Spain's new immigration rules for 2026: it's not all about the "famous regularisation"

Updated on 27 September 2026. The window for the extraordinary regularisation closed on 30 June 2026 and has not been extended, so this article now stands as a reference piece. We have corrected the points that were not actually new and added the changes that remain in force and the Supreme Court rulings published in the BOE (Spain's Official State Gazette) on 22 September 2026.

When we published this article in April 2026, nearly all the attention was on the so-called "regularisation". But the rule that created it, Royal Decree 316/2026 of 14 April (Real Decreto 316/2026, BOE of 15 April, in force since 16 April 2026), also made permanent changes to the Immigration Regulations (Reglamento de Extranjería), approved by Royal Decree 1155/2024 and in force since 20 May 2025. Those other changes still apply today and may affect you even if the regularisation is not relevant to you.

1. The extraordinary regularisation: what it was and where it stands

Royal Decree 316/2026 added two temporary routes to residence on exceptional grounds to the Regulations:

• Arraigo for applicants for international protection (additional provision 20; arraigo means residence based on ties to Spain): for people who had lodged, registered or formalised an asylum application before 1 January 2026. If granted, the holder must withdraw the international protection application or any pending appeal, and prove it when applying for the TIE (Tarjeta de Identidad de Extranjero, the foreign national identity card).
• Extraordinary arraigo (additional provision 21): for people who were in Spain before 1 January 2026 and could prove at least one of the following:
  • Work: having worked in Spain or intending to do so, with a job offer or, if self-employed, a self-declaration (declaración responsable). The contracts had to add up to more than 90 days in a year.
  • Family unit: living with minor children, with adult children with a disability or with their parents.
  • Vulnerability: being in a situation of vulnerability and proving it with a certificate from social services or from a third-sector organisation listed in the Registro Electrónico de Colaboradores de Extranjería (electronic register of immigration partner organisations).

In both cases the requirements included, among others, five months of uninterrupted stay before the application, a valid or expired passport, no criminal record (records that can be expunged in Spain are not counted, but you must apply to have them expunged) and a fee of €38.28. Having entries in the police report does not mean automatic refusal: each case is assessed individually.

Position as at 27 September 2026

• The application window closed on 30 June 2026 and no extension has been published in the BOE. According to the Government's update of 2 July, 1,174,978 applications were filed, 202,424 of them in the Madrid region.
• In-person correction of incomplete applications at selected Correos (Spanish postal service) offices was extended until 30 September 2026.
• The authorities have three months to decide, counted from the day after the application enters the registry of the body responsible for processing it. The deadline can be suspended (for example, for up to three months while criminal records are requested through diplomatic channels) and the provisional permission remains valid during the suspension. If the deadline passes without a decision, the application is deemed refused by administrative silence. Since the application window closed on 30 June, by late September those three months have already passed, or are about to pass, for applications that have not been suspended.
• Guidance issued by the Dirección General de Gestión Migratoria (Directorate-General for Migration Management) on 22 July 2026 makes clear that this silence does not remove the provisional permission to live and work: only an express refusal does. Silence simply lets you appeal and does not release the authorities from their duty to decide; if you have not yet received the notice that processing has started, you do not yet have the provisional permission to work (it starts with that notice), and you will later receive both the notice and the decision.
• If you are granted the authorisation, you must apply for the TIE within the following month. Instruction 7/2026 of the Secretaría de Estado de Seguridad (State Secretariat for Security, 1 July 2026) requires, as a general rule, an original, valid passport (or a cédula de inscripción, the identity document Spain issues to foreign nationals who cannot obtain a passport, or a travel document). As an exception, the police may take your circumstances into account and issue the TIE on an expired passport if you provide proof that you have applied to renew it (a consular appointment, emails from the consulate, application receipts) or that you cannot obtain a new one; this is not automatic. If you have not moved, the address shown in the decision is enough.
• The authorisation lasts one year. The next step is to apply, in the two months before it expires, for a change to another authorisation (article 191 of the Regulations): additional provision 21 says holders "must" apply and additional provision 20 says they "may". Applications in the three months after expiry are also accepted, subject to a possible penalty. If a change is not feasible, both provisions allow a one-year extension for people who are actively seeking work and registered with the public employment service, or who provide an integration effort report from the regional government that recommends the extension and certifies, among other things, that they are learning the official languages; or a four-year extension where serious illness or disability (yours, your spouse's or a dependent child's) or retirement age prevents access to employment.
• The Royal Decree has been challenged before the Tribunal Supremo (Supreme Court), among others by the Generalitat Valenciana (Valencian regional government) and the Government of Aragón. On 8 July 2026 the Supreme Court refused to suspend it and did not, for now, refer a question to the Court of Justice of the EU. The ruling on the merits is pending and, in the meantime, the rule applies.

