second indent point 1 as substituted by NN 40/2025: up to two years where the reunification is with a Croatian citizen, with a third-country national on long-term or permanent stay, with a person granted asylum or subsidiary protection, or with a third-country national who holds temporary stay. Art. 61(5) caps it: the permit is issued to the expiry of the sponsor's own temporary stay, and in any case for no longer than two years. Before NN 40/2025 the two-year term was available only for reunification with a Croatian citizen. |
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| How the initial term is set | matches the sponsor's permit |
| Renewable | Yes as of 2026-08-15[9] Art. 62(1): an application to extend is lodged at the latest 60 days before the current permit expires; the holder may remain until the decision is enforceable. Art. 63(4) as renumbered adds that a refusal to extend, or an expulsion decision, may not rest solely on illness or disability suffered by the family member after the stay was granted. |
| Renewal duration | up to 2 years as of 2025-03-07[10] The same rule in art. 61(1) and (5) governs extension. |
| Work rights | Recorded at the source, but not reducible to a single value as of 2026-08-15[6][9] |
Permanent residence and citizenship
Requirements
| Who can sponsor | citizen, permanent resident, temporary permit holder, specific permits as of 2026-08-15[3][9] Art. 63(1): a Croatian citizen; a third-country national granted long-term residence; a third-country national granted permanent stay; a third-country national granted temporary stay; and a third-country national granted asylum or subsidiary protection. Croatia's two permanence tracks – long-term residence and permanent stay – are both mapped to permanent_resident; 'specific_permits' carries the protection statuses. |
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| Eligible relations | spouse, unmarried partner, minor child, parent, other dependent as of 2026-08-15[3][9] Art. 64(1): spouse; common-law partner; the minor common child of spouses or common-law partners, of life partners or of informal life partners, and each of their own minor children, their jointly adopted minor child and each of their adopted minor children who is not married, and the minor child or adopted minor child of a life or informal life partner who is not married; and the parent or adoptive parent of a minor child who is a Croatian citizen or a third-country national with long-term residence, permanent stay, asylum or subsidiary protection. Art. 64(2): any other relative may be treated as a close family member where there are special personal or serious humanitarian reasons – recorded as other_dependent. Art. 64(4): in a polygamous marriage only one spouse is admitted. The life partner as such applies on the separate life-partnership route (art. 70), recorded as hr-zivotno-partnerstvo. |
| Sponsor income requirement | 0.57 × average monthly net paid salary, previous year per month as of 2026-01-09[7][8] Regulation art. 2(1) as substituted by NN 3/2026: at least 57 % of the previous year's average monthly net paid salary, EUR 825.93 at the Bureau of Statistics figure for 2025. Art. 2(2), unamended: for a two-member family the amount is increased by 15 %, and for each further family member or life or informal life partner by a further 10 % of that average salary – so EUR 1,043.28 for two and EUR 1,188.18 for three. The requirement falls away entirely for the close family member of a Croatian citizen (art. 65(1)) and for the family of a person granted asylum or subsidiary protection (art. 66(1)). Ordinance art. 6(2)(1) as substituted by NN 43/2026 lists what proves it: six payslips immediately before the application, a tax decision, a pension statement, entry in the register of family farms with proof of income from it, or a written maintenance undertaking given by a family or household member – and, where the reunification is with a digital nomad or concerns the minor children of art. 63(3), a bank account as well. Whose income is tested – the sponsor's or the applicant's – is not stated in terms; the condition sits in art. 59(1)(3), which is written about the applicant. |
| Sponsor accommodation requirement | Not established from a qualifying source No accommodation condition for a family sponsor was found in the retrieved text. Croatia's appropriate-accommodation rules in art. 103.f and ordinance arts. 47 to 49 are written for employers of work-permit and seasonal workers, not for family sponsors. |
| Sponsor waiting period | at least 2 years as of 2026-05-27[11] Art. 63(2) as substituted by NN 55/2026: where the sponsor holds a stay and work permit issued or extended under art. 97 with a validity of one year or more, family reunification may be granted only if the sponsor has held temporary stay in Croatia continuously for at least two years. This applies to that sponsor class alone – there is no waiting period for the family of a Croatian citizen, of a long-term or permanent resident, of a protection holder or of a Blue Card holder. NN 55/2026 raised it from one year; the Ministry's English page still states one year, and art. 63(3) as added by NN 40/2025 exempts a minor child both of whose parents hold art. 97 permits, and a minor child of a single parent holding one. |
| Pre-entry language test | No as of 2026-08-15[3][9] Neither the general conditions in art. 59(1) nor the family-reunification conditions in arts. 63 to 68 contain any language condition, and the Ministry's document list for this route contains none. Recorded false on the closed list of conditions, not on an express negative statement. |
| Sponsor and relation matrix |
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Process
| Where to apply from | either as of 2025-03-07[1][10] Art. 58(1) and (2) apply, and art. 58(3) adds several family-specific carve-outs letting a visa-required applicant lodge at a police administration: close family members and life partners of a Croatian citizen, close family members of students and researchers, and family members of a Blue Card holder. Art. 58(4) lets a person with asylum or subsidiary protection lodge in Croatia for a visa-required close family member, and art. 58(5) allows the same for a minor child where both parents, or the only available parent, already hold a Croatian residence title. |
