Ten Years, a Language and History Exam and a Job or a Flat - and the Decree Does Not Take Effect Until You Have Given Up the Other Passport
Article 12(1) of the Organic Law on Georgian Citizenship sets four cumulative requirements for ordinary naturalisation: lawful and continuous residence in Georgia for the last ten years up to the day of applying, knowledge of the state language within the established limits, knowledge of Georgian history and the basic principles of law within those limits, and work in Georgia and/or real estate in Georgia, or entrepreneurial activity in the territory of Georgia, or a holding of shares or an interest in a Georgian enterprise. Marriage shortens it: article 14(1) grants citizenship under the simplified procedure after five years of lawful continuous residence, requiring only the language and history limbs and not the work-or-property one. Dual citizenship is where Georgia is strict in a way the brochures are not. Article 3(2) establishes a single citizenship and article 3(3) allows a Georgian citizen to be a foreign citizen only in the cases in articles 17 and 21¹. Article 15 makes the mechanism concrete: the President's decree granting citizenship to a foreign citizen - except a decree granting it by way of exception - takes effect only when the competent Georgian authorities receive the document certifying that the person has left the other country's citizenship. So the ordinary route requires renunciation, and only the President's exceptional grant does not. Coming the other way, article 21(1)(გ) makes a Georgian citizen lose citizenship on acquiring a foreign one unless article 21¹ applies, and article 21¹(1) applies only where consent to retain was obtained from the Georgian state before the foreign citizenship was acquired, on a test of whether the person's connection with Georgia is considered reliable.
At a glance
- Residence required for ordinary naturalisation
- The last 10 consecutive years, lawfully, up to the day of applying
Article 12(1)(ა) of the Organic Law on Georgian Citizenship.
- Residence required when married to a Georgian citizen
- The last 5 years, lawfully and continuously
Article 14(1), which applies only the language and history requirements of article 12(1).
- Residence required for a stateless person with status in Georgia
- The last 5 years with that status
Article 12(1¹) of the Organic Law, which keeps the requirements of article 12(1)(ბ) to (დ).
- Is dual citizenship allowed
- Only on the President's exceptional grant, or with prior consent to retain
Article 3(3) of the Organic Law allows it in the cases in articles 17 and 21¹ and nowhere else. Article 15 withholds effect from an ordinary decree until renunciation is proved.
- Losing Georgian citizenship by naturalising elsewhere
- Automatic, unless consent to retain was obtained beforehand
Article 21(1)(გ), with article 21¹(1); article 21(3) exempts a person who holds Georgian citizenship by way of exception.
- Test for consent to retain
- Whether the citizen's connection with Georgia is considered reliable
Article 21¹(2) of the Organic Law. Article 21¹(4) refuses retention where it would be against state or public security.
- Deprivation of citizenship
- Inadmissible
Article 3(5) of the Organic Law. Loss under article 21 is a different mechanism from deprivation.
Requirements
- Ten years of lawful continuous residence in Georgia immediately before applying, or five if married to a Georgian citizen
- Knowledge of the state language within the limits set under article 28(1)
- Knowledge of Georgian history and the basic principles of law within those limits
- Work and/or real estate in Georgia, or entrepreneurial activity here, or shares or an interest in a Georgian enterprise - not required on the marriage route
- For the ordinary route: a document certifying renunciation of the other citizenship, without which the President's decree does not take effect
In detail
Lawful residence is not the same word the residence law uses
The citizenship law asks for ten years of living in Georgia კანონიერ საფუძველზე - on a lawful basis - and does not say on a residence permit. The Law on the Legal Status of Aliens and Stateless Persons, when it counts ten years for a permanent residence permit in article 15(ზ), says expressly on the basis of a temporary residence permit and then strikes out years spent studying or being treated. The two instruments are therefore not asking the same question, and we have not found a provision in either that reconciles them. That matters most to the people on a visa-free year, whose presence is lawful under article 5(ე) of the residence law and is plainly not a residence permit. We record the difference rather than resolve it: resolving it would need the practice of the Public Service Development Agency, which is not an instrument.
