The Investor Visa for Italy Explained: Four Routes, No Minimum Stay

Approval before you commit any money, four ways to qualify, and a residence permit that does not ask you to live there.

If you have been looking into an Italian Golden Visa, you have probably found plenty of pages that mention it and very few that explain it. Its legal name is the Investor Visa for Italy. It has been open since 2017, and it works in the opposite order to most European programmes: you are approved first, and you invest afterwards.

This guide sets out what the programme is, what qualifies, who can apply and what it leads to. The facts are current as of September 2026 and, unless stated otherwise, come from the official Investor Visa for Italy portal and the ministry’s published guidance. Nothing here is advice on which route to take.

What is the Investor Visa for Italy?

It is a two-year residence visa for nationals of countries outside the EU, granted in return for one of four investments: €250,000 in an innovative start-up, €500,000 in an established Italian company, a €1,000,000 philanthropic donation, or €2,000,000 in Italian government bonds. You choose one, and the amounts cannot be split or combined. Since December 2024, the €500,000 route has also covered a venture capital fund established and operating in Italy.

Italy’s 2017 Budget Law created the programme by adding a dedicated article to the country’s consolidated immigration law. Unusually, a ministry runs it rather than an immigration office. The Ministry of Enterprises and Made in Italy assesses every application through the Investor Visa for Italy Committee, and the first stage happens entirely online, on a portal whose web address still carries the ministry’s name from before its renaming in 2022.

It is worth setting beside Portugal, since the two are so often compared. Portugal’s Golden Visa has one main route, €500,000 into a regulated fund, and asks for an average of seven days a year in the country. Italy offers four routes from €250,000 and asks for no minimum stay at all. The citizenship paths differ too: both now ask for ten years, but Portugal counts them while you live elsewhere and requires Portuguese at A2, a basic level, while Italy counts years of legal residence and requires Italian at B1, one step higher. Our comparison of Portugal and Italy sets the two out side by side.

The programme at a glance

This is the legal floor as of September 2026. The amounts have changed once since launch, when the start-up and company thresholds were halved in 2020, so confirm every line with counsel before planning around it.

The four routes, in one line each

The innovative start-up route asks for €250,000 in a company registered in the innovative start-up section of the Italian business register. The same 2024 reform limited how long a start-up can stay in that section, to three years from registration with extensions on conditions, and the visa rules do not say what happens to a permit if the company leaves it, which is worth raising with a lawyer before choosing this route. The company route asks for €500,000 in the shares of an established, operating Italian limited company. Since December 2024, under Law 193/2024, the same €500,000 can instead go into a venture capital fund established and operating in Italy, although the Committee’s published guidance, which dates from 2021, has not yet said how such an investment is treated in practice. The donation route asks for €1,000,000 given to a project of public interest in culture, education, scientific research, immigration management or the preservation of cultural and natural heritage, with nothing returned. The bond route asks for €2,000,000 in Italian government bonds with at least two years left to maturity.

Three of the four are investments, and any investment can lose value. The donation, by design, returns nothing. Each route also carries its own evidence at renewal, from a deposit certificate for bonds to a declaration from the recipient that a donation has not been revoked. Whether any of them suits you is a question for independent financial advice, which we do not give.

Pre-approval: how the Nulla Osta works

Pre-approval is the feature that sets the Italian programme apart. It works through a document called the Nulla Osta, literally a certificate of no impediment, which in effect is approval in principle. No money moves before it is issued.

You create an account on the ministry’s portal and upload a passport, evidence that the qualifying sum exists and was lawfully earned, a criminal record certificate and a signed commitment to make the investment, all signed electronically, so this whole first stage can be completed from wherever you live. The Committee, which brings together officials from several ministries, then assesses the file. Its published target is an answer within 30 days of a complete application, and there are three possible outcomes: the Nulla Osta is issued, the Committee asks for more information and gives you 30 days to supply it, or the application is refused with written reasons. The 30 days is a target the ministry sets itself rather than a promise, and a request for further documents adds time. Because the count only starts on a complete file, the quickest route to a decision is a complete file on the first submission rather than a fast one.

The question we are asked most often about Italy is whether the money has to be sitting in an Italian account before the answer comes. It does not. The file needs proof that the funds exist and a signed commitment to invest. The transfer itself happens after you have arrived in Italy, within three months.

Who can apply

The requirements come down to four things. You need to be a national of a country outside the EU and aged 18 or over. You need to show that the qualifying sum exists, can be transferred to Italy and was lawfully earned. You need a clean criminal record, evidenced by certificates from every country where you have lived for more than twelve consecutive months. And you need to sign a commitment to make the investment within three months of entering Italy. Nothing in that list asks how many days you plan to spend in the country.

One group cannot apply at present. The programme has been suspended for Russian and Belarusian citizens since 14 July 2023, following a European Commission recommendation on investor schemes, and in March 2024 the suspension was extended to dual nationals holding one of those passports alongside another non-EU passport.