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| Statutory processing time | Not established from a qualifying source No statutory decision period is stated for a temporary-stay application. |
| Fees |
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| Quota |
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Physical presence
| maximum total absence | 180 days · to keep the permit as of 2025-03-07[5][10] Art. 87(1)(6) as substituted by NN 40/2025: a temporary stay granted for up to two years expires if the holder is abroad for more than 180 days in total on multiple occasions from the day the stay was granted. |
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| maximum consecutive absence | 60 days · to keep the permit as of 2025-03-07[5][10] Same provision: more than 60 days on a single occasion, for a stay granted for up to two years. A single absence of up to 90 days for justified reasons notified to the police administration before departure does not end the stay. |
| registration only | to keep the permit as of 2025-03-07[5][10] Registration of residence with the police administration within 30 days of the grant, or six months where a long-stay visa was required, and reporting of the address within three days of entry. Art. 62.a, added by NN 40/2025, adds a further continuing obligation: the holder must notify the police administration within 15 days when the conditions on which the stay was granted cease to exist. |
Family inclusion
| Family members may be included | Yes as of 2026-05-27[9][11] The holder of this permit is themselves a third-country national with temporary stay, and art. 63(1)(4) makes that one of the five sponsor statuses, so a further family member may in principle be reunited with them. Art. 63(2)'s two-year waiting rule is written for the holder of a stay and work permit under art. 97 and does not reach this route, and art. 63(4)'s exclusions do not name it. The permit's own term caps the chain in practice: art. 61(5) issues a family permit only to the expiry of the sponsor's temporary stay. |
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| Eligible relations | spouse, unmarried partner, minor child, other dependent as of 2026-08-15[9] Art. 64(1) applies unchanged, with the parent limb unavailable because it requires the minor child to be a Croatian citizen or to hold long-term residence, permanent stay or protection. Art. 64(2)'s other relative on special personal or serious humanitarian grounds remains open. |
| Family may apply at the same time | Not established from a qualifying source Not stated in the sources retrieved. |
| Family members' work rights | Recorded at the source, but not reducible to a single value as of 2026-08-15[6] Same per-sponsor-category gap as the route's own work_rights: art. 89(1) frees a further family member from any permit only where the chain reaches a Croatian citizen, a long-term or permanent resident, a protection holder, a Blue Card holder, an intra-corporate transferee, a researcher or a long-term resident of another EEA state. |
Your next step
Read the requirements above considering your own situation: the income multiple, the absence limits, who you can bring. Check the country record for the reference figure those amounts are calculated from, and for anything that has changed recently.
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Verification
| Sources cited | 11 |
|---|---|
| of which official (tier 1) | 11 |
| Oldest as-of date | 2025-03-07 |
| Newest as-of date | 2026-08-15 |
| Reviewed on | 2026-08-22 |
| Schema version | 1.1 |
Sources
- [1] Stay and work of highly-qualified third-country nationals
Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Croatia · official portal · Tier 1 · Accessed 2026-08-15 - [2] Temporary stay of digital nomads
Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Croatia · official portal · Tier 1 · Accessed 2026-08-15 · Archived copy - [3] Temporary stay for the purpose of family reunification
Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Croatia · official portal · Tier 1 · Accessed 2026-08-15 - [4] Long-Term Residence and Permanent stay
Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Croatia (MUP) · official portal · Tier 1 · Accessed 2026-08-15 · Archived copy - [5] Temporary stay of third-country nationals
Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Croatia (MUP) · official portal · Tier 1 · Accessed 2026-08-15 · Archived copy - [6] Work of third-country nationals
Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Croatia (MUP) · official portal · Tier 1 · Accessed 2026-08-15 · Archived copy - [7] Uredba o načinu izračuna i visini sredstava za uzdržavanje državljanina treće zemlje u Republici Hrvatskoj, NN 14/2021
Narodne novine · Vlada Republike Hrvatske · statute · Tier 1 · Published 2021-02-12 · Accessed 2026-08-15 · Archived copy · Amended by hr-uredba-uzdrzavanje-3-26 - [8] Uredba o izmjenama i dopuni Uredbe o načinu izračuna i visini sredstava za uzdržavanje državljanina treće zemlje u RH, NN 3/2026
Narodne novine / Vlada Republike Hrvatske · statute · Tier 1 · Published 2026-01-09 · Accessed 2026-08-15 - [9] Zakon o strancima (Aliens Act), NN 133/2020
Narodne novine (Official Gazette of the Republic of Croatia) / Hrvatski sabor · gazette · Tier 1 · Published 2020-12-04 · Accessed 2026-08-15 · Amended by hr-zakon-o-strancima-114-22, hr-zakon-o-strancima-40-25, hr-zakon-o-strancima-55-26 - [10] Zakon o izmjenama i dopunama Zakona o strancima, NN 40/2025
Narodne novine / Hrvatski sabor · gazette · Tier 1 · Published 2025-03-07 · Accessed 2026-08-15 - [11] Zakon o izmjenama i dopunama Zakona o strancima, NN 55/2026
Narodne novine / Hrvatski sabor · gazette · Tier 1 · Published 2026-05-27 · Accessed 2026-08-15