Exceptions by origin
No exceptions recorded
Nothing we have read treats any nationality differently for this topic. The rule above applies to everyone.
What the law says
«ა) კანონიერ საფუძველზე უწყვეტად ცხოვრობს საქართველოში საქართველოს მოქალაქეობის მინიჭების შესახებ განცხადების წარდგენის დღემდე ბოლო 10 წლის განმავლობაში;»Our translation - not official
(ა) has lived in Georgia lawfully and continuously for the last 10 years up to the day of submitting the application for the grant of citizenship of Georgia;
About this source
The official gazette and consolidated statute book of Georgia, a legal entity under public law under the Ministry of Justice. Every instrument lives at matsne.gov.ge/ka/document/view/<id>: laws, organic laws, Government resolutions, presidential decrees and ministerial orders, each page opening with a metadata block that gives the document number, the issuing body, the date of issue, the source and date of publication, the date of entry into force and the registration code, then listing every consolidated publication by date with its own publication index. Above the body of each page the site states which edition is being shown: კონსოლიდირებული ვერსია (საბოლოო) means the final consolidation, and a different line means it is not. Amending instruments are published separately and in full, each citing the registration code of the act it amends, so a schedule whose consolidation is paywalled can still be reconstructed from the original plus the amendments. Renders through Firecrawl without difficulty, including million-character statutes: the Georgian Tax Code comes back at 1,190,393 characters.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: Three things it must not be cited for. First, it is not free for everything: for some Government resolutions - resolution No 255 of 5 June 2015 on visa-free entry, and resolution No 36 of 21 February 2013 on universal health care - the site serves only the text as originally published and prints დოკუმენტის კონსოლიდირებული ვარიანტის ნახვა ფასიანია, that viewing the consolidated version is a paid service requiring registration and the purchase of a viewing right. A reading of such a page is a reading of the original, however many consolidations have followed, and must be labelled as one. Second, it publishes the consolidated law and not the reasoning: no explanatory memorandum, no case law, no ministerial guidance, and a great deal of Georgian immigration and tax practice sits in orders of the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Internal Affairs which it holds but which are not linked from the parent act. Third, the Georgian pages are the law and the English pages at the matching address are not the same document - see ge-matsne-en. Pages render statutes inside HTML tables, so stored text carries table pipes and <br> markers around the publisher's own words.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«a) they have lawfully resided in Georgia for the last 10 consecutive years up to the day of applying for citizenship of Georgia;»Known to be out of date. The English text matsne serves at this address is the edition that applied from 7 March 2025 to 26 June 2025. Two later consolidations exist in Georgian and not in English, so this text does not carry Organic Law No 881 of 26 June 2025, which rewrote article 12(4) and article 13(3) with effect from 1 October 2025, or Organic Law No 1820 of 25 June 2026, which added article 29(3) with effect from 1 September 2026.
matsne's English of article 12(1)(a) carries the same test. Be aware that the English text at this address is older than the Georgian by two consolidations, so article 12(4) and article 13(3) in it are superseded.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The same publisher's English rendering of Georgian instruments, served at matsne.gov.ge/en/document/view/<id> - the same document id as the Georgian, so the two texts are one address apart. Where an English consolidation exists it is a full translation of that consolidation, with the same article numbering, the same amending-law footers and the same metadata block. For the Law on the Legal Status of Aliens and Stateless Persons the English kept pace with the Georgian through the amendments of 15 April and 25 June 2026, so the 2026 spouse permit and the interagency marriage commission can be read in both languages.