From visa to permanent residency

Once the Nulla Osta is issued, a fixed sequence of deadlines follows: six months to apply for the visa at an Italian consulate, eight working days after arrival to apply for the residence permit, and three months from arrival to complete the investment. Each one matters, and our step-by-step guide to the application covers them in order.

The permit renews on one condition, and it is the investment rather than your presence. If the investment is maintained through the first two years, you can ask for a three-year renewal, and after five years of maintained investment you can apply for the long-term residence permit, which is Italy’s form of permanent residency.

No minimum stay is attached to the investor permit. The rules that normally cancel an Italian residence permit after a long absence do not apply to it, which is what no minimum stay means in practice. Two later steps are different, though. The five years for the long-term permit and the ten years for citizenship both count residence, not merely time spent holding a permit, so ask counsel how time outside Italy is treated for each before planning around either. Tax residence is a separate test again, decided by days spent and personal ties, and it belongs with a tax adviser.

Family members do not need a second investment. A spouse, dependent children and, in defined cases, dependent parents can each apply for a permit linked to yours through Italy’s family reunification rules.

Citizenship after ten years

Citizenship is not part of the Investor Visa, or of any Italian residency programme. What the visa provides is legal residence for as long as the investment is held and the permit renewed, and legal residence is what the citizenship law counts. Under Italy’s nationality law, a non-EU national becomes eligible to apply after ten years of legal residence, with Italian at B1, meaning intermediate, on the European language scale, according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Approval is a decision for the Ministry of the Interior and is not automatic once the ten years have passed.

Permanent residency comes earlier, with a lower language bar. The long-term residence permit, available after five years of maintained investment, generally requires Italian at A2, one level below the citizenship requirement.

A referendum in June 2025 proposed cutting the ten years to five. It failed because turnout, at about 30 per cent, fell well short of the 50 per cent needed for the result to count. The ten-year rule stands, and any change would now need a new law. Our comparison of citizenship timelines sets Italy beside Portugal and Greece.

Who the programme tends to suit

The Investor Visa draws a recognisable set of families, and what attracts them is usually the programme’s design rather than its price. The first group values certainty before commitment. For someone who would rather not move a large sum without knowing the answer, an approval in principle within a 30-day target, while the money stays in their own account, is the whole attraction.

The second group wants European residence without relocating. A permit with no minimum stay suits a family whose working life, schools and property remain elsewhere, and who want the option of Italy rather than an obligation to be there. The third is drawn by the routes themselves: founders and investors who already understand early stage companies may find the start-up route a natural fit, and families with a philanthropic purpose may find that the donation route matches it.

The programme suits less well a family whose main goal is a second passport without living in Italy, because the ten years for citizenship count legal residence rather than time holding a permit. It can also ask for more capital than it first appears for anyone uncomfortable with start-up risk, since the next route up is €500,000 in an established company. None of this is advice on whether to apply. It describes what the programme’s rules reward, and an independent adviser is the right person to test it against your own position.

What people most often get wrong

Three misunderstandings come up again and again, and each can cost time or money.

The first is that the money must be invested before you apply. It must not. The ministry’s guidance is clear that an investment made wholly or partly before the application is submitted does not qualify, so an eager early transfer can disqualify the very investment it was meant to support. The money stays in your own account until after you arrive in Italy.

The second is that no minimum stay means no attention is needed. The permit asks for no days, but it renews only if the investment is maintained, and each renewal needs fresh evidence and a fresh clearance filed at least 60 days before expiry. A bond sold early or a shareholding diluted can end the permit at renewal, whatever your travel pattern.

The third is that the donation route is a shortcut. It is the simplest to evidence and the only route with no market risk, but it is also the only one where the money never comes back. For some families that is exactly the point, and for others it is the detail that rules the route out.

Italy in a smaller field

The list of European Golden Visa programmes has shortened sharply. Ireland closed its investor programme in February 2023, the Netherlands ended its scheme in January 2024, and Spain closed its Golden Visa in April 2025 under Organic Law 1/2025, a decision framed around pressure on housing. Portugal kept its programme but removed property in October 2023, moving applicants onto regulated investment funds instead. Our guide to what remains open in Europe covers the full picture.

Italy’s programme has kept its design since 2017. One investment from four options, approval before commitment, a permit with no minimum stay, permanent residency at five years and eligibility to apply for citizenship at ten: that is the whole programme, and very few places in Europe still offer that combination.

Where to start

If Italy is on your list, we are happy to talk it through with no commitment on either side, and to have the current figures confirmed for your circumstances by the independent immigration lawyers we work with. Our EU residency by investment page explains how we coordinate the process, and you can get in touch whenever you are ready. We coordinate rather than advise on which route to take or whether to invest, and we set out exactly how we are paid on Italian files, in writing, before you commit to anything.

Elite Golden Visa provides immigration consultancy services. We do not provide financial or legal advice. All legal services are delivered by independent, qualified immigration lawyers. All investment decisions should be made with independent financial advice.

This content is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial advice or an offer to invest. The start-up, company and government bond routes are investments and can lose value, including the potential loss of capital; the donation route returns nothing by design. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Seek independent financial advice before making any investment decision.