How to Become a US Citizen: Requirements and Steps

To become a U.S. citizen through naturalization, you generally must be at least 18, have held a green card for 5 years (3 years if you have been married to and living with a U.S. citizen the whole time), have lived in the United States continuously for that period and been physically present for at least half of it, show good moral character, pass an English and civics test, and take the Oath of Allegiance. You apply with Form N-400. As of October 2026 the fee is $710 online or $760 on paper, and the national median from filing to decision is 7.4 months for fiscal year 2026, with slower field offices taking a year or more.

That is the common route, and it accounts for nearly everyone: USCIS reports that 83.8% of people naturalized in fiscal year 2024 qualified under the 5-year rule and 14% under the 3-year marriage rule. This guide explains each requirement in plain terms, shows how to calculate your earliest filing date, and flags the situations where you should get legal advice first. It is general information, not legal advice. The official form and instructions are at uscis.gov/n-400.

Four ways people become U.S. citizens

Before paying for an N-400, USCIS's own first step is to "determine if you are already a U.S. citizen." If one of your parents was a citizen when you were born, or naturalized while you were a child with a green card, check the second and third rows carefully. The rest of this article is about the fourth path.

U.S. citizenship requirements at a glance

Sources: USCIS eligibility pages for five-year residents and spouses of citizens, and the Form N-400 instructions, edition 01/20/25.

Step 1: hold a green card for long enough

The clock starts on the "Resident Since" date printed on your Permanent Resident Card. Time on a work visa, student visa or pending green card application does not count.

Three details catch people out:

• Conditional residence counts. If you received a two-year conditional green card through marriage or investment and the conditions were later removed, the clock runs from the start of conditional residence.
• Refugees and asylees get credit for earlier time. The USCIS Policy Manual calls this a rollback date. A refugee is generally considered a permanent resident as of the date of entry into the United States. An asylee is generally considered a permanent resident as of one year before the date USCIS approved the green card application.
• The 3-year rule is stricter than it sounds. You need three years as a resident, three years of marriage to the same person, three years of living together, and three years of your spouse being a citizen, all at once. If your spouse naturalized only two years ago, you wait for whichever comes first: the third anniversary of that, or your own five years.

If you are not yet a permanent resident, that is the stage to focus on. Our guides to how long it takes to get a green card, the I-130 processing time and the monthly visa bulletin cover it.

Step 2: continuous residence

Continuous residence means you have kept your home in the United States without a long break. It is about where you live, not about never traveling. The rules turn on the length of each single trip abroad.

To overcome the presumption after a trip of more than six months, the USCIS Policy Manual lists the kind of evidence that helps: you did not quit your U.S. job or take a job abroad, your immediate family stayed in the United States, and you kept your home here, owned or leased. Tax returns filed as a resident, bank activity and car registration support the same point.

After an absence of a year or more, the wait restarts, but not from zero. Under the 5-year rule you can apply again 4 years and 1 day after returning. Under the 3-year rule it is 2 years and 1 day. Waiting 4 years and 6 months (or 2 years and 6 months) avoids the six-month presumption as well.

Two warnings. First, filing a tax return as a "nonresident alien," or not filing because you consider yourself a nonresident, can be treated as evidence that you abandoned your green card. Second, long or frequent absences can lead to the loss of permanent resident status itself, which is a bigger problem than a delayed N-400. If you have a trip of more than six months in your history, get advice before filing.

Form N-470 lets certain people working abroad for the U.S. government, American research institutions, American companies engaged in foreign trade, or religious organizations preserve their residence during a long assignment. It has to be approved in advance.

Step 3: physical presence

This is a separate count of days. You must have been physically inside the United States for at least 913 days during the five years before you file, or 548 days during the three years for spouses of citizens. Add up every day spent abroad on every trip and subtract it from the total.

