Marriage in Italy: nulla osta and permit

Getting married in Italy in 2026: nulla osta from your consulate, apostille, pubblicazioni at the comune, the ceremony and the permesso through marriage.

Author: permesso.love editorial team- updated October 12, 2026- 18 min read- how we verify

In short

Getting married in Italy as a foreigner is entirely doable, but the procedure is heavily tied to paperwork: the main document is the nulla osta al matrimonio from your country's consulate, then the comune, pubblicazioni and, if one of the spouses is Italian, the questura with a residence permit for family reasons come into play. Below is the whole chain based on community experience: a wedding in Italy, a marriage abroad with a subsequent trascrizione, a marriage between two foreigners and the options without a stamp - convivenza and unione civile. If the spouse is still abroad, they come through family reunification in Italy. This is an overview of practice, not legal advice: rules and document lists change, verify the current state with your comune and on the official sites.

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In brief: community data

The main document is the nulla osta al matrimonio from your country's consulate; per the community, Russian consulate slots get snapped up 1-2 months ahead, while the document itself is issued in about two weeks - plan ahead.
Three routes: a wedding in Italy, a marriage abroad followed by a trascrizione (for "Italian + foreigner" couples often the calmer route per the community), and no stamp at all - convivenza di fatto or unione civile.
Marriage to an Italian citizen gives a permesso per motivi familiari directly through the questura, per the community usually for 5 years (sometimes 2 if family income is weak); fingerprint appointments run from 3 months to six months and longer, varying by questura.
The "freshness" trap: Italian civil-status certificates are valid for 6 months, and questure and comuni carry that logic over to Russian certificates even though they never expire in Russia - a fresh duplicate from the civil registry with a new apostille helps.
Citizenship per matrimonio: the community benchmark is about two years of living in Italy after the wedding (less with shared children), and a B1 Italian certificate is mandatory; verify the current rules on interno.gov.it.

What the law says about a foreigner marrying in Italy

Rules from the current texts on normattiva.it (checked 12.10.2026):

What	Rule	Norm
Key document	The foreigner gives the ufficiale dello stato civile a declaration from their own country's authority that under its laws nothing prevents the marriage (nulla osta)	art. 116 Codice civile
Visa and permesso	The requirement to show proof of lawful stay was struck down by the Constitutional Court (ruling 245/2011, GU 27.07.2011): a marriage cannot be refused for lack of a permesso alone	art. 116 Codice civile, ruling 245/2011
Pubblicazioni	A foreigner with residenza or domicilio in Italy goes through publication; the notice stays at the town hall door for at least 8 days	art. 116 Codice civile, art. 55 DPR 396/2000
Wedding date	Not before the 4th day after publication ends; if the marriage is not celebrated within 180 days, the publication counts as not made	art. 99 Codice civile
5-year card	The Carta di soggiorno di familiare di un cittadino dell'Unione is valid for 5 years; the decree applies to spouses of Italian citizens where more favourable, and only when the Italian has exercised the right of free movement in the EU	art. 10(4) and art. 23 D.Lgs. 30/2007
Citizenship by marriage	2 years of legal residence in Italy after the wedding, or 3 years from the marriage date if you live abroad; halved with children born to or adopted by the couple; at the time of the decree the marriage is not dissolved and there is no separazione	art. 5 L. 91/1992
Language	Italian at B1 or above (a school diploma or a certificate from a recognised body); people with serious limitations due to age, illness or disability, certified by the public health service, are exempt (Constitutional Court ruling 25/2025)	art. 9.1 L. 91/1992

When this matters and how to use it: if the comune says it will not register the marriage without a valid visa or permesso, cite ruling 245/2011 - it removed that requirement from art. 116. Two counters govern the dates: 8 days of publication, then at least 4 days before the ceremony and at most 180 days for it - set the wedding inside that window or the publication has to be repeated. Article 23 explains why some spouses of Italians get a 5-year card under D.Lgs. 30/2007 and others an ordinary family permesso: the decree covers families of Italians who have lived or worked in another EU country.

Sources: art. 116 Codice civile, art. 99, art. 55 DPR 396/2000, art. 10 and art. 23 D.Lgs. 30/2007, art. 5 and art. 9.1 L. 91/1992 - normattiva.it (checked 12.10.2026).

Three scenarios to start your choice from

A wedding in Italy. You will need a nulla osta, a trip to the comune, possibly pubblicazioni. Longer on paperwork, but you get an Italian marriage certificate right away - no need to legalize it for the local authorities.
Marriage abroad + trascrizione. You register in Russia, Georgia or another country, then the marriage is entered into the Italian registers through an Italian consulate. According to the community, for "Italian + foreign bride" couples this is often the calmest route.
No marriage. Registered cohabitation (convivenza di fatto) or a unione civile for same-sex couples - separate instruments with their own limitations, covered at the end.

