Descent Reaches You Only at Birth; There Is No Residence Route for a Grandchild or an Adult Child
Sweden has nothing of the kind Spain, Italy, Portugal and Ireland have. Citizenship by descent happens at birth and only then: section 2 of the citizenship Act gives Swedish citizenship to a child one of whose parents is a Swedish citizen, or whose deceased parent was one at death. There is no claim for a grandchild and no application a descendant can make later. Chapter 5 of the Aliens Act, which lists every family ground for a residence permit, reaches a spouse, a cohabiting partner and a child, and reaches a parent only where the sponsor in Sweden is a child. An adult child of a Swedish citizen is not on that list. The nearest thing is section 3 g, which admits a close relative who shared a household with the sponsor and depends on them, where that dependency already existed in the country of origin - a test about a present household, not about a bloodline. The Act also closes the descent line in the other direction: a Swedish citizen born abroad who has never been resident in Sweden loses that citizenship at twenty-two unless they apply to keep it.
At a glance
- Residence permit by ancestry
- None in chapter 5 of the Aliens Act
Chapter 5 was read in full. Its family grounds reach a spouse, a cohabiting partner, a child and, where the sponsor is a child, a parent. Ancestry is not among them.
- Citizenship by descent
- At birth only
Section 2 of the citizenship Act. There is no later application by which a descendant can claim it.
- How far descent reaches
- One generation
Section 2 of the citizenship Act names a parent. No provision in the Act read here names a grandparent.
- Adult child of a Swedish citizen
- Not a family ground in chapter 5, section 3 of the Aliens Act
Section 3 names the sponsor's child, and section 3 g extends only to a relative who shared the sponsor's household and depends on them.
- Nearest alternative
- The dependent close relative in chapter 5, section 3 g
Requires a shared household and a special relationship of dependency that already existed in the country of origin.
- Losing citizenship by descent
- At twenty-two, if born abroad and never resident in Sweden
Section 14 of the citizenship Act, unless an application to keep it is made before that birthday.
- Does loss leave you stateless
- No - the Act forbids it
Section 14, final paragraph of the citizenship Act.
Requirements
- For citizenship by descent, a Swedish parent at the moment of your birth
- For a residence permit, membership of one of the family categories in chapter 5 of the Aliens Act, none of which is ancestry
- For the dependent-relative ground, a shared household and a special relationship of dependency that already existed in the country of origin
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
«Ett barn förvärvar svenskt medborgarskap vid födelsen, om»Our translation - not official
A child acquires Swedish citizenship at birth, if
Descent operates at the moment of birth. The section has no second limb for a later claim.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The Swedish parliament's public database of the Svensk författningssamling, serving every Act and ordinance as a single consolidated page at a stable address of the form /sv/dokument-och-lagar/dokument/svensk-forfattningssamling/<slug>_sfs-YYYY-NNN/. Each record prints the SFS number, the department responsible, the date of issue and an Ändrad line naming the last amending SFS incorporated, and each amended section carries in its own body the Act that gave it its present wording. Provisions not yet in force are printed alongside the current text and marked /Träder i kraft I:<date>/, and repealed sections are kept in place reading Har upphävts genom lag (YYYY:NNN), so the page shows what has gone as well as what is there. Transitional provisions are printed at the foot under Övergångsbestämmelser, but only for those amending Acts that have them.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The Ändrad line names the last amendment incorporated. It is not a sweep date and must not be recorded as a consolidation cut-off: it says nothing about when the page was last checked against the statute book. The consolidations are unofficial - the authentic text is the Svensk författningssamling as published by the Government Offices - and riksdagen prints a link to the Government Offices' own full text beside each record. An amending Act's own entry-into-force date is usually not on the page at all: where the Act has no transitional provisions, the date has to be read in the SFS as published. Where a section exists in several future versions the page prints them all, so an article number alone does not identify the text in force. The site is a Next.js application serving the whole statute inside the initial HTML; the extraction service returns nothing at all for some of the larger documents, which has to be met with a direct fetch rather than read as an absence.
