Family reunification as a spouse
Residency route facts
Identity
| Official name (local) | Ansøg om ægtefællesammenføring as of 2026-08-22[3] Heading of the Danish-language edition of this route's own page on nyidanmark.dk, transcribed as published. The Aliens Act enumerates the grounds by section number and gives the permits no names of their own, so the authority's published Danish heading is the local name. |
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| Official name (English) | Family reunification as a spouse as of 2026-02-12[3] The page's own title is 'Apply for family reunification as a spouse'; it covers a spouse, a registered partner and a cohabiting partner alike. |
| Legal basis | Udlaendingeloven (Aliens Act), LBK nr 1183 of 25 September 2025, section 9(1)(1); integration declaration section 9(2); self-support and benefits condition section 9(3) and (5); financial guarantee section 9(4) with sections 9(26)-(27), (37)-(42); housing requirement section 9(6)-(7); integration requirement section 9(8)-(9); prior lawful stay section 9(10); Danish language tests after grant sections 9(34)-(36) as of 2026-02-12[1][3] The Immigration Service's page cites no section anywhere. The identification is from the Act's own text: section 9(1)(1) grants a permit to an alien over 24 cohabiting at a shared address in marriage or lasting fixed cohabitation with a person resident in Denmark who is over 24 and falls within litra a to e. Every condition the page describes – the 24-year rule, the integration requirement, the guarantee, the housing rule, the benefits look-back and the post-grant A1 and A2 tests – has a numbered home in that section, which is what closes the identification. |
| Instrument type | residence permit as of 2026-02-12[3] |
Who can apply
| Minimum age | 24 as of 2026-02-12[1][3] The 24-year requirement, and it binds both parties: the applicant and the sponsor must normally each be at least 24. It sits inside the granting provision itself, section 9(1)(1), not in a separate condition subsection. An application may be submitted when the younger of the two is 23 years and 6 months. Both must additionally have turned 18 at the time of the wedding, and the marriage must be legal where contracted, with both physically present and neither represented by proxy. Dispensation from the 24-year rule is possible for very special reasons, of which the page names four: the sponsor is raising minor children with an independent attachment to Denmark, the sponsor has contact with minor children from a previous relationship, the sponsor works in a field on the Positive Lists, or the sponsor works for the Danish state in a position of special importance to Denmark's security or foreign policy. |
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Permit terms
| Initial duration | 2 years as of 2026-02-12[3] Typically valid for two years – the page says 'typically', not 'up to', so no bound marker is recorded. |
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| Renewable | Yes as of 2025-12-03[4] |
| Renewal duration | 4 years as of 2025-12-03[4] A staircase: after the first 2 years the permit is normally extended by 4 years, and once the holder has had a permit for at least 6 years it is extended by 6 years at a time. Where the sponsor also holds a temporary permit, the holder's permit expires when the sponsor's does. The Immigration Service does not extend a temporary permit for less than 6 months, and the permit cannot be extended past the expiry date of the financial guarantee. |
| Work rights | full as of 2026-02-12[3] The holder may work while the permit is valid; no separate work permit and no restriction is stated. |
Permanent residence and citizenship
| Counts toward permanent residence | Yes as of 2026-07-07[1][6] Permanent residence counts eight years' uninterrupted legal residence on a permit under Aliens Act sections 7-9 f, 9 i-9 n, 9 p or 9 q (1) or (2), and this permit is granted under section 9, inside that range. Neither the application page nor the extension page states the point; it follows from the two provisions read together. The 'transferred requirements for permanent residence' the pages do mention are a condition imposed on the sponsor, which is a different question. |
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Requirements
| Who can sponsor | citizen, permanent resident, temporary permit holder as of 2026-02-12[1][3] |
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| Eligible relations | spouse, registered partner, unmarried partner as of 2026-02-12[1][3] Married spouses, registered partners, and unmarried partners in a lasting fixed cohabitation – for whom the page requires living together at the same address for a minimum of 18 months. |