You will find the requirements in detail in our article on the exceptional circumstances authorisation under the regularisation.

2. Working while your application is processed: only in some procedures

This is the change with the greatest practical effect, but it is not a general rule. The reform creates or rewrites this provisional permission in three procedures:

For family members of Spanish citizens the permission is not new: since 20 May 2025, filing the application already allowed them to stay in Spain while it was processed and, for spouses, partners and children (letters a) to d) of article 94.1), to work. Royal Decree 316/2026 rewrites it: it now starts on admission for processing, not on filing, and allows all family members of working age to work.

In the regularisation and in residence for family members of Spanish citizens, a refusal automatically ends the provisional permission; if you work as an employee, you must tell your employer the outcome. If granted, the effects are backdated to the application date. In work-based arraigo the permission lasts until a decision is made and, if it is granted, you have one month to register with the Seguridad Social (Social Security).

Outside these three cases there are specific rules that already existed and have not changed, such as those for students moving to residence and work (article 190.7) or for victims of gender-based violence (article 135).

3. Other changes still in force

Family members of Spanish citizens: more people can apply for residence from within Spain

Article 97.1.c) now allows all the family members listed in letters a) to h) of article 94.1 to apply from within Spain for residence as a family member of a Spanish citizen. Previously, children could only do so until they turned 18 and ascendants were excluded. You will find the full procedure in our guide to residence for family members of Spanish citizens.

Social arraigo: what changed and what did not

In the first version of this article we presented the 100% IPREM requirement and the priority given to family ties as new. They are not: they have been in the Regulations since 20 May 2025. According to Instruction SEM 1/2025 of the Secretaría de Estado de Migraciones (State Secretariat for Migration), whether you rely on family ties or provide an integration report, you must prove at least 100% of the IPREM (Spain's public income benchmark: €600 a month in 2026) and keep those means for the whole period of the authorisation. If you rely on a family tie, you must prove 200% of the IPREM (100% for the family member and 100% for you): €1,200 a month. Bear in mind that this instruction predates Royal Decree 316/2026: for an extension, the Regulations no longer refer to the initial requirements and focus on active job seeking and registration (see below).

What did change in 2026 is the social integration report, which is required if you do not have those family ties:

• It can be issued by the regional government or, if the region so decides, by the local council.
• It must record how long you have lived at your address, your financial means and your participation in integration programmes.
• The one-month deadline for issuing it remains, but now, if it is not issued in time and you can prove this, you may show your integration by any means of evidence.

In Madrid it is issued by the Comunidad de Madrid (Madrid regional government). According to its website, the report for social arraigo costs €30.60 and requires you to have taken part in the "Conoce tus leyes" ("Know your laws") programme.

A new requirement for every type of arraigo

Article 126.h) requires that you hold no other stay or residence authorisation and have no other application pending (for a grant, extension, renewal or change). Check this before applying: if another application is still open, yours may be refused.

Extensions of arraigo

To extend second-chance, work-based or social arraigo, actively seeking work and being registered with the public employment service were already required. The reform changes two things in article 132.2.a):

• It no longer makes the extension conditional on still meeting the initial requirements of your arraigo, as the previous text did ("al cumplimiento de sus requisitos"). Under the new wording, it is enough to prove active job seeking and registration.
• It adds an exception: you can extend without meeting those requirements if an illness, a disability or having reached retirement age prevents you from accessing employment.

Changes of status: a door that opens

Contrary to what we said before, the reform does not restrict changes of status: it opens a new route. Holders of the humanitarian grounds authorisation under article 128.1.a) can now move to another authorisation, which was previously prohibited. We explain this in our article on Instruction SEM 1/2026.