We re-read it every 45 days. More about this source
«en förälder till barnet är svensk medborgare, eller»Our translation - not official
a parent of the child is a Swedish citizen, or
A parent, and only a parent.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The Swedish parliament's public database of the Svensk författningssamling, serving every Act and ordinance as a single consolidated page at a stable address of the form /sv/dokument-och-lagar/dokument/svensk-forfattningssamling/<slug>_sfs-YYYY-NNN/. Each record prints the SFS number, the department responsible, the date of issue and an Ändrad line naming the last amending SFS incorporated, and each amended section carries in its own body the Act that gave it its present wording. Provisions not yet in force are printed alongside the current text and marked /Träder i kraft I:<date>/, and repealed sections are kept in place reading Har upphävts genom lag (YYYY:NNN), so the page shows what has gone as well as what is there. Transitional provisions are printed at the foot under Övergångsbestämmelser, but only for those amending Acts that have them.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The Ändrad line names the last amendment incorporated. It is not a sweep date and must not be recorded as a consolidation cut-off: it says nothing about when the page was last checked against the statute book. The consolidations are unofficial - the authentic text is the Svensk författningssamling as published by the Government Offices - and riksdagen prints a link to the Government Offices' own full text beside each record. An amending Act's own entry-into-force date is usually not on the page at all: where the Act has no transitional provisions, the date has to be read in the SFS as published. Where a section exists in several future versions the page prints them all, so an article number alone does not identify the text in force. The site is a Next.js application serving the whole statute inside the initial HTML; the extraction service returns nothing at all for some of the larger documents, which has to be met with a direct fetch rather than read as an absence.
We re-read it every 45 days. More about this source
«Uppehållstillstånd på grund av anknytning till en person (anknytningspersonen) som är bosatt i Sverige och är svensk medborgare eller medborgare i något annat nordiskt land eller har permanent uppehållsrätt får ges till en utlänning som är»Our translation - not official
A residence permit on the ground of a tie to a person (the sponsor) who is resident in Sweden and is a Swedish citizen, a citizen of another Nordic country or holds a permanent right of residence may be given to a foreigner who is
The family list for a sponsor who is a Swedish citizen, and the four categories that follow it are a spouse or cohabiting partner and children. An adult child of a Swedish parent is not one of them.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The Swedish parliament's public database of the Svensk författningssamling, serving every Act and ordinance as a single consolidated page at a stable address of the form /sv/dokument-och-lagar/dokument/svensk-forfattningssamling/<slug>_sfs-YYYY-NNN/. Each record prints the SFS number, the department responsible, the date of issue and an Ändrad line naming the last amending SFS incorporated, and each amended section carries in its own body the Act that gave it its present wording. Provisions not yet in force are printed alongside the current text and marked /Träder i kraft I:<date>/, and repealed sections are kept in place reading Har upphävts genom lag (YYYY:NNN), so the page shows what has gone as well as what is there. Transitional provisions are printed at the foot under Övergångsbestämmelser, but only for those amending Acts that have them.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The Ändrad line names the last amendment incorporated. It is not a sweep date and must not be recorded as a consolidation cut-off: it says nothing about when the page was last checked against the statute book. The consolidations are unofficial - the authentic text is the Svensk författningssamling as published by the Government Offices - and riksdagen prints a link to the Government Offices' own full text beside each record. An amending Act's own entry-into-force date is usually not on the page at all: where the Act has no transitional provisions, the date has to be read in the SFS as published. Where a section exists in several future versions the page prints them all, so an article number alone does not identify the text in force. The site is a Next.js application serving the whole statute inside the initial HTML; the extraction service returns nothing at all for some of the larger documents, which has to be met with a direct fetch rather than read as an absence.
