Maltese Citizenship by Marriage: The Complete Form B Checklist

What is Form B for Maltese citizenship by marriage?

Form B is the Application for Registration as a Citizen of Malta by a Person Married to a Citizen of Malta, the form a foreign spouse files with Aġenzija Komunità Malta to become Maltese under article 6 of the Maltese Citizenship Act, after at least five years of marriage to, and living with, a Maltese citizen.

The same form covers marriages under article 4 and article 6 of the Act. Article 4 applies only to marriages that already existed on 20 September 1964, so almost every applicant today applies under article 6, which covers marriages on or after 21 September 1964. The full legal text is published on Legislation Malta (Cap. 188), and the Agency lists the form and its fees on its acquisition of citizenship page.

Form B is not an online application. It is submitted in person, with original documents and a photocopy of each, either at Aġenzija Komunità Malta or through a Maltese embassy, high commission or consulate. That makes the quality of the paper file decisive: there is no portal to correct a missing document after the fact, and an incomplete file simply waits. This checklist is built to help you assemble the file once, completely and consistently. For the service overview, see our page on Maltese citizenship by marriage.

Who can apply for Maltese citizenship by marriage on Form B?

A foreign spouse can apply for Maltese citizenship by marriage on Form B when, on the date of the application, the couple have been married and living together for at least five years, counted from the wedding date, and they are still married and living together when the registration as a citizen is made.

The Maltese spouse can hold citizenship by birth, by descent, by registration or by naturalisation; the route is open to the spouse of any Maltese citizen. Since 1 September 2017, marriage in Malta has been open to same-sex couples, and same-sex spouses apply under the same article 6 conditions. The marriage must be genuine and subsisting, and the grant must not be contrary to the public interest, which the Minister assesses in every case.

Where you lived during the five years

The Maltese Citizenship Act requires five years of marriage and living together and does not itself say where the couple must have lived. Many applicants live abroad and apply through a Maltese mission. Because practice can vary, confirm your position with the Agency before you apply rather than assuming either way.

Widows and widowers

The spouse of a Maltese citizen who has died can still apply, where the couple had been married and living together for at least five years at the time of the death, or lived together from the marriage until the death and the fifth anniversary of the marriage has passed by the date of application. These applications add the death certificate and two affidavits from immediate family members.

Separated spouses

Spouses who separated after living together for five years or more face a harder question. Form B includes an option for an applicant who lived with the spouse for at least five years after the marriage, while the statute speaks of spouses who are still living together. A separated spouse's case needs an individual legal assessment by a warranted Maltese advocate before any application is made, and we refer those cases accordingly.

What must be done before you fill in Form B?

Before you fill in Form B, a marriage celebrated outside Malta must be registered with the Identità Public Registry, at a government fee of €2.60 and with an apostille on the certificate unless it was issued in another EU member state, because the Agency cannot process Form B without a marriage certificate registered in Malta.

This is the step applicants most often miss, and it is the reason some files are turned back at the counter after months of preparation. The Public Registry sets out its requirements on its page for registering a foreign marriage. Our guide on how to register a foreign marriage in Malta covers the certificate, the apostille and the common pitfalls in detail.

Two other checks belong at this stage. First, confirm that the five-year condition will be met on the date you intend to apply, counting from the wedding and not from the start of the relationship. Second, check that the Maltese spouse's own civil records are registered in Malta. Families who left Malta a generation ago sometimes find that a birth or a parent's marriage was never recorded, and those gaps are far easier to close now than after Form B has been lodged.

What documents does Form B need?

Form B needs a joint affidavit, one passport photograph, the marriage certificate registered in Malta, certificates of any previous marriages with proof of how each ended, the applicant's full birth certificate, both spouses' identity documents, and the Maltese spouse's birth certificate with that spouse's parents' certificates, each presented as an original with a photocopy.

The Agency may ask for further documents where a case requires it, for example where a widow or widower applies, where names differ between records, or where a previous marriage needs explaining. Treat the list above as the core of the file, not its outer limit, and keep the originals together so that a request for something extra can be answered quickly.

How do you prepare each Form B document so the file is complete?

Preparing each Form B document so the file is complete means checking every certificate for matching names, dates and places, authenticating foreign documents with an apostille, translating anything not in Maltese or English, and tracing the Maltese spouse's family records early, because those older certificates usually take the longest to obtain.

The joint affidavit

The joint affidavit is the couple's sworn statement that they have been married for at least five years and still live together. In Malta, the spouses swear it at the Agency when the application is submitted; abroad, it is sworn before a mission official or a person authorised under local law. Both spouses need to be available to swear it, so plan the appointment around both diaries. Each oath, affidavit or declaration sworn at the Agency carries a fee of €10.

The applicant's full birth certificate

Order the full version of your birth certificate, the one that names both parents, rather than a short extract. If it is not in Maltese or English, arrange a certified translation. A certificate issued outside the EU will normally need an apostille from the country that issued it, so add that to the request when you order it.

Previous marriages and how they ended

If either spouse was married before, Form B asks for the certificate of each earlier marriage and proof of how it ended, such as a final divorce decree or a death certificate. These documents are easy to overlook and slow to obtain if the earlier marriage took place in a different country, so they belong at the top of the list rather than the bottom.

The Maltese spouse's family certificates

Form B asks for the Maltese spouse's birth certificate together with the birth and marriage certificates of that spouse's parents, or the parents' dates of birth as the form allows. For many families this is the hardest part of the file. Older records sit in the Malta Public Registry and, for earlier generations, in parish archives, and a family that left Malta decades ago may not know where to begin. Start this search first.