Standing:
Cannot be cited for: It may never be cited as the law, for four reasons found in the text itself. (1) It lags, silently to a reader who does not look up: on 11 October 2026 the Tax Code in English was the consolidation of 25 June 2026 while the Georgian was that of 30 September 2026, and the Organic Law on Georgian Citizenship in English was the edition of 7 March to 26 June 2025 while the Georgian was 25 June 2026. (2) The newest consolidation of a lagging instrument does not exist in English at all: the English page for Tax Code publication 246 and citizenship publication 12 carries no law, only 'Attention! The consolidation of the document is underway. You are not reading the latest version of the document.' (3) The default English address serves the last complete English edition under the line 'Attention! You are not reading the final edition', which is one line of body text above a million characters of statute. (4) Subparagraph letters are relabelled by alphabetical position rather than transliterated, so Georgian ფ becomes u, ჟ becomes p and თ becomes h - and the trap is live, because the Latin letter that a reader would reach for by sound lands on a different and sometimes repealed subparagraph: English article 99(1)(p) is Georgian 99(1)(ჟ), while Georgian 99(1)(პ) was deleted on 30 May 2018. It also mis-states one amending law's number, printing the law of 30 May 2018 as No 3591 in twelve places and as No 2391 in twelve others where the Georgian prints №2391 throughout, and it loses superscripts: article 21¹ appears as '211' and paragraph 6¹ as '61'. Cite it beside the Georgian, as a translation, never instead of it.
We re-read it every 120 days. More about this source
«2\. საქართველოში დადგენილია ერთიანი მოქალაქეობა. 3\. საქართველოს მოქალაქე იმავდროულად შეიძლება იყოს სხვა ქვეყნის მოქალაქე მხოლოდ ამ კანონის მე-17 და 211 მუხლებით გათვალისწინებულ შემთხვევებში.»Our translation - not official
2. A single citizenship is established in Georgia. 3. A citizen of Georgia may at the same time be a citizen of another country only in the cases provided for in articles 17 and 21¹ of this Law.
About this source
The official gazette and consolidated statute book of Georgia, a legal entity under public law under the Ministry of Justice. Every instrument lives at matsne.gov.ge/ka/document/view/<id>: laws, organic laws, Government resolutions, presidential decrees and ministerial orders, each page opening with a metadata block that gives the document number, the issuing body, the date of issue, the source and date of publication, the date of entry into force and the registration code, then listing every consolidated publication by date with its own publication index. Above the body of each page the site states which edition is being shown: კონსოლიდირებული ვერსია (საბოლოო) means the final consolidation, and a different line means it is not. Amending instruments are published separately and in full, each citing the registration code of the act it amends, so a schedule whose consolidation is paywalled can still be reconstructed from the original plus the amendments. Renders through Firecrawl without difficulty, including million-character statutes: the Georgian Tax Code comes back at 1,190,393 characters.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: Three things it must not be cited for. First, it is not free for everything: for some Government resolutions - resolution No 255 of 5 June 2015 on visa-free entry, and resolution No 36 of 21 February 2013 on universal health care - the site serves only the text as originally published and prints დოკუმენტის კონსოლიდირებული ვარიანტის ნახვა ფასიანია, that viewing the consolidated version is a paid service requiring registration and the purchase of a viewing right. A reading of such a page is a reading of the original, however many consolidations have followed, and must be labelled as one. Second, it publishes the consolidated law and not the reasoning: no explanatory memorandum, no case law, no ministerial guidance, and a great deal of Georgian immigration and tax practice sits in orders of the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Internal Affairs which it holds but which are not linked from the parent act. Third, the Georgian pages are the law and the English pages at the matching address are not the same document - see ge-matsne-en. Pages render statutes inside HTML tables, so stored text carries table pipes and <br> markers around the publisher's own words.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«2\. There shall be a single citizenship in Georgia. 3\. A citizen of Georgia may at the same time be a foreign citizen only in cases provided for in Articles 17 and 211 of this Law.»Known to be out of date. The English text matsne serves at this address is the edition that applied from 7 March 2025 to 26 June 2025. Two later consolidations exist in Georgian and not in English, so this text does not carry Organic Law No 881 of 26 June 2025, which rewrote article 12(4) and article 13(3) with effect from 1 October 2025, or Organic Law No 1820 of 25 June 2026, which added article 29(3) with effect from 1 September 2026.