Students, temporary protection, minors and pending files

• End of studies (art. 190.6): an application filed on time (two months before or three months after) now keeps the previous authorisation valid until you are notified of the decision.
• Temporary protection (Ukraine): holders can apply for the stay and residence authorisations in the Regulations that can be started from within Spain (additional provision 19), and Instruction SEM 2/2026 does not apply the article 126.h) requirement to them.
• Unaccompanied minors (art. 172.2): the reference to refusal by administrative silence has been removed, to keep the Regulations consistent with the law: the residence of minors in the guardianship of a public authority is lawful for all purposes (art. 35.7 of Organic Law 4/2000).
• Pending applications and appeals: exceptional circumstances applications (except those under article 128.1) filed from 20 May 2025 until the Royal Decree came into force that are still being processed only require having been in Spain before 1 January 2026 and meeting the common requirements of the regularisation (paragraph 1 of additional provision 21). According to the interpretative criteria of the Dirección General de Gestión Migratoria (updated on 18 May 2026), the rule covers applications filed up to and including 15 April 2026 and also pending appeals against their decisions, both administrative and before the administrative courts, and what is granted is the authorisation originally applied for. If you appealed against the refusal of an application from those dates, this rule may work in your favour: take advice before withdrawing the appeal.

4. The Supreme Court has also changed the Regulations

The BOE of 22 September 2026 published the operative part (fallo) of Supreme Court judgment 868/2026 of 8 July (corrected by an order of 1 September), which strikes down several points of the Regulations. Among others:

• The obligation to deal with the authorities electronically in article 197.2. A second judgment, of 29 July, reiterates that annulment. Both allow the Government to require electronic filing for specific procedures if it is justified and proportionate.
• Automatic refusal on the basis of a criminal record, without assessing the case, for family members of Spanish citizens in situations covered by article 20 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU.
• Two provisions affecting family members of Spanish citizens: the requirement in article 196.2.b) that an ascendant's financial dependency arise in the country of origin, to the extent that it prevents proof when the ascendant is already in Spain, and the requirement in article 94.1.f) that the relationship between a parent or guardian and a Spanish minor have been established under Spanish law. The first fits with the change allowing ascendants to apply for residence from within Spain (section 3).
• The requirement that children be "unmarried" for minors' residence, and the requirement that a child born in Spain has never left the country: what matters is the child's actual habitual residence in Spain.

5. What is coming

On 25 August 2026 the Consejo de Ministros (Council of Ministers) gave initial approval (first round) to a preliminary draft bill (anteproyecto) amending Organic Law 4/2000 and another for a new Asylum Law, to adapt to the EU Pact on Migration and Asylum. They are not law yet: they still have the whole procedure ahead, including passage through the Cortes (Spanish Parliament). That said, most of the Pact's EU legislative acts have applied since 12 June 2026 (its regulations apply directly); the draft bills adapt Spanish law to them and, among other things, transpose Directive (EU) 2024/1346 on reception conditions for applicants for international protection.

In short

The regularisation was temporary and its window has closed, but the reform leaves lasting changes that are worth checking against your own situation before you file anything.

If you have an application still awaiting a decision, your authorisation is approaching its first year or you are unsure which route applies to you, you can book an immigration consultation and we will review your case with the documents in front of us.

Legislation and sources

• Royal Decree 316/2026 of 14 April amending the Immigration Regulations (BOE)
• Immigration Regulations approved by Royal Decree 1155/2024 (consolidated text)
• Organic Law 4/2000 of 11 January on the rights and freedoms of foreign nationals in Spain (consolidated text)
• Operative part of Supreme Court judgment 868/2026 of 8 July (BOE of 22 September 2026)
• Operative part of the Supreme Court judgment of 29 July 2026 (BOE of 22 September 2026)
• Order PJC/617/2025 of 13 June on immigration fees (consolidated text)
• Instruction SEM 1/2025 on arraigo authorisations (State Secretariat for Migration)
• Instruction SEM 2/2026 on the transition from temporary protection to other authorisations (State Secretariat for Migration)
• Interpretative guidance of the Dirección General de Gestión Migratoria of 22 July 2026 on the validity of the provisional permission (internal document not published in the BOE; CSV GEN-d65e-3fd7-4c9f-7bfd-4b3c-3dbd-b4f6-5fbb, which can be checked on the Spanish Government's CSV verification service)
• Interpretative criteria of the Dirección General de Gestión Migratoria on Royal Decree 316/2026, updated on 18 May 2026 (internal document not published in the BOE; CSV GEN-5b39-b13d-a026-1b20-439b-695d-7110-d332, which can be checked on the same service)
• Instruction 7/2026 of the Secretaría de Estado de Seguridad of 1 July 2026 on the documents required to issue the TIE after the regularisation (internal document not published in the BOE; CSV GEN-de80-f9e8-83a1-e7eb-35af-59b3-9a9d-6126, which can be checked on the same service)
• Update on the extraordinary regularisation (La Moncloa, 2 July 2026)
• The Supreme Court does not suspend the regularisation decree (Spanish Judiciary, 8 July 2026)