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Country-wide policy

Slovakia's A2 Slovak Examination Guards the Union Long-Term Status, Not Permanent Residence, and It Has No Upper Age Exemption

Both halves of the former Czechoslovakia ask for A2, and they attach it to different documents. In Czechia the examination guards permanent residence after five years and section 70(5)(f) of Act No. 326/1999 Sb. excuses anyone over 60. In Slovakia permanent residence is a family status - section 43 grants it to the spouse or dependent relative of a Slovak citizen with no language test at all - and the five-year, time-based route is the EU long-term resident status in section 52 of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z. That is where the language sits. Section 52(7) grants the long-term residence only where the applicant proves command of Slovak under section 54(4), and section 54(4) sets the level: an examination at a language school or a public university whose linguistic difficulty corresponds to at least A2 of the Common European Framework. The exemptions are four and none of them is an age ceiling: under 14 at the application, a holder of temporary residence as a Slovak living abroad under section 29, a person who completed lower secondary education at a Slovak-language school, and a person who studied at least two school years at a Slovak-language primary or secondary school or two academic years in a Slovak-language university programme, within the last five years. Section 52(8) lets the Ministry of the Interior waive it for permanent ill health.

Verified with official sourceStable2026-10-10

Topics it changes

What it requires

  • Five years of lawful continuous residence immediately before applying
  • A language examination at A2 at a language school or a public university, unless one of the four exemptions fits
  • Stable and regular resources, accommodation and health insurance

At a glance

What the A2 guards
The EU long-term resident status, not permanent residence

Section 52(7) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z. Permanent residence under section 43 is a family status and has no language test.

Level
At least A2 of the Common European Framework

Section 54(4) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z.

Where it is taken
A language school or a public university

Section 54(4) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z. Czechia requires a certificate from a body authorised to hold the examination under section 70(2)(h) of Act No. 326/1999 Sb., with the level set by Government Regulation No. 31/2016 Sb.

Qualifying residence
5 years, lawful and continuous, immediately before the application

Section 52(1)(a) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z.; study time counts half under section 52(5)(a).

Upper age exemption
None in section 52(7) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z.

Czechia excuses anyone over 60 from its equivalent examination under section 70(5)(f) of Act No. 326/1999 Sb.

Who is exempt
Under 14, a Slovak living abroad, and two kinds of Slovak-language schooling

Section 52(7)(a) to (d) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z.; section 52(8) adds a health waiver by the Ministry of the Interior.

Decision
90 days

Section 53(7) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z.

What the law says

Text layer - verbatim verifiedZákon č. 404/2011 Z. z. o pobyte cudzincov a o zmene a doplnení niektorých zákonov · § 52 ods. 7 · consolidated to 2026-10-01
«Policajný útvar udelí dlhodobý pobyt podľa odseku 1 písm. a) a c) len vtedy, ak štátny príslušník tretej krajiny preukáže ovládanie slovenského jazyka podľa § 54 ods. 4; to neplatí, ak štátny príslušník tretej krajiny a) v čase podania žiadosti nedovŕšil 14 rokov, b) má udelený prechodný pobyt podľa § 29,»

Our translation - not official

The police department shall grant long-term residence under paragraph 1(a) and (c) only where the third-country national proves command of the Slovak language under section 54(4); that does not apply where the third-country national a) had not reached the age of 14 at the time of the application, b) has been granted temporary residence under section 29,

The exemption list continues with two kinds of Slovak-language schooling. It has no upper age limit.

Read it at the source
About this source

The Slovak state's own legal information system, run by the Ministry of Justice, which publishes the Zbierka zákonov Slovenskej republiky and keeps every instrument as a series of point-in-time versions. Three addresses serve the same corpus and they behave differently. www.slov-lex.sk is the live portal: a legacy address such as /pravne-predpisy/SK/ZZ/2011/404/ answers HTTP 301 to redir.slov-lex.sk and again to /ezbierky/pravne-predpisy/SK/ZZ/2011/404/, which is an application page. static.slov-lex.sk is a complete static mirror at predictable addresses and is the one to read: /static/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/ is the version history, /static/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/{YYYYMMDD}.html is the version in force from that date, and /static/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/{YYYYMMDD}.print.html is the same text without the navigation. The third is the PDF, at /pdf/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/ZZ_{year}_{number}_{YYYYMMDD}.pdf, and for an instrument of any age it is the one with legal force: each version's header prints either Obsah dokumentu je právne záväzný or, for older instruments, Obsah tohto dokumentu má informatívny charakter, and the HTML page says in terms that its content is informative and that the legally binding content is in the PDF. Version dates are the date the version took effect, so finding the text in force on a given day means reading the history page rather than guessing an address.