The English prints article 21¹ as '211' because the superscript is lost in extraction. There is no article 211 in the Law.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The same publisher's English rendering of Georgian instruments, served at matsne.gov.ge/en/document/view/<id> - the same document id as the Georgian, so the two texts are one address apart. Where an English consolidation exists it is a full translation of that consolidation, with the same article numbering, the same amending-law footers and the same metadata block. For the Law on the Legal Status of Aliens and Stateless Persons the English kept pace with the Georgian through the amendments of 15 April and 25 June 2026, so the 2026 spouse permit and the interagency marriage commission can be read in both languages.
Standing:
Cannot be cited for: It may never be cited as the law, for four reasons found in the text itself. (1) It lags, silently to a reader who does not look up: on 11 October 2026 the Tax Code in English was the consolidation of 25 June 2026 while the Georgian was that of 30 September 2026, and the Organic Law on Georgian Citizenship in English was the edition of 7 March to 26 June 2025 while the Georgian was 25 June 2026. (2) The newest consolidation of a lagging instrument does not exist in English at all: the English page for Tax Code publication 246 and citizenship publication 12 carries no law, only 'Attention! The consolidation of the document is underway. You are not reading the latest version of the document.' (3) The default English address serves the last complete English edition under the line 'Attention! You are not reading the final edition', which is one line of body text above a million characters of statute. (4) Subparagraph letters are relabelled by alphabetical position rather than transliterated, so Georgian ფ becomes u, ჟ becomes p and თ becomes h - and the trap is live, because the Latin letter that a reader would reach for by sound lands on a different and sometimes repealed subparagraph: English article 99(1)(p) is Georgian 99(1)(ჟ), while Georgian 99(1)(პ) was deleted on 30 May 2018. It also mis-states one amending law's number, printing the law of 30 May 2018 as No 3591 in twelve places and as No 2391 in twelve others where the Georgian prints №2391 throughout, and it loses superscripts: article 21¹ appears as '211' and paragraph 6¹ as '61'. Cite it beside the Georgian, as a translation, never instead of it.
We re-read it every 120 days. More about this source
«სხვა ქვეყნის მოქალაქეს უფლება აქვს, მიმართოს უფლებამოსილ ორგანოს საქართველოს მოქალაქეობის მინიჭების მოთხოვნით. სხვა ქვეყნის მოქალაქისათვის საქართველოს მოქალაქეობის მინიჭების შესახებ საქართველოს პრეზიდენტის ბრძანებულება, გარდა საქართველოს მოქალაქეობის საგამონაკლისო წესით მინიჭების შესახებ საქართველოს პრეზიდენტის ბრძანებულებისა, ძალაში შედის საქართველოს კომპეტენტური ორგანოების მიერ ამ პირის სხვა ქვეყნის მოქალაქეობიდან გასვლის დამადასტურებელი დოკუმენტის მიღებისთანავე.»Our translation - not official
A citizen of another country has the right to apply to the authorised body with a request for the grant of citizenship of Georgia. A decree of the President of Georgia on granting citizenship of Georgia to a citizen of another country, other than a decree of the President of Georgia on granting citizenship of Georgia by way of exception, enters into force upon receipt by the competent bodies of Georgia of the document certifying that person's departure from the citizenship of the other country.
