Long residence: settling after ten lawful years in the UK
Ten years of lawful, continuous residence on almost any combination of visas can lead to settlement. Trips that began before 11 April 2024 are tested against 548 days in total and 184 at a time; later ones against 180 in any 12 months.
Long residence date with old and new absence limits
Earliest date to apply for ILR
15 September 2032
No 12-month window holds more than 180 days: your 10-year period is unbroken.
| 10 years completed | 13 October 2032 |
| Apply from (28 days early) | 15 September 2032 |
| Worst 12-month window | 30 days |
| Allowance left today | 180 days |
| Days abroad on the trips listed | 30 days |
| Citizenship, at the earliest | 15 September 2033 |
On that date: 0 days abroad in 5 years (limit 450), 0 in the last 12 months (limit 90); set by 12 months after indefinite leave.
Whole days only: the day you leave and the day you come back are not counted. Citizenship assumes ILR granted on the first application date; enter the real date when you have it.
Calculated in your browser: nothing you type is sent anywhere. Not legal advice; not affiliated with the Home Office.
Published by Radif Partners · How we calculate · Home Office fees of 8 October 2026, rules checked 13 October 2026
The long residence route in Appendix Long Residence rewards time rather than a particular visa: you need a qualifying period of 10 years spent lawfully in the UK, which can mix Student, Graduate, Skilled Worker, family and most other permissions, but not visitor, short-term study, Seasonal Worker or Ukraine scheme permission. Absences follow two regimes. Any absence that began before 11 April 2024 is checked against the old limits, 184 days in a single trip and 548 days in total; absences that began on or after that date must stay within 180 days in any rolling 12 months. If your current permission was granted on or after 11 April 2024 you must normally have held it for 12 months. Settlement then needs English (B1 now, B2 for applications from 26 March 2027) and the Life in the UK test. If you meet the time but not those two tests, you can apply for 24 months' permission instead, for £1,407. Dependants cannot be included and apply in their own right.
Which years count towards the ten
Appendix Long Residence (LR 11.1) accepts time with any permission except as a visitor, a short-term English language student, a Seasonal Worker or under the Ukraine schemes. Time exempt from immigration control counts, as does time as an EEA national exercising treaty rights before the end of 2020, and time as a British citizen unless citizenship was later taken away. That breadth is the route's attraction: a degree, a Graduate visa, a few years of sponsored work and a spell as a dependant can add up, where each route on its own would fall short.
What does not count is set out in LR 11.2: immigration bail, temporary admission or release, and any gap between permissions when you were overstaying, even a gap the rules later forgave. A gap does not only fail to count, it can break continuous residence altogether under CR 4.1. Removal from the UK breaks it too. If you have had a gap, take advice from a solicitor or an adviser registered with the Immigration Advice Authority before paying the fee.
Absences: the old limits and the new rule
Long residence is the one route where absences before 11 April 2024 keep their old treatment (CR 3.3). Take someone who arrived as a student on 21 November 2016:
| Scenario | Trips | What the calculator finds | Earliest application |
|---|---|---|---|
| Six months away in 2019, three in 2024 | 176 days, then 99 days | under both regimes | 24 October 2026 |
| The 2019 trip runs to 20 July | 195 days in one absence | over 184 days at a time | 22 June 2029 |
| Four long trips between 2017 and 2022 | 166 + 168 + 171 + 151 days | over 548 days in total | 2 September 2032 |
The first case shows why the transition matters: a 176-day trip would be close to the rolling limit today, but in 2019 it only had to stay under 184. In the second, nineteen extra days abroad push one trip past the single-absence limit and the ten years start again from the return in July 2019. In the third, no trip is long on its own, but the total passes 548. Where a trip started before 11 April 2024 and ended after it, the guidance says the rolling 12-month count only begins with the next absence. The tool restarts the period after a breach; the Home Office may instead accept a permitted reason under CR 3.4, such as serious illness or travel disruption.
The 12-month rule on your current permission
Since 11 April 2024, LR 11.3 asks that you have held permission on your current route for at least 12 months on the date of application. A switch to a new route shortly before the tenth anniversary can therefore delay the application, even when the ten years are complete. If your current permission was granted before 11 April 2024, the rule does not apply to you (LR 11.4). You must be in the UK when you apply, and you cannot add a partner or children: each needs their own route, often as the partner or child of a settled person once you have ILR.
When the tests are not ready: the 24-month permission
If you meet the time, the residence and suitability but not English or Life in the UK, the same appendix grants permission to stay for 24 months (LR 7.1) on an application costing £1,407, decided in about 8 weeks. It allows work and study but no public funds. That buys time to pass the tests; settlement itself costs £3,226. Note the date: from 26 March 2027 the English level for long residence rises from B1 to B2 (LR 13.1). The government's earned settlement consultation proposed folding long residence into a single adjustable system; that is a proposal, and the route stands in the rules in force on 13 October 2026. The absence calculator explains the rolling rule in detail.