Identity documents and the photograph

Both spouses provide passports, identity cards or residence cards, and the applicant attaches one passport photograph to page 1 of the form. Check that the names in these documents match every certificate exactly, including middle names and the transliteration of special characters.

Originals and photocopies

Present each original with a photocopy. Before any original leaves your hands, order spare certified copies from the authority that issued it, so that a lost or retained document never stalls the application.

If the Maltese spouse's family records are scattered, or you are unsure whether a previous marriage is properly documented, book a free consultation with Mirabello. We review your documents against the Form B list and tell you exactly what is missing before you book an appointment.

How much does Form B cost in 2026?

Form B costs €150 in government fees when you apply, with a further €50 for the certificate of registration if the application is approved, plus €10 for each oath, affidavit or declaration sworn at the Agency, and €2.60 beforehand to register a marriage celebrated abroad with the Identità Public Registry.

Those are the official figures published by Aġenzija Komunità Malta and Identità. On top of them, families applying from abroad pay mission charges, which vary by mission, together with apostilles, certified translations and courier costs set in the countries that provide them. For many families the documents cost more than the government fees themselves, which is another reason to order everything once and correctly.

Government fees are always paid at cost to the authority concerned and are shown separately from Mirabello's service fee, which is confirmed per case before you commit. You can prepare and file Form B yourself; our fee covers the preparation, coordination and follow-up that make the file complete the first time.

How do you submit Form B, in Malta or from abroad?

Form B is submitted in person, either at Aġenzija Komunità Malta, where the documents are reviewed, the applicant signs and the spouses swear the joint affidavit, or through a Maltese embassy, high commission or consulate abroad, where the affidavit and the oath are sworn before a mission official or a person authorised under local law.

There is no online submission. In Malta, the appointment at the Agency is where the file is checked, so arriving with every original, every photocopy and both spouses present makes the visit count. The Agency's citizenship unit can be reached at citizenship.akm@komunita.gov.mt, and its public hours are Monday to Friday, 07:30 to 11:30, closed on Wednesdays.

Spouses living in Australia, the United Kingdom, Canada, the United States and elsewhere do not need to travel to Malta. Missions add their own charges, and documents issued outside the EU need apostilles and, where they are not in English or Maltese, certified translations. Every applicant also takes the oath of allegiance, either at the Agency in Valletta or before an authorised official at a Maltese mission abroad.

Keep the reference number you are given when the application is lodged. Follow-up questions about a citizenship application are answered against that reference, and without it a simple status enquiry becomes a search.

What timeline should you expect for Form B?

Form B has no officially published processing time and no paid or official fast track, so the timeline you can plan is the preparation time you control, while the decision rests with the Minister, who must be satisfied that the grant is not contrary to the public interest and may hold an interview with the applicant.

Because no figure is published, we do not quote one. What we can say with confidence is where time is lost. Most delays come from files that are incomplete or inconsistent: a marriage that was never registered in Malta, a previous divorce without its final decree, a parent's certificate that cannot be found, or names that differ between documents. Each of these leads to a request for further documents, and the application waits until it is answered.

Think of the timeline in three stages. The first, preparation, is in your hands: registering the marriage, tracing the Maltese spouse's family records, and arranging apostilles and translations. The second, submission, depends on appointment availability at the Agency or the mission. The third, the decision, belongs to the Maltese authorities, and some applicants are invited to an interview. A complete, consistent file shortens only the first two stages and protects the third from avoidable requests, which is the most any applicant or adviser can honestly offer.

Mirabello Consultancy never implies that a decision can be influenced or accelerated, because it cannot. Citizenship by marriage is decided on eligibility alone. The only official fast track across Maltese citizen services is the Passport Office's urgent passport service, which applies to passports, not to citizenship.

What happens after Form B is approved?

After Form B is approved, the new citizen pays €50 and collects the certificate of registration, then applies for a Maltese identity card and a Maltese passport in the usual way, and the family checks whether any children already hold Maltese citizenship by descent or need to be registered themselves.

Malta has permitted dual citizenship since 10 February 2000, so registering as a Maltese citizen does not require you to give up your existing nationality under Maltese law. Whether you keep it depends on the law of your other country of nationality, which you should check before applying.

With the certificate in hand, the passport application follows the standard process described in our Maltese passport guide. For children, the position depends on their date of birth and their parents' citizenship at the time: our article on whether a child is automatically Maltese sets out the rules, and our newborn registration and first passport service covers registering a child born abroad.

How Mirabello Consultancy helps with Form B

Mirabello Consultancy helps foreign spouses of Maltese citizens prepare a complete Form B file remotely, confirming eligibility, preparing the registration of a foreign marriage, sourcing certificates from the Malta Public Registry and parish records, coordinating apostilles and translations, preparing the form and joint affidavit, booking the appointment, and following the application until the certificate is issued.

We work from offices in Zurich, Dubai and Hong Kong SAR and have no office in Malta. Our role is preparation, coordination, documentation and follow-up; every decision rests with the Maltese authorities. Matters that need a legal opinion, such as a separated spouse's application, are referred to a warranted Maltese advocate.

Because one set of certificates serves several applications, we obtain each document once and reuse it across the family's needs, from Form B to children's registrations and passports. All of our services for Maltese families are brought together on our Maltese citizen services page.

If you are comparing routes, our citizenship by marriage overview explains how spousal citizenship works in other countries Mirabello Consultancy covers. If you have children born abroad, our guide to registering a baby born abroad to a Maltese parent covers their side of the paperwork.