About this source
The official gazette and consolidated statute book of Georgia, a legal entity under public law under the Ministry of Justice. Every instrument lives at matsne.gov.ge/ka/document/view/<id>: laws, organic laws, Government resolutions, presidential decrees and ministerial orders, each page opening with a metadata block that gives the document number, the issuing body, the date of issue, the source and date of publication, the date of entry into force and the registration code, then listing every consolidated publication by date with its own publication index. Above the body of each page the site states which edition is being shown: კონსოლიდირებული ვერსია (საბოლოო) means the final consolidation, and a different line means it is not. Amending instruments are published separately and in full, each citing the registration code of the act it amends, so a schedule whose consolidation is paywalled can still be reconstructed from the original plus the amendments. Renders through Firecrawl without difficulty, including million-character statutes: the Georgian Tax Code comes back at 1,190,393 characters.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: Three things it must not be cited for. First, it is not free for everything: for some Government resolutions - resolution No 255 of 5 June 2015 on visa-free entry, and resolution No 36 of 21 February 2013 on universal health care - the site serves only the text as originally published and prints დოკუმენტის კონსოლიდირებული ვარიანტის ნახვა ფასიანია, that viewing the consolidated version is a paid service requiring registration and the purchase of a viewing right. A reading of such a page is a reading of the original, however many consolidations have followed, and must be labelled as one. Second, it publishes the consolidated law and not the reasoning: no explanatory memorandum, no case law, no ministerial guidance, and a great deal of Georgian immigration and tax practice sits in orders of the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Internal Affairs which it holds but which are not linked from the parent act. Third, the Georgian pages are the law and the English pages at the matching address are not the same document - see ge-matsne-en. Pages render statutes inside HTML tables, so stored text carries table pipes and <br> markers around the publisher's own words.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«A foreign citizen may apply to an authorised body for granting citizenship of Georgia. The Decree of the President of Georgia on granting citizenship of Georgia to a foreign citizen, except for the Decree of the President of Georgia on granting citizenship of Georgia by way of exception, shall take effect upon receiving by the competent Georgian authorities of a document certifying such person’s renunciation of the citizenship of another country.»Known to be out of date. The English text matsne serves at this address is the edition that applied from 7 March 2025 to 26 June 2025. Two later consolidations exist in Georgian and not in English, so this text does not carry Organic Law No 881 of 26 June 2025, which rewrote article 12(4) and article 13(3) with effect from 1 October 2025, or Organic Law No 1820 of 25 June 2026, which added article 29(3) with effect from 1 September 2026.
About this source
The same publisher's English rendering of Georgian instruments, served at matsne.gov.ge/en/document/view/<id> - the same document id as the Georgian, so the two texts are one address apart. Where an English consolidation exists it is a full translation of that consolidation, with the same article numbering, the same amending-law footers and the same metadata block. For the Law on the Legal Status of Aliens and Stateless Persons the English kept pace with the Georgian through the amendments of 15 April and 25 June 2026, so the 2026 spouse permit and the interagency marriage commission can be read in both languages.
Standing:
Cannot be cited for: It may never be cited as the law, for four reasons found in the text itself. (1) It lags, silently to a reader who does not look up: on 11 October 2026 the Tax Code in English was the consolidation of 25 June 2026 while the Georgian was that of 30 September 2026, and the Organic Law on Georgian Citizenship in English was the edition of 7 March to 26 June 2025 while the Georgian was 25 June 2026. (2) The newest consolidation of a lagging instrument does not exist in English at all: the English page for Tax Code publication 246 and citizenship publication 12 carries no law, only 'Attention! The consolidation of the document is underway. You are not reading the latest version of the document.' (3) The default English address serves the last complete English edition under the line 'Attention! You are not reading the final edition', which is one line of body text above a million characters of statute. (4) Subparagraph letters are relabelled by alphabetical position rather than transliterated, so Georgian ფ becomes u, ჟ becomes p and თ becomes h - and the trap is live, because the Latin letter that a reader would reach for by sound lands on a different and sometimes repealed subparagraph: English article 99(1)(p) is Georgian 99(1)(ჟ), while Georgian 99(1)(პ) was deleted on 30 May 2018. It also mis-states one amending law's number, printing the law of 30 May 2018 as No 3591 in twelve places and as No 2391 in twelve others where the Georgian prints №2391 throughout, and it loses superscripts: article 21¹ appears as '211' and paragraph 6¹ as '61'. Cite it beside the Georgian, as a translation, never instead of it.
We re-read it every 120 days. More about this source
«1\. საქართველოს მოქალაქე დაკარგავს საქართველოს მოქალაქეობას, თუ: ა) საქართველოს კომპეტენტური ორგანოების ნებართვის გარეშე შევა სხვა ქვეყნის სამხედრო სამსახურში ან პოლიციის ან უშიშროების სამსახურში; ბ) საქართველოს მოქალაქეობას ყალბი დოკუმენტების წარდგენით მოიპოვებს; გ) მოიპოვებს სხვა ქვეყნის მოქალაქეობას, გარდა ამ კანონის 211 მუხლით გათვალისწინებული შემთხვევისა.»Our translation - not official
A citizen of Georgia loses citizenship of Georgia if they: (ა) join the military, police or security service of another country without the permission of the competent bodies of Georgia; (ბ) acquire citizenship of Georgia by submitting false documents; (გ) acquire the citizenship of another country, other than in the case provided for in article 21¹ of this Law.