If your goal is not the wedding itself but moving your family to join a residence permit holder, that is a different procedure - see the breakdown in family reunification: ricongiungimento, coesione and al seguito.

Documents for a marriage at the comune

The exact list depends on the comune and your marital history, so the first step is to ask for the list exactly where you will be registering. The core, based on community experience, is this:

international passport (and the Italian bride's/groom's document - carta d'identita);
nulla osta al matrimonio - a certificate from your country's consulate in Italy stating there are no impediments to the marriage;
birth certificate with an apostille and translation - not requested everywhere, but regularly;
documents on the termination of a previous marriage (a divorce certificate with an apostille and translation), if there was one;
sometimes - copies of the witnesses' documents.

How a Russian citizen gets the nulla osta

The scheme according to the community: you book online at the Russian consulate in Italy, choose the nulla osta service, come with your passport. If you were previously married, get a certificate of the marriage's termination from the Russian civil registry in advance (in the chats it is referred to by its form number). The finished document is handed over in about a couple of weeks. Two practical points:

appointment slots get snapped up months ahead - book as soon as you have settled on a wedding date;
based on participants' experience, apostilles and translations of Russian documents are not needed for the nulla osta itself - the consulate works with the originals directly.

One more paper often requested in parallel is a civil registry certificate stating you are not married, with an apostille: in Russia it takes from 5 business days plus shipping, and its validity is limited (Russian registries say 3 months, some countries want it fresher than 30 days).

We registered in a small town in Piedmont, and I was bracing for a mountain of paperwork. In reality the comune asked me only for my passport and the nulla osta - no translations, no apostilles at that stage. We came, signed up, and they set the ceremony date right away. But a friend in the neighboring comune also had to submit a birth certificate with a translation, so the list really is different for everyone.

community member, rephrasedpersonal opinion

Apostille, translation and the "freshness" trap

All Russian documents for Italy follow the chain: an apostille at the authority that issued the document (certificates - through the civil registry), then a translation by an accredited translator and certification at the Italian consulate, or a sworn translation (traduzione giurata) already in Italy. A detailed breakdown of the routes is in the article document legalization and apostille, and you can build the route for a specific document in the tool:

Legalization & sworn translationApostille / translation

A distinctly Italian surprise: local civil status certificates are valid for 6 months, and officials carry that logic over to foreign certificates. According to the community, questure and comuni periodically demand a "fresh" marriage or birth certificate, even though in Russia they have no expiry date. What worked in the chats: order a duplicate from the civil registry with a recent issue date and apostille that one, or write a declaration that the marriage has not been dissolved. Also note the nuance with consular marriages: if you registered at a Russian consulate abroad, an apostille cannot be placed on such a certificate - you will have to get a duplicate in Russia.

How the registration goes: application, pubblicazioni, ceremony

The order in broad strokes: the couple comes to the ufficio di stato civile of their comune, submits the documents and requests a date. If at least one of the future spouses is an Italian resident, the comune publishes the pubblicazioni di matrimonio - an official announcement of the upcoming marriage, which stays posted for the required period, and only after that is the ceremony scheduled. According to the community, in small comuni everything goes faster and more humanely than in big cities with queues of foreigners.

Ceremony options:

civil - in the comune's hall, performed by an official, the most common choice for couples with a foreigner;
Catholic church wedding (matrimonio concordatario) - has civil effect too, but based on community experience the wedding requires confirmation of the sacraments, including cresima (confirmation): without it the rite will not be performed, and people end up "catching up" at the parish.

After the ceremony the comune issues an Italian marriage certificate/extract - with it the foreign spouse moves on down the residence permit chain.

A separate topic is an expired visa against the backdrop of a scheduled wedding. Positions diverge even within one province: in some places the comune stalls the registration, in others the questura says outright that for a marriage to an Italian citizen it is not an obstacle. Still, a filed marriage application by itself does not legalize your stay - until the stamp you are not yet a family member of an EU citizen.

Our visa ran out a month before the scheduled date. The comune clerk dragged her feet on the paperwork and declared she would not register us with an expired visa, and sent us to the questura. There they replied that with a marriage to an Italian this is routine practice and there is no problem. In the end we were married without a hitch, but for the month before the wedding I tried not to show up near train stations and airports.

community member, rephrasedpersonal opinion

Marriage to an Italian citizen: what it gives you

Permesso per motivi familiari

The spouse of an Italian citizen applies for a residence permit for family reasons as a familiare di cittadino italiano. The key practical points according to the community:

application directly at the questura, without the postal kit: people book via Prenota Facile or come in person for an appuntamento. Some questure themselves tell couples not to fill in the kit but to bring the documents directly (how this differs from the postal route - see the kit and applying for the permesso);
the document set is compact: passport, the Italian marriage certificate or an extract from the comune, codice fiscale, the spouse's documents, photos; some questure ask for the spouse's income certificate and housing;
card duration - according to the community usually 5 years; there are questure that give 2 years when the family's income is weak, although participants, citing the portal portaleimmigrazione.it, insist that income requirements do not apply to the spouse of an Italian - practice is inconsistent;
residency (registration at an address) through marriage is arranged even before the permesso is ready, sometimes before the first visit to the questura - for how that works, see changing residenza;
on a 5-year family permesso, absences from Italy of up to 6 months a year are allowed (up to 12 - for valid reasons with documents); the rules for traveling with the ricevuta in hand are in the article traveling with the ricevuta.