A person can satisfy one test and fail the other. Someone who takes a three-month trip every year never breaks continuous residence, yet loses about 450 days over five years, which still leaves enough presence. Someone who takes five trips of about 175 days each never crosses the six-month line on any single trip, but is absent for about 875 days out of 1,826. That leaves roughly 950 days, close to the 913-day minimum, and a pattern like that invites questions about continuous residence as well. The officer will do this arithmetic from the travel section of your N-400, so do it yourself first.

Step 4: three months in your state or district

You must have lived for at least three months in the state or USCIS district where you file. If you just moved from Texas to Illinois, wait three months before filing. Students who are financially dependent on their parents may apply either where they study or where the family lives.

Step 5: good moral character

The N-400 instructions define good moral character as "character that measures up to the standards of average citizens of the community in which the applicant resides." You must show it for the full 5 or 3 years before filing and up to the oath, and USCIS may look further back.

Some conduct is a bar written into the law. Other conduct is weighed case by case. Things that commonly cause trouble:

• Criminal convictions. Certain serious offenses are permanent bars. Many others bar you if they fall inside the statutory period.
• Lying to an immigration officer or on an immigration form to get a benefit
• Falsely claiming to be a U.S. citizen, or voting unlawfully in a federal, state or local election
• Failing to file required tax returns or leaving taxes unpaid with no payment plan
• Willfully failing to support dependents, including unpaid child support
• For men who lived in the United States between 18 and 26, knowingly failing to register with the Selective Service

A USCIS policy memorandum dated August 15, 2025 tells officers to evaluate good moral character through the "totality of circumstances." In practice that means officers also consider positive evidence. If your record has a blemish, documents showing steady employment, tax compliance, family responsibilities, education and community involvement belong in your file.

Any arrest, even one that ended in dismissal, is a reason to see an attorney before you apply. Some old convictions make a person deportable, and filing an N-400 puts the record in front of the government.

Step 6: English and civics

At the interview you must show you can read, write and speak basic English and pass a civics test on U.S. history and government. Applicants who file on or after October 20, 2025 take the 2025 civics test, with up to 20 questions from a list of 128 and 12 correct answers needed. Earlier filers take the 2008 version, 6 correct out of up to 10.

Exceptions, measured on the day you file:

• 50/20: age 50 or older with 20 years as a permanent resident: no English test, civics in your own language
• 55/15: age 55 or older with 15 years as a permanent resident: no English test, civics in your own language
• 65/20: age 65 or older with 20 years as a permanent resident: no English test and a shorter civics test of 10 questions drawn from 20
• Medical disability: Form N-648, completed by a licensed doctor or clinical psychologist, can waive English, civics or both

Sample questions and a study plan are in our U.S. citizenship test guide.

Step 7: attachment to the Constitution and the oath

You must be willing to support the Constitution and take the Oath of Allegiance, which includes renouncing allegiance to other countries and promising to bear arms or perform other service for the United States when the law requires. The law allows a modified oath for people whose religious training and belief, or deeply held moral convictions, prevent them from bearing arms. You are not a citizen until you take the oath at a ceremony. See the oath ceremony.

When can you apply? Calculating the 90-day early filing date

USCIS lets you file up to 90 calendar days before your 5-year or 3-year anniversary. The Policy Manual gives this example: someone who first meets the five-year requirement on June 10, 2010 may file as early as March 12, 2010.

Applied to current dates:

USCIS has an early filing date calculator on its website. Use it, and do not round. An application that arrives even one day too soon is rejected or denied. Also remember that the early window applies only to the residence period: the three months in your state, the physical presence days and, for spouses, the three years of marriage must already be complete on the filing date.

Citizenship through marriage: what it does and does not do

Marrying a U.S. citizen does not make you a citizen and does not let you skip the green card. The sequence is: your spouse files a family petition, you become a permanent resident, and then the three-year clock for naturalization begins. Marriage shortens the wait from five years to three. Nothing more.