Standing: Maintains the text in force

Cannot be cited for: **The HTML and the PDF are two manifestations of one document and only one of them can be quoted at length.** The static HTML is captured with the portal's own copy-to-clipboard icons between every block, which survive extraction as image markdown; a quotation that crosses a paragraph boundary therefore carries exclamation marks the publisher never wrote, and in the residence Act that is every lettered list. The PDF has no such furniture and extracts as clean single-column text, but it breaks a sentence wherever a footnote block or a running header falls: section 20(2) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z., section 27(1) of the same Act and section 7(3) of Act No. 40/1993 Z. z. are each cut in half by a footnote, and section 23a(1)(e) of Act No. 5/2004 Z. z. is cut by a page break with the forty-hour limit on one page and the eighty-hour limit on the next. A quotation has to be taken from whichever side of the break its sentence survives on and cut short rather than stitched. **The informative-versus-binding line is not where its age suggests.** The PDF of Vyhláška No. 499/2011 Z. z. prints Obsah tohto dokumentu má informatívny charakter on its own first page, so for that instrument neither manifestation is the promulgated text. It cannot be cited for anything the Collection does not carry: the register of occupations with a labour shortage by region, kept under section 12(ad) of Act No. 5/2004 Z. z. by the Central Office of Labour, Social Affairs and Family; the annexes to Government Regulation No. 521/2021 Z. z., which the portal serves as separate downloads rather than as part of the text; how much of that regulation's ceiling of 3,000 national visas remains at any moment, which nothing requires anyone to publish; the business plan template the Ministry of Economy publishes under section 32(5)(a) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z.; and the practice of the Office for Slovaks Living Abroad in assessing national consciousness under Act No. 474/2005 Z. z. It is also not the place to read a figure that an opatrenie moves: Act No. 601/2003 Z. z. still prints 178.92 EUR in its own section 2(a), and the amount in force is in the ministerial measure, which is a separate instrument with its own address.

We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source

Text layer - verbatim verifiedZákon č. 404/2011 Z. z. o pobyte cudzincov a o zmene a doplnení niektorých zákonov · § 54 ods. 4 · consolidated to 2026-10-01
«Ovládanie slovenského jazyka podľa § 52 ods. 7 sa overuje úspešným vykonaním jazykovej skúšky na jazykovej škole32a) alebo na verejnej vysokej škole. Jazyková náročnosť skúšky podľa predchádzajúcej vety zodpovedá najmenej stupňu A2 podľa Spoločného európskeho referenčného rámca pre jazyky.»

Our translation - not official

Command of the Slovak language under section 52(7) is verified by successfully passing a language examination at a language school or at a public university. The linguistic difficulty of the examination under the preceding sentence corresponds to at least level A2 of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages.

The level is in the Act itself, where Czechia leaves it to a government regulation.

Read it at the source
About this source

The Slovak state's own legal information system, run by the Ministry of Justice, which publishes the Zbierka zákonov Slovenskej republiky and keeps every instrument as a series of point-in-time versions. Three addresses serve the same corpus and they behave differently. www.slov-lex.sk is the live portal: a legacy address such as /pravne-predpisy/SK/ZZ/2011/404/ answers HTTP 301 to redir.slov-lex.sk and again to /ezbierky/pravne-predpisy/SK/ZZ/2011/404/, which is an application page. static.slov-lex.sk is a complete static mirror at predictable addresses and is the one to read: /static/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/ is the version history, /static/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/{YYYYMMDD}.html is the version in force from that date, and /static/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/{YYYYMMDD}.print.html is the same text without the navigation. The third is the PDF, at /pdf/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/ZZ_{year}_{number}_{YYYYMMDD}.pdf, and for an instrument of any age it is the one with legal force: each version's header prints either Obsah dokumentu je právne záväzný or, for older instruments, Obsah tohto dokumentu má informatívny charakter, and the HTML page says in terms that its content is informative and that the legally binding content is in the PDF. Version dates are the date the version took effect, so finding the text in force on a given day means reading the history page rather than guessing an address.

