When you are granted a first-time student residence permit, you are automatically granted a permit to work part-time in addition to your studies. However, when you apply for a renewal of your study permit, your work permit is not automatically renewed.
Automatic permit for part-time work
When you are granted your first student residence permit in Norway, you are automatically granted a permit to work part-time in addition to your studies. This allows you to work up to 20 hour per week and take full-time work during ordinary holidays (the period when the study institution has closed and/or during regular public holidays).
You can be granted a permit to work full time for a limited period if you can document that the work is relevant to your studies, or that the work is a completely necessary precondition for admission to further education within the same programme option, and a concrete offer of employment has been made.
The permit to work part-time is not linked to one single employer. Nor is there a requirement that you have to submit a work contract to be granted such a permit.
However, you must present a concrete offer of employment if you intend to cover all or part of the financial maintenance (subsistence) requirement by means of income from employment. The offer of employment must contains a job description, the number of hours you will be working per week and your hourly wage.
Is the permit renewable?
The part-time work permit has the same duration as the study permit.
When you reply for a renewal of your study permit, however, the part-time work permit will not be renewed automatically. You must document satisfactory progress in your studies in order to continue to work part-time. This requirement is met by enclosing a statement from the educational institution where you study with the renewal application.
The statement must contain information about your progress, whether you should be allowed to work in addition to you studies and, if relevant, how many hours per week you can work. This statement is required because it is the studies, not the work, that is to be the main purpose of your stay in Norway as a student.
How to apply
You can find more information about the application procedure on the page How to apply for a residence permit for education. You must pay an application fee to apply for a residence permit to study in Norway, but there is no extra charge for the part-time work permit. How long will it take to process the application? See the list of the UDI’s expected case processing times at www.udi.no/caseprocessingtime.
Further information
If you have further questions about this topic, contactyour nearest Norwegian embassy or consulate, the nearest police district or the UDI’s Information Service.
