TL;DR:

If you have ever searched Google for phrases such as “how to stay in Spain without a visa” or “Spain regularisation 2026”, you have probably come across the rather mysterious word arraigo. It roughly refers to having established roots in Spain. The term may sound bureaucratic, but in practice it has become one of the most dynamic and frequently changing areas of Spanish immigration policy in recent years. The rules were rewritten three times in a year and a half, and in 2026 something happened that many people had been waiting for as a last opportunity. It attracted enormous attention – but that chapter is now over.

So let us take it step by step: what arraigo is, how it used to work, what has changed and, most importantly, why this route to residence should be approached carefully.

What is arraigo?

Arraigo – literally referring to being “rooted” or established in a place – is a temporary residence permit granted in exceptional circumstances. It was not designed for someone entering Spain as a tourist or buying a property in the hope of obtaining residence. It is intended for people who, for various reasons, are already living in Spain – often without regular immigration status – and can provide convincing evidence that they have established genuine ties through employment, family, education or lasting social connections.

The logic is fairly pragmatic: the person is already in the country, and removing hundreds of thousands of people would be both physically difficult and extremely expensive. The state therefore effectively says: demonstrate that you are integrated and you may be able to regularise your status. This mechanism has existed for more than twenty years, but the last two years have brought its most significant overhaul.

How the system worked before

Before the reform, the system rested on three main routes: arraigo social, laboral and familiar. The classic options generally required three years of continuous residence, supported by registration in the municipal register (padrón), a preliminary employment contract for at least one year, as well as a positive integration report from the local authority (ayuntamiento).

Employment evidence could be required in cases involving undocumented work, while family arraigo was designed for parents of Spanish children or children of Spanish citizens.

On paper, it looked straightforward. In practice, people could spend years collecting the necessary paperwork only to run into technicalities: the wrong type of contract, a document submitted too late, or confusion between an NIE and an actual residence permit. Many documents are also valid for only three months, meaning that by the time one document arrived, another could already have expired.

The system worked, but not smoothly. Fifteen years ago, finding undocumented work in a bar, café or on a construction site was a realistic strategy for some people. Many regularised their status that way: first informal employment, then three years of continuous residence supported by registration records, and eventually arraigo laboral. Today, that route is largely closed in practice – more on that below.

The 2025 reform: five routes instead of three

On 20 May 2025, Spain’s new Immigration Regulations under Royal Decree 1155/2024 came into force. Instead of three forms of arraigo, there were now five. Alongside the social, employment-related and family routes came socioformativo, which links regularisation to education or training, and segunda oportunidad – the “second chance” route for people who previously held legal status in Spain but later lost it.

For most categories, the general continuous-residence requirement was reduced from three years to two. The reform simplified proof of financial support for parents over 65, made regularisation more accessible for children of Spanish citizens who had not acquired citizenship at birth for various reasons, and introduced specific protection for guardians of Spanish minors and people with disabilities. Most arraigo permits are issued for one year, while the family route provides a five-year card.

2026: the closed regularisation window and the options that remain

On 15 April 2026, Royal Decree 316/2026 was published in the BOE, introducing two entirely new but temporary types of permits. The first covered people who had applied for asylum before 1 January 2026. For them, the requirements were relaxed considerably: five months of residence in Spain and no criminal record were sufficient. The second, arraigo extraordinario, targeted people who had entered Spain before 1 January 2026 but applied for asylum after that date, meaning they fell outside both the previous asylum framework and traditional arraigo. Three routes were available to them: employment, family and social grounds in cases of clear vulnerability.

Applications opened on 16 April and closed on 30 June 2026, with no extension, as had been announced in advance. According to the official figures cited in the original article, 1,174,978 applications were submitted, of which 609,737 had already been processed by the time the window closed. Almost 80% concerned arraigo extraordinario, with the remaining 20% relating to the route for asylum applicants. The authorities had initially expected around half a million applicants; actual demand was more than twice that estimate.

