Lithuania work visa (work-based residence permit)

The employer must submit a binding job offer for an employment contract of at least six months with full-time working hours. It must also provide information on one of three points: your qualification for the job, at least one year of relevant work experience within the past three years, or a monthly wage of at least the latest published national average gross monthly earnings. In any case your pay may not be lower than that of a resident doing the same job for the same employer, or, if there is no such colleague, lower than the average gross monthly earnings published by Statistics Lithuania for that economic activity.

The Employment Service then decides whether hiring you matches the needs of the Lithuanian labour market. This decision is not needed if your occupation is on the List of Shortage Occupations by economic activity and the annual quota has not been used up, or if you graduated from a Lithuanian programme within the last ten years. Temporary agency work is allowed only through agencies on the State Labour Inspectorate list.

The employer files a mediation letter (tarpininkavimo raštas) in MIGRIS committing to employ you. Since 1 August 2024 the assessment of this letter carries a state fee of EUR 50. The Migration Department also checks the employer’s reputation and transparency; an employer that fails one of the criteria is barred from issuing mediation letters for six months.

Your own costs are the EUR 160 state fee (EUR 320 for urgent processing) and the VFS service fee. A later change of employer or job function costs EUR 100.

You start in MIGRIS (migracija.lt): choose your citizenship, the permit you want and the ground, fill in the form and upload scans. When asked where to lodge, choose the external service provider and then book a visit separately with VFS Global. Since 1 December 2024 a VFS branch accepts residence permit and national visa applications from citizens of the country where it is located, and from other nationals only on a few grounds such as family reunification, highly qualified work or studies. VFS charges its own service fee, which includes delivery of the finished card to the centre.

Every applicant must meet the general conditions of the Law on the Legal Status of Foreigners: health insurance (at least EUR 5,792 under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs rules, unless you are covered by compulsory insurance as an employee), sufficient means of subsistence, a written pledge to declare your residence at a home with at least 7 square metres per adult, a list of the countries you visited or lived in, and a detailed questionnaire on your ties with people in Lithuania and with foreign security or military bodies. Children from the age of two attend in person. Your passport must be valid three months longer than the permit, or the card will be issued for a shorter period.

The Migration Department decides. Its standard time is three months in the general procedure and 1.5 months in the urgent one, with shorter legal limits for some grounds. The approved card is sent to VFS, and you travel to Lithuania with the card itself, so no separate visa is needed. Within one month of collecting the permit you declare your place of residence.

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. The permit is renewed for up to two more years if you continue working and still meet the conditions.

Holders of a work-based permit can bring a spouse, registered partner or minor children once they have lived in Lithuania for the preceding two years, hold a permit valid for at least one more year and have reasonable prospects of permanent residence. Spouses must both be at least 21. Since 1 July 2024 family members of working foreigners with a temporary residence permit are covered by compulsory health insurance.

You may work only for the employer that made the job offer and only in the function you were hired for. Since 1 July 2024 you can ask to change employer only six months after obtaining the permit; the Migration Department checks the conditions again and decides within one month, and the approval is valid for one month. A multi-employer contract is possible, with the first employer submitting the offer, but the number of employers is limited to four.

If the employment ends, you must leave Lithuania unless you obtain a permit on another ground. In 2024 almost 16,000 permits were withdrawn because the employment contract had ended, so keep your permit status in mind when a contract is terminated.