Ireland Start-up Visa

The threshold is EUR 50,000 in secured funding, and the guidelines state plainly that meeting it guarantees nothing: the Evaluation Committee must also be satisfied that the proposal is genuinely innovative and has significant export potential.

Where a proposal has more than one principal, family members aside, the amount to be demonstrated runs per principal:

Four sources are accepted and may be combined: the applicant's own resources, a business loan, business angel or venture capital funding, and a grant from an Irish State Agency.

The difficulty lies not in the figure but in the standard of proof.

For own resources, the applicant files a letter from a financial institution regulated by the Central Bank of Ireland showing the amount available in the applicant's name.

Where the money sits outside Ireland, the file instead needs personal bank statements covering the three full consecutive months before the date of application, the most recent no more than one calendar month old at that date.

They must be originals rather than copies, on the bank's official stationery, each showing the full amount available.

A bank letter used in place of statements must confirm four things:

The applicant's name and that the money is available in that name; that the bank is regulated by its home regulator; the period covered, which must include both the day the letter was produced and the three full consecutive months immediately before it; and a credit balance sufficient throughout that period.

Where the letter cannot confirm a sufficient balance for the whole period, further evidence of the source of the money is required.

For a business loan or angel and venture capital funding, a letter from each provider must confirm two things: the amount of funds committed to the enterprise project, and that the applicant may use those funds for that project.

One separate condition is easily missed because it is not about quantum at all: all of the funding must be capable of being transferred to Ireland and convertible to euro.

The authority notes that many jurisdictions control the transfer of currency, so transferability must be proved separately by an original letter on official letterhead.

The letter must state the name of the beneficial owner of the funds, the date of the letter, the amount to be transferred, and that the money can be transferred to Ireland if the application succeeds. It must also state that the institution will confirm the content of the letter to the immigration service on request.

Last comes the yardstick the money must support. A high potential start-up, on the programme's own definition, is a venture introducing a new or innovative product or service to international markets, engaged in manufacturing or internationally traded services.

It must be capable of creating 10 jobs in Ireland and realising EUR 1 million in sales within three years of starting up. It must also be led by an experienced management team, headquartered and controlled in Ireland, and less than five years old from the date of registration as per Article 22 of GBER. That is the 2023 Guidelines definition; the current Enterprise Ireland definition adds three points: the product or service must carry some form of protectable IP, the EUR 1 million is annual sales, and the management team must be residing in Ireland.

Yet no initial job creation targets are set, the authority recognising that such businesses take time to get off the ground. The other direction is categorical: retail, personal services, catering, hospitality and small or medium enterprises oriented towards the domestic market fall outside the programme.

The outcome is not a card but a letter granting permission to reside in the State, decided by the Minister for Justice on the recommendation of an independent evaluation committee of senior public and civil servants; the first permission runs for two years.

The part most worth reading is the five conditions attached to that permission, because they bind for as long as it is held rather than being tested once: the business must be established as set out in the application.

The holder must work on that business full time; the holder is not permitted to be employed in any other capacity. The holder must not become a financial burden on the Irish State; and the holder must not be convicted of a criminal offence in any jurisdiction.

Where these are not met, residency status under the programme may be withdrawn. Two further points close off routes readers often assume exist. The decision is final: a refused application is not subject to review or appeal, and the applicant is informed in writing with the reasons. The two official texts differ on who takes the final decision: the programme page says the decision of the Minister is final, while the September 2023 Guidelines say the decision of the Evaluation Committee is final and that the Committee will decide and inform the Minister.

The Guidelines add that a refusal does not prevent the person from making a new application at a later date. No waiting period is stated, and a new application carries the EUR 350 fee like any other, since the fee already paid is non-refundable.

And lobbying or canvassing disqualifies both the applicant and the associated project. One nationality restriction currently in force should be known before anything else is planned: the Minister for Justice has instructed that no further applications from Russian or Belarusian citizens will be accepted.

Applications may be filed electronically at any time, but proposals are considered by an independent evaluation committee on a quarterly basis — so the real wait depends on where in the quarter the file lands, not on any published processing target.

The authority publishes no processing time: the 13-page programme guidelines of September 2023 set no timeframe for a decision, and neither does the official page.

One clock the applicant controls: the application is not processed until the EUR 350 fee has been paid in full, and the authority states that underpayment will delay it.

Once a proposal is approved, residence permission issues only after the required funding has been moved to a Central Bank of Ireland-regulated financial institution and the applicant, and their spouse or partner where relevant, have filed the required affidavit as to character

The guidelines set no minimum number of days of residence. What they set instead is a chain of conditions that must be kept up.

The first permission runs for two years and it is permission to reside and to work; a visa required national is additionally granted a multiple entry visa for the same two years to facilitate business related travel.

Throughout that period the beneficiary must hold private medical insurance and must not have recourse to public funds.

The condition for issuing the permission is stated twice in two different formulations, and the two bind different things.

The procedural section says the required funding must be transferred to a financial institution regulated by the Central Bank of Ireland, while the residency section says it must be transferred to a business bank account in Ireland. One speaks to the regulator, the other to the type of account, so the arrangement must satisfy both.

Renewal turns on four conditions: the start-up remaining in place for the designated period; an assessment by the Evaluation Committee that the investment is successful or viable; the candidate maintaining good character; and the candidate maintaining private medical insurance and not having recourse to publicly funded welfare programmes.