We re-read it every 45 days. More about this source
«utlänningen har ingått i samma hushåll som anknytningspersonen och det finns ett särskilt beroendeförhållande mellan dem som fanns redan i hemlandet»Our translation - not official
the foreigner has belonged to the same household as the sponsor and there is a special relationship of dependency between them which already existed in the country of origin
The closest thing to an ancestry route, and it is a test about a household and a dependency rather than about descent.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The Swedish parliament's public database of the Svensk författningssamling, serving every Act and ordinance as a single consolidated page at a stable address of the form /sv/dokument-och-lagar/dokument/svensk-forfattningssamling/<slug>_sfs-YYYY-NNN/. Each record prints the SFS number, the department responsible, the date of issue and an Ändrad line naming the last amending SFS incorporated, and each amended section carries in its own body the Act that gave it its present wording. Provisions not yet in force are printed alongside the current text and marked /Träder i kraft I:<date>/, and repealed sections are kept in place reading Har upphävts genom lag (YYYY:NNN), so the page shows what has gone as well as what is there. Transitional provisions are printed at the foot under Övergångsbestämmelser, but only for those amending Acts that have them.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The Ändrad line names the last amendment incorporated. It is not a sweep date and must not be recorded as a consolidation cut-off: it says nothing about when the page was last checked against the statute book. The consolidations are unofficial - the authentic text is the Svensk författningssamling as published by the Government Offices - and riksdagen prints a link to the Government Offices' own full text beside each record. An amending Act's own entry-into-force date is usually not on the page at all: where the Act has no transitional provisions, the date has to be read in the SFS as published. Where a section exists in several future versions the page prints them all, so an article number alone does not identify the text in force. The site is a Next.js application serving the whole statute inside the initial HTML; the extraction service returns nothing at all for some of the larger documents, which has to be met with a direct fetch rather than read as an absence.
We re-read it every 45 days. More about this source
«Uppehållstillstånd får ges till en utlänning som har särskild anknytning till Sverige, om det finns synnerliga skäl.»Our translation - not official
A residence permit may be given to a foreigner who has a special connection to Sweden, if there are exceptional reasons.
A residual ground resting on exceptional reasons. It is not a descent route and the Act attaches no criteria to it.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The Swedish parliament's public database of the Svensk författningssamling, serving every Act and ordinance as a single consolidated page at a stable address of the form /sv/dokument-och-lagar/dokument/svensk-forfattningssamling/<slug>_sfs-YYYY-NNN/. Each record prints the SFS number, the department responsible, the date of issue and an Ändrad line naming the last amending SFS incorporated, and each amended section carries in its own body the Act that gave it its present wording. Provisions not yet in force are printed alongside the current text and marked /Träder i kraft I:<date>/, and repealed sections are kept in place reading Har upphävts genom lag (YYYY:NNN), so the page shows what has gone as well as what is there. Transitional provisions are printed at the foot under Övergångsbestämmelser, but only for those amending Acts that have them.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The Ändrad line names the last amendment incorporated. It is not a sweep date and must not be recorded as a consolidation cut-off: it says nothing about when the page was last checked against the statute book. The consolidations are unofficial - the authentic text is the Svensk författningssamling as published by the Government Offices - and riksdagen prints a link to the Government Offices' own full text beside each record. An amending Act's own entry-into-force date is usually not on the page at all: where the Act has no transitional provisions, the date has to be read in the SFS as published. Where a section exists in several future versions the page prints them all, so an article number alone does not identify the text in force. The site is a Next.js application serving the whole statute inside the initial HTML; the extraction service returns nothing at all for some of the larger documents, which has to be met with a direct fetch rather than read as an absence.
