The Instituto dos Registos e do Notariado (IRN) reported 515,000 pending nationality requests in the first half of 2025, according to recently updated data on the Justice Portal.
This figure marks the highest recorded in recent years and pertains solely to the first six months of the year: 515,334 pending nationality requests by the end of the first half of 2025.
Updated data also indicated that the IRN had registered 121,460 new nationality requests, 92,257 approved cases, and 3,649 refusals.
Since 2020, the services saw the highest number of entries in 2022, with 367,348 submissions, yet the backlog has continued to grow.
In 2023, the most recent year with detailed data, 73,278 nationalities were granted based on familial ties to Portuguese nationals, 41,393 were processed through requests, and there were 8,129 refusals.
That same year, nationalities registered by citizens from former Portuguese colonies totaled 1,332, with 73 nationality losses recorded, though the reasons were not specified.
The Justice Portal data also highlights the top five countries of origin for nationality acquisitions, led by Brazil with 10,365 cases. Following, based on 2016 data, are Cape Verde (3,922), Ukraine (3,249), Angola (1,937), and Guinea-Bissau (1,791).
On Friday, Minister of the Presidency António Leitão Amaro assessed the number of pending nationality requests during a debate on the nationality law.
According to the minister, of the more than 500,000 pending requests, only 15% pertain to Portuguese nationals born abroad.
“Access to and ownership of Portuguese citizenship cannot be eased or commercialized,” as “nationality cannot be a transaction or transition to obtain a passport and then move to other European countries,” he stated. The minister noted that in recent years, “the required connection to the national community has weakened, resulting in a surge in nationality requests, excluding those from the children of Portuguese parents.”
