EU Blue Card in Lithuania

The employer must make a binding job offer for an employment contract of at least six months with a monthly wage of at least 1.5 times the most recently published average gross monthly earnings for the calendar year. For an occupation on the List of Shortage Occupations with High Added Value approved by the Minister of the Economy and Innovation, the threshold is 1.2 times that average.

For a regulated profession you prove that you meet the Lithuanian requirements for it; for other jobs the employer provides information on your higher professional qualification. Where the job is unregulated, falls into the top three groups of the Lithuanian classification of occupations and you lack a degree, relevant professional experience can be recognised as equivalent under a Government procedure. If the job is to manage the company, the Lithuanian employer must show that its foreign parent or group earned at least EUR 1,000,000 in at least one of the last three financial years.

The application is filed in MIGRIS and, from abroad, lodged with biometrics at a VFS Global branch; the state fee is EUR 160 or EUR 320 urgent and VFS adds its own service fee. The legal time limit for a decision is one month. If you are already legally staying in Lithuania when you lodge the application, you may start the highly qualified job with the offering employer straight away while the application is examined.

The general conditions apply: health insurance until you are covered as an employee, a pledge to declare residence in a home with at least 7 square metres per adult, a list of visited countries and the security questionnaire. Approved cards are sent to the VFS centre and you travel with them.

A renewal is applied for in MIGRIS and lodged at the Migration Department in Lithuania. Since 16 November 2024 the application may be filed no earlier than six months before the current permit expires, and the Migration Department advises lodging it at least four months ahead; the legal time limit for a renewal decision is two months. A pending application does not let you stay or work once the old permit has expired. A Blue Card renewal is also decided within one month.

Family members do not have to wait: the two-year residence condition for sponsors does not apply to Blue Card holders, and spouses and children can lodge their applications with yours so that the decisions are taken together and the permits match yours. A Blue Card holder qualifies for permanent residence after five continuous years of residence in EU countries, including at least two continuous years in Lithuania; absences shorter than 12 consecutive months and no more than 18 months in total do not break that period.

During the first year of legal employment in Lithuania, changing employer, or taking a new highly qualified job within six months after losing one, requires an application to the Migration Department, which decides within 14 calendar days. You may also work for another employer as long as the employer that made the binding offer stays the same.

If you already hold a Blue Card from another EU country that is valid for more than a year and you have lived there for at least six months, you can enter Lithuania and start work; you and accompanying family must lodge a Lithuanian application within one month of starting.