Ireland Marriage Visa

UK citizens may move, work and travel to Ireland freely without completing any visa application. This is due to the agreement between Ireland and the United Kingdom called the Common Travel Area (CTA) which was agreed upon many decades ago.

Due to this Common Travel Area, UK nationals and Irish citizens can live, travel and work freely in the two counties. Despite Brexit, this agreement is still in place.

So, if your partner or civil partner is a UK national, there is no need to worry about a visa or residency permit. You can freely marry in Ireland, Northern Ireland or the UK.

This benefit extends to citizens of Switzerland and the European Economic Area, you will not need to apply for a marriage visa.

However, many people live in the UK by way of a different immigration system or permission or UK visa and are not a UK national, Irish national, Switzerland or EEA national. As such, if your partner is a non-EEA family member, they will  require an Irish marriage visa.

Whilst the specific required documents may differ somewhat depending on your individual circumstances, there are a number of documents that are needed.

The required information/documents for this Irish visa are:

• Valid passport
• Signed and dated application summary sheet
• A signed letter highlighting your reasons for travelling to Ireland, how long you intend to stay, who you plan to stay with and your financial resources of how you will fund the trip. You will also need to confirm your commitment to the conditions of the visa and that you won’t become a burden on the State
• Two colour passport-size photographs
• Financial information
• Provide Evidence of your relationship history and intention to get married
• Documents that show you’ll return to your home country. This evidence needs to demonstrate strong family, social or economic ties to your home country. If you are employed, you will need to provide your three most recent payslips, a letter from your employer on how long you have been employed at the company, the dates which you were absent from the company and the proposed date of your return to work. Whereas if you are a student, you will need to provide a letter from your college explaining the course(s) you are studying, how many years you have been a student at the college and the time of years/terms you have remaining at the college.

All the information and documents need to be submitted in their original form and in English by an official, accredited translator.

Once you have all the relevant documents together, you will need to send them, along with your application summary sheet, to the visa application office.

It is important to show you and your family member/partner’s genuine relationship.

Information required includes: 

• Evidence that the relationship between you and your partner in person, such as travel documents that show you and your partner have travelled to visit you a number of times. If your relationship was formed solely over the internet or through text messages, such circumstances will not be considered.
• Acknowledgement from the Registrar which confirms the date of the receipt of notification of your intention to marry in Ireland
• Marriage Registration Form with proposed date or marriage
• Civil Partnership Registration Form
•  Up-to-date bank statements, show money going out and coming into your account over the past six months. (This applies regardless of whether you are funding your expenses or if someone else is).

If your or your partner was previously married or in a civil partnership, you must also provide:

• Marriage/civil partnership certificate
• Divorce/dissolution of the civil partnership certificate
• As well as the evidence of the relationship, you will need to provide evidence of your intention to marry/enter into a civil partnership.

If somebody else is funding your expenses in Ireland and will bear complete financial responsibility, you will need to show your relationship to this person. The information needed is: 

• Your name, address, account number and type of account must be visible on statements
• Bank statements on official headed paper
• If providing a bank statement from a savings account, you must include a letter from the bank institution explaining how much you can withdraw from the account