• You must pay an application fee.

• You must have your identity verified. As a general rule, you are required to present a passport. 

• You must be residing in Norway and intend to continue living here in the future.
  
  • You must have permanently residence when you apply for Norwegian citizenship and when the application is processed.

• If you are between 18 and 67 years old, you must meet the following requirements:
  • You must have passed an oral test in Norwegian at level B1 at the minimum, or
  • You must have passed an oral test in Norwegian at level A2 at the minimum, if you are:
    • a stateless person
    • over 55 years of age and came to Norway on the basis of an application for protection or as a resettled refugee, or
    • over 55 years of age and receive disability benefits, and 
  • Passed a test in social studies in Norwegian or a citizenship test

• If you over the age of 15 years: You must order a criminal record certificate (external website), which you must hand in with the application. The certificate cannot be more than three months old when you meet for your appointment with the police to submit the application documents. Therefore, you must wait to apply for a criminal record certificate until you know when you have an appointment with the police. If you already have a criminal record certificate that is older than three months, you must apply for a new certificate before you have your appointment. If you have been convicted or fined by the police or if you are under investigation for a criminal offence, you might have to wait longer to become a Norwegian citizen.

• From 1 January 2020, you are not required to give up your original citizenship to become a Norwegian citizen. You can have one or more citizenships in addition to a Norwegian citizenship. However, if the country you are a citizen of now does not allow you to have more than one citizenship, you may still lose this citizenship when you become a Norwegian citizen.
  
  You must make sure what the rules are in your current country of citizenship. You can, for example, look for information on an official website which belongs to the authorities in that country or ask an embassy.
  
  You do not have to inform Norwegian authorities that you wish to keep your previous citizenship. 

• You must have stayed in Norway for a total of eight of the past eleven years, the past three years with a right of residence.
  • For the last three years, your stay in Norway must have been continuous. This means that your travels abroad must have been limited to a maximum of two months per calendar year during the last three years. This applies regardless of whether you have a permanent right of residence or not.
  • Right of residence means that you must have worked, studied or been granted family reunification with an EEA citizen with a right of residence in Norway for the entire three-year period. For applicants who do not meet the requirements for a permanent right of residence, this means that you cannot have been without a right of residence (worked, studied or family reunification with an EEA citizen with a right of residence in Norway) for more than a total of two months during the last three years. «The last three years» are calculated from the date we make a decision in your case. For the remaining five years, you must have resided in Norway with a right of residence or other permits of at least one year's duration.
  • Read more about how to calculate the length of your residence period.

There are shorter residency requirements for some groups. If you have sufficient income, you must have resided in Norway with a right of residence for the last three years, and a total of six years of the past ten years with a right of residence or permits of at least one year's duration.

If you were born in Norway or came here before you reached the age of 18, there is a shorter residence period requirement. In that case, you must have resided in Norway with a right of residence for the last three years, and for a total of five years of the past seven years with either a right of residence or with permits of at least one year's duration.

A few other groups also have their own requirements for residency time. Read more about the exemptions for «researchers associated with a Norwegian research institution», «athletes», «household members of deployed personnel at a Norwegian foreign service mission or of military personnel», «foreigners who have held a Norwegian passport», and «Kola Norwegians» here.