About this source
The official gazette and consolidated statute book of Georgia, a legal entity under public law under the Ministry of Justice. Every instrument lives at matsne.gov.ge/ka/document/view/<id>: laws, organic laws, Government resolutions, presidential decrees and ministerial orders, each page opening with a metadata block that gives the document number, the issuing body, the date of issue, the source and date of publication, the date of entry into force and the registration code, then listing every consolidated publication by date with its own publication index. Above the body of each page the site states which edition is being shown: კონსოლიდირებული ვერსია (საბოლოო) means the final consolidation, and a different line means it is not. Amending instruments are published separately and in full, each citing the registration code of the act it amends, so a schedule whose consolidation is paywalled can still be reconstructed from the original plus the amendments. Renders through Firecrawl without difficulty, including million-character statutes: the Georgian Tax Code comes back at 1,190,393 characters.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: Three things it must not be cited for. First, it is not free for everything: for some Government resolutions - resolution No 255 of 5 June 2015 on visa-free entry, and resolution No 36 of 21 February 2013 on universal health care - the site serves only the text as originally published and prints დოკუმენტის კონსოლიდირებული ვარიანტის ნახვა ფასიანია, that viewing the consolidated version is a paid service requiring registration and the purchase of a viewing right. A reading of such a page is a reading of the original, however many consolidations have followed, and must be labelled as one. Second, it publishes the consolidated law and not the reasoning: no explanatory memorandum, no case law, no ministerial guidance, and a great deal of Georgian immigration and tax practice sits in orders of the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Internal Affairs which it holds but which are not linked from the parent act. Third, the Georgian pages are the law and the English pages at the matching address are not the same document - see ge-matsne-en. Pages render statutes inside HTML tables, so stored text carries table pipes and <br> markers around the publisher's own words.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«1\. საქართველოს მოქალაქე შეინარჩუნებს საქართველოს მოქალაქეობას, თუ იგი სხვა ქვეყნის მოქალაქეობის მოპოვებამდე საქართველოს სახელმწიფოსგან მიიღებს თანხმობას საქართველოს მოქალაქეობის შენარჩუნებაზე.»Our translation - not official
A citizen of Georgia retains citizenship of Georgia if, before acquiring the citizenship of another country, they obtain the consent of the Georgian state to the retention of citizenship of Georgia.
About this source
The official gazette and consolidated statute book of Georgia, a legal entity under public law under the Ministry of Justice. Every instrument lives at matsne.gov.ge/ka/document/view/<id>: laws, organic laws, Government resolutions, presidential decrees and ministerial orders, each page opening with a metadata block that gives the document number, the issuing body, the date of issue, the source and date of publication, the date of entry into force and the registration code, then listing every consolidated publication by date with its own publication index. Above the body of each page the site states which edition is being shown: კონსოლიდირებული ვერსია (საბოლოო) means the final consolidation, and a different line means it is not. Amending instruments are published separately and in full, each citing the registration code of the act it amends, so a schedule whose consolidation is paywalled can still be reconstructed from the original plus the amendments. Renders through Firecrawl without difficulty, including million-character statutes: the Georgian Tax Code comes back at 1,190,393 characters.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: Three things it must not be cited for. First, it is not free for everything: for some Government resolutions - resolution No 255 of 5 June 2015 on visa-free entry, and resolution No 36 of 21 February 2013 on universal health care - the site serves only the text as originally published and prints დოკუმენტის კონსოლიდირებული ვარიანტის ნახვა ფასიანია, that viewing the consolidated version is a paid service requiring registration and the purchase of a viewing right. A reading of such a page is a reading of the original, however many consolidations have followed, and must be labelled as one. Second, it publishes the consolidated law and not the reasoning: no explanatory memorandum, no case law, no ministerial guidance, and a great deal of Georgian immigration and tax practice sits in orders of the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Internal Affairs which it holds but which are not linked from the parent act. Third, the Georgian pages are the law and the English pages at the matching address are not the same document - see ge-matsne-en. Pages render statutes inside HTML tables, so stored text carries table pipes and <br> markers around the publisher's own words.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
«1\. A citizen of Georgia shall retain citizenship of Georgia if he/she obtains consent from the state of Georgia to retention of citizenship of Georgia before he/she acquires citizenship of another country.»Known to be out of date. The English text matsne serves at this address is the edition that applied from 7 March 2025 to 26 June 2025. Two later consolidations exist in Georgian and not in English, so this text does not carry Organic Law No 881 of 26 June 2025, which rewrote article 12(4) and article 13(3) with effect from 1 October 2025, or Organic Law No 1820 of 25 June 2026, which added article 29(3) with effect from 1 September 2026.