By late September 2026, this extraordinary regularisation process is already history. New applications cannot be submitted under it. What remains are the five standard arraigo routes introduced under the 2025 regulations:

• Arraigo social: based on social integration together with sufficient means of support or family ties to foreign residents.
• Arraigo sociolaboral: for people with an employment offer and preliminary employment contract.
• Arraigo socioformativo: linked to qualifying education or training.
• Arraigo familiar: for parents or guardians of minor citizens of the EU, EEA or Switzerland, as well as relatives caring for a person with a disability.
• Arraigo de segunda oportunidad: for people who previously held legal status in Spain but failed to renew it in time.

These routes currently have no comparable application deadline, but their requirements are stricter than those of the one-off regularisation programme.

Documents required for arraigo

The exact file depends on the type of arraigo, but the basic documentation commonly includes:

• a valid passport and copies of all pages containing visas and entry or exit stamps;
• a criminal-record certificate from the country of origin, apostilled and translated into Spanish, plus equivalent certificates from other countries where the applicant has lived where required;
• evidence of continuous residence in Spain for the required period, such as travel records, medical records, children’s school documents, bank statements, rental contracts and other evidence showing your physical presence in the country;
• for arraigo social – a positive integration report (informe) from the relevant regional social services, together with evidence of sufficient means;
• for employment-related or sociolaboral arraigo – an employment contract or preliminary contract;
• for family arraigo – apostilled and translated birth, marriage or other family-status certificates;
• for socioformativo – proof of enrolment in an eligible course or training programme. Not every course qualifies: training generally needs to be primarily in person (presencial) or hybrid (semipresencial), particularly for practical components. Fully online courses without in-person attendance are generally not accepted;
• the appropriate Modelo EX application form, photographs and proof of payment of the relevant Modelo 790 fee.

The list does not look particularly complicated. In practice, however, individual documents – especially apostilles and translations issued abroad – can take months. It is worth preparing well in advance rather than starting a week before you intend to apply.

What became easier – and what became harder

To be fair, the new reform genuinely simplified some things. Two years instead of three, new arraigo routes for people who previously did not fit the system at all, and a one-off regularisation window that gave documents to more than half a million people. These were substantial changes, not cosmetic ones.

At the same time, other aspects have become considerably more difficult – something that receives less attention.

Employment-based arraigo is now extremely difficult to treat as a practical strategy. Fifteen years ago, getting an undocumented job in a bar, kitchen or on a construction site was relatively common. Employers often looked the other way, and after a few years that employment history could help a person regularise their status.

Today the risks for employers are much higher. Hiring someone without authorisation to work can result in serious penalties, potentially reaching tens of thousands of euros per employee. As a result, very few legitimate businesses are willing to take that risk. Finding an employer prepared to do so has become extremely difficult, which means arraigo laboral has largely disappeared as a realistic strategy for newcomers.

A preliminary employment contract is not necessarily an easy solution either. First, not every employer will qualify: the employer must be prepared to provide documentation about the business, such as annual turnover and licences, and not every company is enthusiastic about additional scrutiny from public authorities. Second, although the official processing period for a residence application is three months, actual waiting times can reach eight months or more. Will a potential employer wait that long without any guarantee that the application will be approved? Often, the answer is no.

Banking can create another practical obstacle. Opening a Spanish bank account as a foreign national or non-resident may involve extensive compliance checks and requirements concerning identity, tax residence, address and the source of funds. Without a workable bank account, renting a home, receiving a salary, paying utilities and insurance or handling larger everyday transactions can become considerably more difficult. The exact requirements vary by bank and by the applicant’s circumstances.

Our view: arraigo is a risk, not a Plan B

At Alegria, we work every day with people relocating to Spain, so arraigo regularly comes up in conversations with clients. Our position is straightforward: if you are already physically in Spain and your circumstances mean that you now meet the conditions for regularisation through arraigo, it is certainly worth exploring. In that situation, there may be a genuine opportunity to obtain legal residence.

But if you are only planning your move and considering arraigo as your primary route, deliberately arriving with the idea of “living without status for a while and sorting it out later” deserves much more caution. Too many factors are outside your control: Spain’s political environment around regularisation is unstable, temporary opportunities can open and close, undocumented employment is increasingly difficult to find, and living without stable immigration and banking arrangements can turn ordinary daily tasks into a succession of exhausting problems. Arraigo involves too much uncertainty to build an entire relocation strategy around it.