Photo: Marius E. HaugePhoto: Marius E. Hauge

Residence permit

If you intend to stay in Norway for more than 90 days, or if you are going to work while in Norway, you need a Residence permit. An application for Residence permit must be submitted at the Royal Norwegian Embassy in Hanoi or at the Royal Norwegian Consulate in HCMC, but the application will be forwarded to the Directorate of Immigration (UDI) in Norway for consideration. The applicant has to stay in his/her home country until the permit has been granted by UDI.

Types of Permit and Processing Time

A Residence permit will mainly be granted for the following purposes:

• Family reunification (e.g. with husband, parent(s), co-habitant)
• Visit by elderly parents up to 9 months
• Work (e.g. specialist, Au Pair, seasonal)
• To get married in Norway (“Fiancée permit")
• Education

Please use this checklist for documentation requirements: ENGLISH version  – VIETNAMESE version.


Please note that all Vietnamese documents must be translated into English, and verified by the Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Once the case has been sent to UDI in Norway, the Embassy has no further bearing on the case. The processing time depends on the work load at UDI at any time, but you can find an average expected processing time for the various types of permits on UDI’s Web site: Please CHECK HERE.


7-day Entry Visa (D-visa) - Foreign Spouse or Registered Partner of Norwegian Citizen

Foreign spouses of Norwegian citizens are, as a main rule, required to apply for a Residence Permit for reunification with the Norwegian spouse. This application must be submitted at the Embassy, and will be forwarded to UDI for processing. In some exceptional cases, the Embassy may grant a 7 day Entry Visa (a national D-visa) so that the foreign spouse can travel to submit the application for Residence Permit in Norway, and wait in Norway while the case is being processed. Similarly, a 7 day Entry Visa may be granted if an application for Residence Permit already has been submitted. The processing time for the 7 day Entry Visa is four weeks.

Please use this checklist when applying for a 7 day Entry Visa: ENGLISH version – VIETNAMESE version. More information in Norwegian about the documentation requirements from the Norwegian spouse is available here.

The issuance of this type of 7-day Entry Visa is regulated by UDI Circular 2010-003 . The English version is available here. A separate Circular AI-08/2006 from the Ministry of Labour and Social Inclusion and Instruction GI 2010-001 from the Ministry of Justic and Police also has relevance for the processing of these cases.


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