We re-read it every 45 days. More about this source
«En svensk medborgare förlorar sitt svenska medborgarskap när han eller hon fyller tjugotvå år, om han eller hon»Our translation - not official
A Swedish citizen loses his or her Swedish citizenship on reaching the age of twenty-two, if he or she
The other end of descent. Citizenship passed to a child born abroad expires at twenty-two on the conditions that follow.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The Swedish parliament's public database of the Svensk författningssamling, serving every Act and ordinance as a single consolidated page at a stable address of the form /sv/dokument-och-lagar/dokument/svensk-forfattningssamling/<slug>_sfs-YYYY-NNN/. Each record prints the SFS number, the department responsible, the date of issue and an Ändrad line naming the last amending SFS incorporated, and each amended section carries in its own body the Act that gave it its present wording. Provisions not yet in force are printed alongside the current text and marked /Träder i kraft I:<date>/, and repealed sections are kept in place reading Har upphävts genom lag (YYYY:NNN), so the page shows what has gone as well as what is there. Transitional provisions are printed at the foot under Övergångsbestämmelser, but only for those amending Acts that have them.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The Ändrad line names the last amendment incorporated. It is not a sweep date and must not be recorded as a consolidation cut-off: it says nothing about when the page was last checked against the statute book. The consolidations are unofficial - the authentic text is the Svensk författningssamling as published by the Government Offices - and riksdagen prints a link to the Government Offices' own full text beside each record. An amending Act's own entry-into-force date is usually not on the page at all: where the Act has no transitional provisions, the date has to be read in the SFS as published. Where a section exists in several future versions the page prints them all, so an article number alone does not identify the text in force. The site is a Next.js application serving the whole statute inside the initial HTML; the extraction service returns nothing at all for some of the larger documents, which has to be met with a direct fetch rather than read as an absence.
We re-read it every 45 days. More about this source
«aldrig haft hemvist i Sverige, och»Our translation - not official
has never been resident in Sweden, and
The condition that matters to a family abroad: never having been resident here.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The Swedish parliament's public database of the Svensk författningssamling, serving every Act and ordinance as a single consolidated page at a stable address of the form /sv/dokument-och-lagar/dokument/svensk-forfattningssamling/<slug>_sfs-YYYY-NNN/. Each record prints the SFS number, the department responsible, the date of issue and an Ändrad line naming the last amending SFS incorporated, and each amended section carries in its own body the Act that gave it its present wording. Provisions not yet in force are printed alongside the current text and marked /Träder i kraft I:<date>/, and repealed sections are kept in place reading Har upphävts genom lag (YYYY:NNN), so the page shows what has gone as well as what is there. Transitional provisions are printed at the foot under Övergångsbestämmelser, but only for those amending Acts that have them.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The Ändrad line names the last amendment incorporated. It is not a sweep date and must not be recorded as a consolidation cut-off: it says nothing about when the page was last checked against the statute book. The consolidations are unofficial - the authentic text is the Svensk författningssamling as published by the Government Offices - and riksdagen prints a link to the Government Offices' own full text beside each record. An amending Act's own entry-into-force date is usually not on the page at all: where the Act has no transitional provisions, the date has to be read in the SFS as published. Where a section exists in several future versions the page prints them all, so an article number alone does not identify the text in force. The site is a Next.js application serving the whole statute inside the initial HTML; the extraction service returns nothing at all for some of the larger documents, which has to be met with a direct fetch rather than read as an absence.
We re-read it every 45 days. More about this source
«På ansökan som görs innan den svenske medborgaren fyller tjugotvå år får dock medges att medborgarskapet behålls.»Our translation - not official
On an application made before the Swedish citizen reaches the age of twenty-two it may, however, be permitted that the citizenship be retained.
The application that stops the clock, and it has to be made before the birthday.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The Swedish parliament's public database of the Svensk författningssamling, serving every Act and ordinance as a single consolidated page at a stable address of the form /sv/dokument-och-lagar/dokument/svensk-forfattningssamling/<slug>_sfs-YYYY-NNN/. Each record prints the SFS number, the department responsible, the date of issue and an Ändrad line naming the last amending SFS incorporated, and each amended section carries in its own body the Act that gave it its present wording. Provisions not yet in force are printed alongside the current text and marked /Träder i kraft I:<date>/, and repealed sections are kept in place reading Har upphävts genom lag (YYYY:NNN), so the page shows what has gone as well as what is there. Transitional provisions are printed at the foot under Övergångsbestämmelser, but only for those amending Acts that have them.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The Ändrad line names the last amendment incorporated. It is not a sweep date and must not be recorded as a consolidation cut-off: it says nothing about when the page was last checked against the statute book. The consolidations are unofficial - the authentic text is the Svensk författningssamling as published by the Government Offices - and riksdagen prints a link to the Government Offices' own full text beside each record. An amending Act's own entry-into-force date is usually not on the page at all: where the Act has no transitional provisions, the date has to be read in the SFS as published. Where a section exists in several future versions the page prints them all, so an article number alone does not identify the text in force. The site is a Next.js application serving the whole statute inside the initial HTML; the extraction service returns nothing at all for some of the larger documents, which has to be met with a direct fetch rather than read as an absence.