About this source
The same publisher's English rendering of Georgian instruments, served at matsne.gov.ge/en/document/view/<id> - the same document id as the Georgian, so the two texts are one address apart. Where an English consolidation exists it is a full translation of that consolidation, with the same article numbering, the same amending-law footers and the same metadata block. For the Law on the Legal Status of Aliens and Stateless Persons the English kept pace with the Georgian through the amendments of 15 April and 25 June 2026, so the 2026 spouse permit and the interagency marriage commission can be read in both languages.
Standing:
Cannot be cited for: It may never be cited as the law, for four reasons found in the text itself. (1) It lags, silently to a reader who does not look up: on 11 October 2026 the Tax Code in English was the consolidation of 25 June 2026 while the Georgian was that of 30 September 2026, and the Organic Law on Georgian Citizenship in English was the edition of 7 March to 26 June 2025 while the Georgian was 25 June 2026. (2) The newest consolidation of a lagging instrument does not exist in English at all: the English page for Tax Code publication 246 and citizenship publication 12 carries no law, only 'Attention! The consolidation of the document is underway. You are not reading the latest version of the document.' (3) The default English address serves the last complete English edition under the line 'Attention! You are not reading the final edition', which is one line of body text above a million characters of statute. (4) Subparagraph letters are relabelled by alphabetical position rather than transliterated, so Georgian ფ becomes u, ჟ becomes p and თ becomes h - and the trap is live, because the Latin letter that a reader would reach for by sound lands on a different and sometimes repealed subparagraph: English article 99(1)(p) is Georgian 99(1)(ჟ), while Georgian 99(1)(პ) was deleted on 30 May 2018. It also mis-states one amending law's number, printing the law of 30 May 2018 as No 3591 in twelve places and as No 2391 in twelve others where the Georgian prints №2391 throughout, and it loses superscripts: article 21¹ appears as '211' and paragraph 6¹ as '61'. Cite it beside the Georgian, as a translation, never instead of it.
We re-read it every 120 days. More about this source
Practical notes
The limits of the language and history examinations are set by a regulation under article 28(1) of the Organic Law, which we have not read. No syllabus or pass mark is published here.
The English text of the Organic Law at matsne is the edition that applied from 7 March 2025 to 26 June 2025. The Georgian is the consolidation of 25 June 2026. Every article quoted here in English was checked against the Georgian and is unchanged; the articles that did change, 12(4), 13(3) and the new 29(3), are not quoted from the English.