Timelines, according to the community, swing from questura to questura: some got fingerprints scheduled 3 months after the wedding, for others the appointment via the postal channel flew 7-8 months out. Check your questura and its habits on the questure page.

We went to the questura literally the day after the ceremony, taking the paper from the comune. They gave us an invitation to come back with documents and photos in three months. The advice we got on the spot: do not send the kit by mail, come in person - the queue is shorter that way. But a friend in another city was suddenly missing the housing suitability certificate at her fingerprints appointment, even though her husband owns his apartment and is registered there - and everything slid by several months. The bureaucracy depends on which window you land at.

community member, rephrasedpersonal opinion

If the questura asks for proof of housing, the breakdown of the idoneita alloggiativa will come in handy. What happens to this permesso if the marriage is dissolved and how a divorce is recognized in the other country is in the article divorce in Italy.

Sham marriage checks

In some regions the police come to check that the spouses actually live together; on suspicion the permesso can be revoked. Consultants also tell of absurd nitpicks - up to suspicions about a years-long marriage because of different registration addresses back home. The remedy is one: the more documentary traces of your shared life, the easier it is.

Citizenship through marriage

Marriage to an Italian citizen opens a separate path to a passport - cittadinanza per matrimonio - with its own residence periods and a mandatory Italian language certificate of at least B1. The conditions, timelines and pitfalls are covered in the article citizenship through marriage; check the current requirements on interno.gov.it, and you can estimate your own dates in the calculator:

PR & citizenship timelineSteps to citizenship

Two foreigners marrying in Italy

Two foreigners can also get married in Italy - the scheme is the same: a nulla osta for each from their own consulate, the comune, the ceremony. What happens next depends on the other half's status:

if the spouse has an Italian residence permit or permanent residency, the second spouse after the wedding goes down the family permit route via coesione familiare - converting their status (a visa or another permesso) into the family motivo on the spot, without leaving;
if the spouse is only in the process of legalizing, the wedding by itself adds no status - count your visa deadlines.

The difference between coesione, the classic ricongiungimento and the al seguito visa is in the separate breakdown of the reunification procedures.

My husband is a foreigner with a permanent permesso; we got married in Italy, where I arrived on a tourist visa with my son. I prepared all the translations and the child's father's consent in advance, the marriage was done at the comune, and a CAF put together the permesso documents. At fingerprints the inspector was missing one housing certificate - the new date came several months later, and all that time we sat without cards and without healthcare. Build in a time buffer for surprises like these.

community member, rephrasedpersonal opinion

Marriage abroad and trascrizione in Italy

If marrying in Italy is inconvenient, couples marry abroad and then do a trascrizione - the entry of the act into the Italian civil status registers through the Italian consulate in the country of the marriage. Practice according to the community:

marriage in Russia to an Italian: the marriage certificate is forwarded to the comune where the Italian is registered via the consular channel; after the trascrizione the foreign spouse applies for a type D visa per motivi familiari - participants had it issued within days, and the permesso is then arranged in Italy. Visa requirements are on vistoperitalia.esteri.it, consular procedures on esteri.it;
marriage in Georgia and other third countries: faster on booking, but you add legalization of the Georgian documents and, if the surname changes, a cascade of passport replacements - weigh the benefit;
a bonus of marrying at home: you will not have to legalize the Italian certificate for your own country - the problem simply never arises.

For couples where one partner is Italian, it is often simpler to register in the bride's country and do the trascrizione through the consulate. Assembling the nulla osta and hunting for slots for the sake of a wedding in Italy often outweighs it in effort: the route "wedding at home - trascrizione - type D visa - permesso" usually costs fewer nerves in total than months of back-and-forth with the comune.

permesso.love editorseditors' note

Convivenza di fatto and unione civile: briefly

Italy also recognizes a non-marriage format of relationships:

convivenza di fatto - registered cohabitation of an opposite-sex or same-sex couple under the Cirinna law. It is arranged through the comune with a shared registered address; in practice, to register with an Italian citizen the foreigner must already hold some residence permit, although there is court practice in favor of registration without one. The rights are close to spousal, but not identical;
unione civile - a civil union for same-sex couples with effects close to marriage;
according to the community, there was a precedent where the Italian consulate in Moscow issued reunification visas to children on the basis of a registered convivenza di fatto - but that was the result of a lawyer's work with references to the rules, not guaranteed practice.