You must stay married and living together until you take the oath. If the marriage ends by divorce or death before then, or you separate, you no longer qualify under the 3-year rule and have to wait for the 5-year mark. There is an exception for people who obtained residence as the abused spouse of a citizen under the Violence Against Women Act. Spouses of U.S. citizens working abroad for the government or certain employers may qualify under a separate provision, INA 319(b), with no minimum period of residence.

Expect to prove the marriage is real. The N-400 instructions suggest joint tax transcripts for the past three years, a shared lease or mortgage, joint bank statements, insurance policies and children's birth certificates.

Military service

Service members have two special routes, both set out in Volume 12, Part I of the USCIS Policy Manual. Under INA 328, a person who has served honorably in the U.S. armed forces for periods totaling at least one year, and who is a permanent resident at the time of the naturalization interview, can apply. Someone who files while still serving or within six months of an honorable discharge is exempt from the residence and physical presence requirements. Under INA 329, honorable service for any length of time during a designated period of hostilities can qualify, with no continuous residence or physical presence requirement. A green card is generally not required under INA 329 if the person was physically present in the United States or certain U.S. territories at the time of enlistment, reenlistment, extension of service or induction. The period that began September 11, 2001 remains a designated period of hostilities until a president ends it by executive order. If the person has left the service, any separation must have been under honorable conditions. In both cases the filing fee is $0. USCIS runs a Military Help Line at 877-247-4645.

How to apply, step by step

1. Confirm eligibility using the requirements above or the USCIS naturalization eligibility tool.
2. Gather documents: green card, travel records, tax transcripts, marriage and divorce records, and certified court records for any arrest.
3. Complete Form N-400. Our N-400 form guide goes through it part by part.
4. Pay the fee. $710 online or $760 on paper as of October 2026, with a $380 reduced fee and fee waivers for those who qualify. A proposed increase is pending. See the N-400 fee guide.
5. Attend biometrics when USCIS sends the appointment notice.
6. Go to the interview and take the tests. See the citizenship interview.
7. Take the oath and receive your Certificate of Naturalization.

How long does it take to become a U.S. citizen?

There are two waits. The first is fixed by law: 5 years as a permanent resident, or 3 through marriage. USCIS says the median person naturalized in fiscal year 2024 had actually held a green card for 7.5 years, so many people wait longer than they must.

The second is the processing time. For fiscal year 2026 through August 30, the national median from filing to decision was 7.4 months. Field offices, checked October 13, 2026, were completing 80% of cases within 9 to 18 months. Add the 90-day head start and a typical applicant under the 5-year rule can expect a decision roughly five and a half to six years after getting a green card, and later at the slowest offices. Office-by-office figures are in N-400 processing time.

For someone starting from outside the green card system, the total is much longer and depends on the visa category and country. Some family and employment categories have waits measured in many years before the green card stage even begins.

How hard is it?

For a permanent resident with a clean record, the process is demanding on paperwork and patience more than anything else. USCIS naturalized 818,500 people in fiscal year 2024, and the agency's published pass rate for the English and civics tests was 89.7% on the first attempt and 94.4% after a retest, measured on the 2008 version of the test. Pass rates for the longer 2025 test had not been published when we checked in October 2026.

The cases that go wrong usually involve something the applicant could have identified in advance: a long trip, a tax problem, an old arrest, or a marriage that ended before the oath. Reviewing those four areas honestly before you file is the most useful preparation there is.

What you gain, and what changes

Citizens can vote in federal elections, serve on juries, run for most public offices, apply for federal jobs that require citizenship, travel on a U.S. passport and sponsor a wider range of relatives for immigration, including parents and married children. Citizenship cannot be lost by living abroad, and a citizen cannot be deported, although naturalization can be revoked if it was obtained by fraud. Children under 18 who hold green cards and live with a parent who naturalizes generally become citizens automatically at the same moment.

Citizens also take on duties: jury service when called, and continuing to report worldwide income to the IRS wherever they live. Whether you can keep your original nationality depends on that country's law. The United States does not require new citizens to give up another passport, but some countries end a person's citizenship when he or she naturalizes elsewhere. Check with your country's consulate before the oath.