Standing: Maintains the text in force

Cannot be cited for: **The HTML and the PDF are two manifestations of one document and only one of them can be quoted at length.** The static HTML is captured with the portal's own copy-to-clipboard icons between every block, which survive extraction as image markdown; a quotation that crosses a paragraph boundary therefore carries exclamation marks the publisher never wrote, and in the residence Act that is every lettered list. The PDF has no such furniture and extracts as clean single-column text, but it breaks a sentence wherever a footnote block or a running header falls: section 20(2) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z., section 27(1) of the same Act and section 7(3) of Act No. 40/1993 Z. z. are each cut in half by a footnote, and section 23a(1)(e) of Act No. 5/2004 Z. z. is cut by a page break with the forty-hour limit on one page and the eighty-hour limit on the next. A quotation has to be taken from whichever side of the break its sentence survives on and cut short rather than stitched. **The informative-versus-binding line is not where its age suggests.** The PDF of Vyhláška No. 499/2011 Z. z. prints Obsah tohto dokumentu má informatívny charakter on its own first page, so for that instrument neither manifestation is the promulgated text. It cannot be cited for anything the Collection does not carry: the register of occupations with a labour shortage by region, kept under section 12(ad) of Act No. 5/2004 Z. z. by the Central Office of Labour, Social Affairs and Family; the annexes to Government Regulation No. 521/2021 Z. z., which the portal serves as separate downloads rather than as part of the text; how much of that regulation's ceiling of 3,000 national visas remains at any moment, which nothing requires anyone to publish; the business plan template the Ministry of Economy publishes under section 32(5)(a) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z.; and the practice of the Office for Slovaks Living Abroad in assessing national consciousness under Act No. 474/2005 Z. z. It is also not the place to read a figure that an opatrenie moves: Act No. 601/2003 Z. z. still prints 178.92 EUR in its own section 2(a), and the amount in force is in the ministerial measure, which is a separate instrument with its own address.

We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source

Text layer - verbatim verifiedZákon č. 404/2011 Z. z. o pobyte cudzincov a o zmene a doplnení niektorých zákonov · § 52 ods. 1 písm. a) · consolidated to 2026-10-01
«a) ktorý sa na území Slovenskej republiky zdržiava oprávnene a nepretržite po dobu piatich rokov bezprostredne pred podaním žiadosti,»

Our translation - not official

a) who stays on the territory of the Slovak Republic lawfully and continuously for a period of five years immediately before lodging the application,

Continuous residence is defined in section 2(1)(k), which excludes any single absence over 180 days.

Read it at the source
About this source

The Slovak state's own legal information system, run by the Ministry of Justice, which publishes the Zbierka zákonov Slovenskej republiky and keeps every instrument as a series of point-in-time versions. Three addresses serve the same corpus and they behave differently. www.slov-lex.sk is the live portal: a legacy address such as /pravne-predpisy/SK/ZZ/2011/404/ answers HTTP 301 to redir.slov-lex.sk and again to /ezbierky/pravne-predpisy/SK/ZZ/2011/404/, which is an application page. static.slov-lex.sk is a complete static mirror at predictable addresses and is the one to read: /static/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/ is the version history, /static/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/{YYYYMMDD}.html is the version in force from that date, and /static/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/{YYYYMMDD}.print.html is the same text without the navigation. The third is the PDF, at /pdf/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/ZZ_{year}_{number}_{YYYYMMDD}.pdf, and for an instrument of any age it is the one with legal force: each version's header prints either Obsah dokumentu je právne záväzný or, for older instruments, Obsah tohto dokumentu má informatívny charakter, and the HTML page says in terms that its content is informative and that the legally binding content is in the PDF. Version dates are the date the version took effect, so finding the text in force on a given day means reading the history page rather than guessing an address.

Standing: Maintains the text in force

Cannot be cited for: **The HTML and the PDF are two manifestations of one document and only one of them can be quoted at length.** The static HTML is captured with the portal's own copy-to-clipboard icons between every block, which survive extraction as image markdown; a quotation that crosses a paragraph boundary therefore carries exclamation marks the publisher never wrote, and in the residence Act that is every lettered list. The PDF has no such furniture and extracts as clean single-column text, but it breaks a sentence wherever a footnote block or a running header falls: section 20(2) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z., section 27(1) of the same Act and section 7(3) of Act No. 40/1993 Z. z. are each cut in half by a footnote, and section 23a(1)(e) of Act No. 5/2004 Z. z. is cut by a page break with the forty-hour limit on one page and the eighty-hour limit on the next. A quotation has to be taken from whichever side of the break its sentence survives on and cut short rather than stitched. **The informative-versus-binding line is not where its age suggests.** The PDF of Vyhláška No. 499/2011 Z. z. prints Obsah tohto dokumentu má informatívny charakter on its own first page, so for that instrument neither manifestation is the promulgated text. It cannot be cited for anything the Collection does not carry: the register of occupations with a labour shortage by region, kept under section 12(ad) of Act No. 5/2004 Z. z. by the Central Office of Labour, Social Affairs and Family; the annexes to Government Regulation No. 521/2021 Z. z., which the portal serves as separate downloads rather than as part of the text; how much of that regulation's ceiling of 3,000 national visas remains at any moment, which nothing requires anyone to publish; the business plan template the Ministry of Economy publishes under section 32(5)(a) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z.; and the practice of the Office for Slovaks Living Abroad in assessing national consciousness under Act No. 474/2005 Z. z. It is also not the place to read a figure that an opatrenie moves: Act No. 601/2003 Z. z. still prints 178.92 EUR in its own section 2(a), and the amount in force is in the ministerial measure, which is a separate instrument with its own address.