We re-read it every 45 days. More about this source
Practical notes
The absence here is bounded by two texts read in full: chapter 5 of the Aliens Act and the citizenship Act. It is not a survey of every Swedish instrument.
Section 17 of the citizenship Act disapplies the loss at twenty-two for someone who has been resident for at least seven years in a Nordic state with which Sweden has an agreement. Whether such an agreement is in force is decided by regulations under section 16, which were not read.
- consolidatesLag (2001:82) om svenskt medborgarskap, consolidated text as amended to SFS 2026:1689
Sveriges riksdag, Dokument och lagar
About this source
The Swedish parliament's public database of the Svensk författningssamling, serving every Act and ordinance as a single consolidated page at a stable address of the form /sv/dokument-och-lagar/dokument/svensk-forfattningssamling/<slug>_sfs-YYYY-NNN/. Each record prints the SFS number, the department responsible, the date of issue and an Ändrad line naming the last amending SFS incorporated, and each amended section carries in its own body the Act that gave it its present wording. Provisions not yet in force are printed alongside the current text and marked /Träder i kraft I:<date>/, and repealed sections are kept in place reading Har upphävts genom lag (YYYY:NNN), so the page shows what has gone as well as what is there. Transitional provisions are printed at the foot under Övergångsbestämmelser, but only for those amending Acts that have them.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The Ändrad line names the last amendment incorporated. It is not a sweep date and must not be recorded as a consolidation cut-off: it says nothing about when the page was last checked against the statute book. The consolidations are unofficial - the authentic text is the Svensk författningssamling as published by the Government Offices - and riksdagen prints a link to the Government Offices' own full text beside each record. An amending Act's own entry-into-force date is usually not on the page at all: where the Act has no transitional provisions, the date has to be read in the SFS as published. Where a section exists in several future versions the page prints them all, so an article number alone does not identify the text in force. The site is a Next.js application serving the whole statute inside the initial HTML; the extraction service returns nothing at all for some of the larger documents, which has to be met with a direct fetch rather than read as an absence.
We re-read it every 45 days. More about this source
- consolidatesUtlänningslag (2005:716), consolidated text as amended to SFS 2026:1752
Sveriges riksdag, Dokument och lagar
About this source
The Swedish parliament's public database of the Svensk författningssamling, serving every Act and ordinance as a single consolidated page at a stable address of the form /sv/dokument-och-lagar/dokument/svensk-forfattningssamling/<slug>_sfs-YYYY-NNN/. Each record prints the SFS number, the department responsible, the date of issue and an Ändrad line naming the last amending SFS incorporated, and each amended section carries in its own body the Act that gave it its present wording. Provisions not yet in force are printed alongside the current text and marked /Träder i kraft I:<date>/, and repealed sections are kept in place reading Har upphävts genom lag (YYYY:NNN), so the page shows what has gone as well as what is there. Transitional provisions are printed at the foot under Övergångsbestämmelser, but only for those amending Acts that have them.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: The Ändrad line names the last amendment incorporated. It is not a sweep date and must not be recorded as a consolidation cut-off: it says nothing about when the page was last checked against the statute book. The consolidations are unofficial - the authentic text is the Svensk författningssamling as published by the Government Offices - and riksdagen prints a link to the Government Offices' own full text beside each record. An amending Act's own entry-into-force date is usually not on the page at all: where the Act has no transitional provisions, the date has to be read in the SFS as published. Where a section exists in several future versions the page prints them all, so an article number alone does not identify the text in force. The site is a Next.js application serving the whole statute inside the initial HTML; the extraction service returns nothing at all for some of the larger documents, which has to be met with a direct fetch rather than read as an absence.
We re-read it every 45 days. More about this source