- consolidatesსაქართველოს ორგანული კანონი საქართველოს მოქალაქეობის შესახებ
საქართველოს საკანონმდებლო მაცნე (Legislative Herald of Georgia) · consolidated to 2026-06-25
About this source
The official gazette and consolidated statute book of Georgia, a legal entity under public law under the Ministry of Justice. Every instrument lives at matsne.gov.ge/ka/document/view/<id>: laws, organic laws, Government resolutions, presidential decrees and ministerial orders, each page opening with a metadata block that gives the document number, the issuing body, the date of issue, the source and date of publication, the date of entry into force and the registration code, then listing every consolidated publication by date with its own publication index. Above the body of each page the site states which edition is being shown: კონსოლიდირებული ვერსია (საბოლოო) means the final consolidation, and a different line means it is not. Amending instruments are published separately and in full, each citing the registration code of the act it amends, so a schedule whose consolidation is paywalled can still be reconstructed from the original plus the amendments. Renders through Firecrawl without difficulty, including million-character statutes: the Georgian Tax Code comes back at 1,190,393 characters.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: Three things it must not be cited for. First, it is not free for everything: for some Government resolutions - resolution No 255 of 5 June 2015 on visa-free entry, and resolution No 36 of 21 February 2013 on universal health care - the site serves only the text as originally published and prints დოკუმენტის კონსოლიდირებული ვარიანტის ნახვა ფასიანია, that viewing the consolidated version is a paid service requiring registration and the purchase of a viewing right. A reading of such a page is a reading of the original, however many consolidations have followed, and must be labelled as one. Second, it publishes the consolidated law and not the reasoning: no explanatory memorandum, no case law, no ministerial guidance, and a great deal of Georgian immigration and tax practice sits in orders of the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Internal Affairs which it holds but which are not linked from the parent act. Third, the Georgian pages are the law and the English pages at the matching address are not the same document - see ge-matsne-en. Pages render statutes inside HTML tables, so stored text carries table pipes and <br> markers around the publisher's own words.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source
- publishesOrganic Law of Georgia on Georgian Citizenship (matsne English translation)
Legislative Herald of Georgia, English translation service · consolidated to 2025-03-07
Known to be out of date. The English text matsne serves at this address is the edition that applied from 7 March 2025 to 26 June 2025. Two later consolidations exist in Georgian and not in English, so this text does not carry Organic Law No 881 of 26 June 2025, which rewrote article 12(4) and article 13(3) with effect from 1 October 2025, or Organic Law No 1820 of 25 June 2026, which added article 29(3) with effect from 1 September 2026.
About this source
The same publisher's English rendering of Georgian instruments, served at matsne.gov.ge/en/document/view/<id> - the same document id as the Georgian, so the two texts are one address apart. Where an English consolidation exists it is a full translation of that consolidation, with the same article numbering, the same amending-law footers and the same metadata block. For the Law on the Legal Status of Aliens and Stateless Persons the English kept pace with the Georgian through the amendments of 15 April and 25 June 2026, so the 2026 spouse permit and the interagency marriage commission can be read in both languages.
Standing:
Cannot be cited for: It may never be cited as the law, for four reasons found in the text itself. (1) It lags, silently to a reader who does not look up: on 11 October 2026 the Tax Code in English was the consolidation of 25 June 2026 while the Georgian was that of 30 September 2026, and the Organic Law on Georgian Citizenship in English was the edition of 7 March to 26 June 2025 while the Georgian was 25 June 2026. (2) The newest consolidation of a lagging instrument does not exist in English at all: the English page for Tax Code publication 246 and citizenship publication 12 carries no law, only 'Attention! The consolidation of the document is underway. You are not reading the latest version of the document.' (3) The default English address serves the last complete English edition under the line 'Attention! You are not reading the final edition', which is one line of body text above a million characters of statute. (4) Subparagraph letters are relabelled by alphabetical position rather than transliterated, so Georgian ფ becomes u, ჟ becomes p and თ becomes h - and the trap is live, because the Latin letter that a reader would reach for by sound lands on a different and sometimes repealed subparagraph: English article 99(1)(p) is Georgian 99(1)(ჟ), while Georgian 99(1)(პ) was deleted on 30 May 2018. It also mis-states one amending law's number, printing the law of 30 May 2018 as No 3591 in twelve places and as No 2391 in twelve others where the Georgian prints №2391 throughout, and it loses superscripts: article 21¹ appears as '211' and paragraph 6¹ as '61'. Cite it beside the Georgian, as a translation, never instead of it.
We re-read it every 120 days. More about this source