If the relationship is not registered in any form, for migration purposes it does not exist: a "civil marriage" in the everyday sense gives neither a visa nor a permesso.

Timelines and costs according to the community

All figures below are benchmarks from the chats, verify the current state:

booking at the Russian consulate for the nulla osta - slots 1-2 months out and beyond, issuance in about 2 weeks;
the civil registry certificate of no marriage plus an apostille in Russia - from 5 business days plus shipping time;
legalization of a translation at the Italian consulate - from half an hour to 1-2 weeks in season, paid in cash; a consular copy of a document costs a small surcharge (around 10 euros according to the community), but the original certificate stays free for other uses;
fingerprints at the questura after a wedding to an Italian - from 3 months to half a year and more, depending on the city;
the notarial separate property regime (separazione dei beni) - from 600 euros;
wedding costs are a universe of their own: salon dresses start at several thousand euros, which is why some brides bring their outfit from home.

The closing thought: the marriage itself is the easiest part of the route. Most of the time goes to the documents before (nulla osta, apostilles, translations) and the bureaucracy after (questura, residency, the card). Plan the whole chain, before and after the ceremony date, and keep your comune's and questura's current requirements at hand - this is not legal advice, but a map assembled by the community.

Divorce in Italy for an immigrant - separazione and divorzio, recognition of a Russian divorce and what happens to the permesso.
Ricongiungimento or coesione - family reunification with a residence-permit holder: the three routes.
Idoneita alloggiativa - the housing suitability certificate, if the questura asks for it.
Citizenship through marriage - conditions and timelines of cittadinanza per matrimonio.
Document legalization - apostille and sworn translation of certificates.
Changing residenza - registration at the spouse's address.

Official sources

interno.gov.it - the Italian Ministry of the Interior: family grounds and citizenship per matrimonio.
portaleimmigrazione.it - the permesso for a family member of an Italian citizen.
questure.poliziadistato.it - questure and booking via Prenota Facile.
esteri.it - consular procedures, trascrizione of a marriage, D visas for spouses.
vistoperitalia.esteri.it - requirements for the visa per motivi familiari.
normattiva.it - art. 116 and 99 Codice civile, art. 5 and 9.1 L. 91/1992: nulla osta, publication, citizenship-by-marriage periods (checked 12.10.2026).

Frequently asked questions

What documents does a foreigner need to get married in Italy?

The basic set: an international passport, a nulla osta al matrimonio from your country's consulate in Italy and, on request from some comuni, a birth certificate with an apostille and translation. If you were previously married - divorce documents. The exact list differs from comune to comune, so the first thing to do is confirm it with the very comune where you plan to register. This is not legal advice.

What is a nulla osta al matrimonio and where do you get it?

It is a certificate stating that under the laws of your country there are no impediments to the marriage: you are not in another marriage and are free to marry. Russian citizens obtain it at the Russian consulate in Italy via online booking; if there was a previous marriage, they get a civil registry certificate of its termination in advance. According to the community, consulate appointment slots get snapped up months ahead, while the document itself is issued in about a couple of weeks - plan ahead.

What does marriage to an Italian citizen give you?

The right to a permesso di soggiorno per motivi familiari: according to the community, spouses of Italians get it directly through the questura, without the postal kit, and usually for 5 years. Plus a faster route to citizenship per matrimonio: the community benchmark is about 2 years of living in Italy after the wedding, less with shared children. Check the current conditions on interno.gov.it - this is not legal advice.

Can you get married in Italy on a tourist visa?

Yes, the marriage itself on a tourist visa or Schengen is possible - comuni register marriages regardless of visa type. But a filed marriage application does not protect you from the consequences of an overstayed visa: the bride is legally not yet a family member of an EU citizen. According to the community, it is safer to time things so that the wedding and the residence permit application happen before your legal stay runs out.

Do you have to marry specifically in Italy to get a residence permit through marriage?

No. Many couples register the marriage in Russia or Georgia and then do a trascrizione - the entry of the marriage into the Italian registers through an Italian consulate. After the trascrizione, the foreign spouse applies for a type D visa per motivi familiari and then applies for the permesso once in Italy. According to the community, this route is often easier than assembling a nulla osta for a wedding in Italy.

Why does Italy ask for a fresh marriage certificate if it has no expiry date?

In Italy, civil status certificates are issued anew and are valid for a limited time, so officials are used to demanding documents no older than 6 months. According to the community, questure sometimes reject old certificates: a fresh duplicate from the civil registry with a new apostille, or a written declaration that the marriage has not been dissolved, helps. Requirements vary by questura - check locally.

Related materials - Family reunification

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