Coronavirus disease (COVID-19): Citizenship

Entering Canada: Mandatory quarantine, COVID-19 testing and other requirements

Before you travel to Canada, make sure you know the rules and what you need to do before and after you arrive:

• Quarantine or isolation plan
• COVID-19 testing for travellers
• Requirements for flying to Canada
• Mandatory hotel stay for all air travellers

If you’re a permanent resident

If you’re travelling or planning to travel, find out what you need to re-enter Canada.

You can use an expired permanent resident card (PR card) to

• apply for Canadian citizenship
• bring to your citizenship test and ceremony

If you’re a dual Canadian citizen

You can only enter Canada with a

• valid Canadian passport, or
• special authorization

Find out who can travel to Canada

Citizenship events

Citizenship tests and interviews

Due to COVID-19, we

• cancelled all in-person citizenship tests and interviews
• now offer online citizenship tests
• have limited capacity to schedule online tests and interviews
• are scheduling urgent requests for the tests and interviews if you qualify and apply for urgent processing

Online citizenship test

We’re now inviting some applicants to take the citizenship test online. Wait for us to invite you.

Video oath ceremony (virtual citizenship ceremony)

Due to COVID-19, we

• cancelled all in-person citizenship ceremonies
• started inviting applicants to take the Oath of Citizenship through video calls since April 1, 2020

We’ll

• contact you soon with the time and date of your video oath ceremony
• contact applicants with cancelled in-person ceremonies first
• schedule the ceremonies based on the order we make decisions on the applications
  • This depends on the complexity of the application.

Please wait for us to invite you.

How we invite you

We’ll contact the email address or phone number you gave in your application. If your contact information changed, tell us using our Web form.

By email

If you provided an email address in your application, we’ll email you the invitation.

To avoid missing our emails

• add email addresses ending in “@cic.gc.ca” to your email’s safe sender list
• check your junk or spam folder regularly if you don’t see our message

By phone

Our agent will call you if we don’t have your email address. Our call may show up as

• an “Unknown caller” in your caller ID
• a number from outside of Canada

Answer your phone when you see these numbers so you don’t miss our calls.

After you respond to the phone call, we’ll send you the invitation by mail.

How to attend the video oath ceremony

You’ll attend the video oath ceremony via a Zoom videoconference call.  We’ll explain how to set up Zoom in your ceremony invitation.

Most in-person citizenship events are cancelled

To keep everyone safe, the following citizenship events are cancelled until further notice:

• in-person citizenship ceremonies
  • We’ll contact you to schedule a video oath ceremony
• in-person citizenship tests and retests
  • We’ll contact you to invite you for an online citizenship test
• most retests, interviews and hearings (including videoconference hearings)
  • Wait for us to contact you.
  • If you need to change your appointment, contact the office that sent the invitation.
    • The contact information is in the letter we sent.
• citizenship events in our temporary offices (itinerant service trips)

Processing your citizenship application

We’re still accepting new applications for citizenship.

Due to COVID-19, we

• are prioritizing Canadians who are trying to return to Canada
• have limited capacity to process citizenship applications
• can’t provide accurate processing times

It’s taking us longer to

• check that your application is complete
• send you an acknowledgement of receipt (AOR) letter or email with your application number
  • We send you the AOR after we receive your application and check that it’s complete.

Other citizenship applications

• Resuming Canadian citizenship
• Giving up Canadian citizenship (renunciation)
• Canadian citizenship certificate (proof of citizenship)
• Search of citizenship records

Until you get your AOR

• the Client Support Centre won’t have information about your application status
• you can’t check your application status online
• don’t submit a Web form to check your application status

Check your application status

After you receive your AOR

• you can check your application status online, or
• if you can’t check your status online
  • find out why you can’t check your status
  • we’ll let you know as soon as there are updates to your application

If we ask you to submit documents for an application in progress

Last updated: April 12, 2021

Because many applicants can now provide the supporting documents needed for us to process applications, we’ll no longer automatically give more time to submit information.

• We’ll contact you to request the supporting documents.
  • This will happen in the next few months.
  • You’ll have 30 days from the date we contact you to submit the information.
• Start collecting your documents.
  • Do this before we contact you. It can take time to get certain documents.
  • Check the last email we sent you to confirm what you need to submit.
• Don’t travel to another city or country to get the supporting documents.
• We’ll consider extending your deadline if you have a reasonable explanation that shows you’re affected by COVID-19.

Find out what to do if you still have documents to provide for your application.

Urgent processing of applications

If you have an emergency, you can request urgent processing of your citizenship application.

• We can only process citizenship applications urgently in special cases.
• We’ll check if your request meets the conditions for urgent processing.
• If it doesn’t meet the conditions, we’ll process your application normally.

Find out when and how to apply urgently

• for Canadian citizenship (grant of citizenship or naturalization)
• for a Canadian citizenship certificate (proof of citizenship)
• to resume Canadian citizenship
• to give up Canadian citizenship (renunciation)

Time you’ve lived in Canada (physical presence)

Extra days spent abroad due to COVID-19 will not count as days in Canada. You must still meet the physical presence requirement for your citizenship application.

Updates and related links

• Find more information on COVID-19
• Public Health Agency of Canada: COVID-19 information (available in multiple languages)
• Canada provides update on exemptions to travel restrictions to protect Canadians and support the economy