| Sponsor income requirement | Not applicable[1][2][3] There is no income floor on this route, and recording one would misstate it. What the Act imposes instead is a benefits condition and a collateral: section 9(5) bars a permit where the sponsor has received aid under the Active Social Policy Act or the Integration Act in the three years before the decision, and bars either party from receiving such aid until permanent residence – the page warns that even short periods on cash benefits in that window are enough – while section 9(4) requires the sponsor to post a financial guarantee. Minor one-off benefits and payments equivalent to a wage or a pension are excluded from the bar. |
| Sponsor accommodation requirement | Yes as of 2026-02-12[1][3] Aliens Act section 9(6). Three limbs. The sponsor must have an independent, reasonably sized dwelling at their disposal – independent meaning its own entrance and appearance as one unit, with no kitchen or bathroom required; at their disposal meaning owned, rented or sublet, with a housing-association share counting. Reasonably sized is met by either of two tests: the number of people living there may not exceed double the number of rooms, or there must be at least 20 square metres of living space per person. Second limb: at the time the application is submitted the dwelling must not lie in an area on the housing-requirement list published by the Minister for Social Affairs and Housing every 1 December. Third limb: neither party may move into such an area before permanent residence. The list's timing is asymmetric between the two stages – at first grant, a later listing of the area does not break the requirement, while at extension it does. Where the sponsor lives abroad or has recently returned, the deadline can be extended by up to six months after the applicant is granted a permit, normally on condition that the application is made within a month of returning. |
| Sponsor waiting period | 3 years as of 2026-02-12[1][3] Only where the sponsor qualifies through permanent residence (section 9(1)(1) litra e): three years' holding of the permanent permit, plus what the page calls the transferred requirements for a permanent residence permit. One year instead for an economically active Turkish national granted permanent residence on an application submitted on or after 15 March 2017. A Danish or Nordic citizen sponsor has no waiting period. |
| Pre-entry language test | Recorded at the source, but not reducible to a single value[1][3][5] |
Process
| Where to apply from | either as of 2026-02-12[1][3] Aliens Act section 9(25) governs where the application may be lodged; the page adds a separate visitation condition – the applicant will normally need to have visited Denmark at least once, on a legal presence, with no minimum length, and entry as an asylum seeker does not satisfy it. |
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| Observed processing time | Recorded at the source, but not reducible to a single value[3][4] |
| Fees |
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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.
The next step is your own case. That assessment is legal work. Create profile for our assistance in this.
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Verification
| Sources cited | 6 |
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| of which official (tier 1) | 6 |
| Oldest as-of date | 2025-12-03 |
| Newest as-of date | 2026-08-22 |
| Reviewed on | 2026-08-22 |
| Schema version | 1.1 |
Sources
- [1] Bekendtgoerelse af udlaendingeloven (Aliens Act, consolidated), LBK nr 1183 af 25/09/2025
Udlaendinge- og Integrationsministeriet / Retsinformation · statute · Tier 1 · Published 2025-09-25 · Accessed 2026-08-22 - [2] The collateral guarantee – Reduction and release
The Danish Immigration Service · official guidance · Tier 1 · Published 2025-10-06 · Accessed 2026-08-20 - [3] Apply for family reunification as a spouse
The Danish Immigration Service · official portal · Tier 1 · Published 2026-02-12 · Accessed 2026-08-20 · Archived copy - [4] Apply to extend a residence permit as a spouse
The Danish Immigration Service · official portal · Tier 1 · Published 2025-12-03 · Accessed 2026-08-20 - [5] New rules for family reunification for spouses
The Danish Immigration Service · official portal · Tier 1 · Published 2018-06-08 · Accessed 2026-08-20 - [6] Apply for a permanent residence permit
The Danish Immigration Service · official portal · Tier 1 · Published 2026-07-07 · Accessed 2026-08-19