We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source

Text layer - verbatim verifiedZákon č. 404/2011 Z. z. o pobyte cudzincov a o zmene a doplnení niektorých zákonov · § 43 ods. 1 písm. a) · consolidated to 2026-10-01
«Policajný útvar udelí trvalý pobyt na päť rokov, ak nie sú dôvody na zamietnutie žiadosti podľa § 48 ods. 2, štátnemu príslušníkovi tretej krajiny, a) ktorý je manželom štátneho občana Slovenskej republiky s trvalým pobytom na území Slovenskej republiky alebo závislým príbuzným v priamom rade štátneho občana Slovenskej republiky s trvalým pobytom na území Slovenskej republiky,»

Our translation - not official

The police department shall grant permanent residence for five years, where there are no grounds to refuse the application under section 48(2), to a third-country national a) who is the spouse of a citizen of the Slovak Republic with permanent residence on the territory of the Slovak Republic or a dependent relative in the direct line of a citizen of the Slovak Republic with permanent residence on the territory of the Slovak Republic,

The route that carries the name permanent residence and asks for no language at all.

Read it at the source
About this source

The Slovak state's own legal information system, run by the Ministry of Justice, which publishes the Zbierka zákonov Slovenskej republiky and keeps every instrument as a series of point-in-time versions. Three addresses serve the same corpus and they behave differently. www.slov-lex.sk is the live portal: a legacy address such as /pravne-predpisy/SK/ZZ/2011/404/ answers HTTP 301 to redir.slov-lex.sk and again to /ezbierky/pravne-predpisy/SK/ZZ/2011/404/, which is an application page. static.slov-lex.sk is a complete static mirror at predictable addresses and is the one to read: /static/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/ is the version history, /static/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/{YYYYMMDD}.html is the version in force from that date, and /static/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/{YYYYMMDD}.print.html is the same text without the navigation. The third is the PDF, at /pdf/SK/ZZ/{year}/{number}/ZZ_{year}_{number}_{YYYYMMDD}.pdf, and for an instrument of any age it is the one with legal force: each version's header prints either Obsah dokumentu je právne záväzný or, for older instruments, Obsah tohto dokumentu má informatívny charakter, and the HTML page says in terms that its content is informative and that the legally binding content is in the PDF. Version dates are the date the version took effect, so finding the text in force on a given day means reading the history page rather than guessing an address.

Standing: Maintains the text in force

Cannot be cited for: **The HTML and the PDF are two manifestations of one document and only one of them can be quoted at length.** The static HTML is captured with the portal's own copy-to-clipboard icons between every block, which survive extraction as image markdown; a quotation that crosses a paragraph boundary therefore carries exclamation marks the publisher never wrote, and in the residence Act that is every lettered list. The PDF has no such furniture and extracts as clean single-column text, but it breaks a sentence wherever a footnote block or a running header falls: section 20(2) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z., section 27(1) of the same Act and section 7(3) of Act No. 40/1993 Z. z. are each cut in half by a footnote, and section 23a(1)(e) of Act No. 5/2004 Z. z. is cut by a page break with the forty-hour limit on one page and the eighty-hour limit on the next. A quotation has to be taken from whichever side of the break its sentence survives on and cut short rather than stitched. **The informative-versus-binding line is not where its age suggests.** The PDF of Vyhláška No. 499/2011 Z. z. prints Obsah tohto dokumentu má informatívny charakter on its own first page, so for that instrument neither manifestation is the promulgated text. It cannot be cited for anything the Collection does not carry: the register of occupations with a labour shortage by region, kept under section 12(ad) of Act No. 5/2004 Z. z. by the Central Office of Labour, Social Affairs and Family; the annexes to Government Regulation No. 521/2021 Z. z., which the portal serves as separate downloads rather than as part of the text; how much of that regulation's ceiling of 3,000 national visas remains at any moment, which nothing requires anyone to publish; the business plan template the Ministry of Economy publishes under section 32(5)(a) of Act No. 404/2011 Z. z.; and the practice of the Office for Slovaks Living Abroad in assessing national consciousness under Act No. 474/2005 Z. z. It is also not the place to read a figure that an opatrenie moves: Act No. 601/2003 Z. z. still prints 178.92 EUR in its own section 2(a), and the amount in force is in the ministerial measure, which is a separate instrument with its own address.

We re-read it every 60 days. More about this source

Practical notes

The two statuses are not interchangeable. Permanent residence under section 43 depends on a family relationship and can be cancelled if that relationship ends within five years; long-term residence under section 52 depends on time and a language examination and is granted for an unlimited period under section 51.

Naturalisation has its own language test, in section 8 of Act No. 40/1993 Z. z., with no level and a three-member commission. Passing the A2 examination discharges nothing there.

Which language schools and public universities actually hold the examination is an administrative matter and no list was read.