A renewal grants three further years, after which permission may be renewed in five-year instalments. The stamp type is not consistent across official sources: the immigration stamps page and the Long Term Residency page give Stamp 4, while the March 2023 STEP application form says successful applicants receive Stamp 1; on the stamps page, both are reckonable as residence for naturalisation.

The Guidelines state that after five years of residence the participant becomes eligible for long term residence in the State, but that sentence does not match the Long Term Residency page of the immigration service. The Long Term Residency scheme is open only to those legally resident for at least five years (60 months) as holders of an employment permit issued by the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment, and the page lists the Start-Up Entrepreneur Programme Stamp 4 among the stamps that do not qualify.

For a holder of this permission, the step after five years is therefore continued renewal in five-year instalments or naturalisation, and the document states that the programme confers no preferential access to citizenship:

Anyone seeking naturalisation applies in the normal manner under the Irish Nationality and Citizenship Acts 1957-2004.

Three circumstances end the status, and they reach the family members too: the status having been acquired fraudulently; the holder becoming the subject of a deportation order; the holder being convicted of a serious criminal offence.

A fourth case is not discipline but commercial risk, and the authority states it bluntly. Start-up ventures have a high rate of failure, so if the venture fails the participant's immigration status will be reviewed and they will need to apply to remain in Ireland on some other basis.

That could be a further application under the entrepreneur programme, an employment permit, or a green card, subject to whatever immigration rules are in place at the time.

Residence under this route is therefore tied to the life of the business rather than to years already spent.

Good character carries its own documentary standard. It requires a statement of character from the police authorities of every country in which the applicant has resided for more than six months during the 10 year period before applying.

Applicants able to supply screening reports from reputable international risk management companies are invited to do so.

The family scope is spouse or partner and children under 18 for whom the principal applicant, or their spouse or partner, holds legal guardianship.

The status granted to them is on similar terms to the principal applicant's, and once granted it applies automatically for as long as the principal fulfils the criteria of the programme.

That cuts both ways, and the second way is rarely stated: the three grounds that withdraw the principal's status withdraw the family members' status with it.

The standard of proof differs by category, and this is where an application sound on its merits often catches. Spouses: evidence that the marriage or civil partnership is legal.

Unmarried partners: evidence of cohabitation in a common law or de facto relationship for the previous two years — the heaviest condition in this cell, and the document provides for no exception.

Children: they must be legally in the custody or guardianship of the applicant, must be unmarried and not in a de facto or common law relationship; for each child the applicant must supply a birth certificate detailing parentage, or legal documentation verifying custody or guardianship.

On the sworn affidavit, three details decide whether it is accepted:

Every family member aged 16 or over must submit one; it must be produced by a legal practitioner registered to practise law in Ireland, so it cannot be sworn at home and carried over; and the immigration service will assist with a visa where one is needed to do exactly that.

The sanction is drafted in the widest terms the document uses anywhere: a false declaration invalidates any permission granted under the programme.

The status this programme grants, whether a visa or a residence permit, does not replace the holder's passport. The holder still travels on the passport of their own country, so the figure below belongs to the Ireland passport and becomes the holder's only once they are issued a Ireland passport.

According to the Passport Index of Prosperous Intelligence, on data dated 30 September 2026, the Ireland passport reaches 201 destinations without applying for a consular visa in advance. The figure combines three forms of entry and does not count an e-Visa that must be obtained beforehand:

It is therefore a measure of how easily the holder travels, not a count of visa-free countries in the narrow sense.

For comparison, on the same source and the same method of counting, the Vietnamese passport reaches 44 destinations. The two lists of destinations do not nest inside one another, so the difference is an indication rather than a list of places newly opened.

Prosperous Intelligence dates its data and advises checking with the destination’s official authorities before travelling.

The guidelines state plainly, in a boxed note, that the programme contains no special provisions regarding taxation and that such matters are governed by the existing tax laws and treaties.

Yet the same document devotes a section to the tax regime it wants the reader to look at, and the seven features it lists are all features of corporate tax rather than of the permission holder's own tax: a corporate tax rate of 12.5% for active business.

A 25% research and development tax credit which may be refundable over a three year period. An intellectual property regime giving a tax write-off for broadly defined IP acquisitions.

A holding company regime including participation exemption from capital gains tax on the disposal of shares in subsidiaries. An effective zero tax rate for foreign dividends, namely 12.5% on qualifying foreign dividends with flexible onshore pooling of foreign tax credits.

An EU-approved stable tax regime with access to an extensive treaty network and EU Directives; and generous domestic law withholding tax exemptions.

The limit of scope must be stated so that nothing absent is added in: the document does not mention income tax, names no rate of personal income tax, sets out no test for tax residence, and says nothing about how income arising outside Ireland is taxed.

One point about the age of the document itself: this September 2023 edition still cites rankings from Doing Business 2010, the 2009 Global Innovation Survey, the 2008-2012 business environment ranking and Forbes 2011, so its tax section is the programme's own prospectus rather than a current tax opinion.

Anyone computing actual liability must consult the tax laws and treaties in force, exactly as that boxed note directs.

The EUR 350 application fee is the only charge this page publishes, and it covers the principal applicant together with all nominated family members — but the four conditions attached to it are what most often spoils an application that is sound on its merits. First, the fee is non-refundable whatever the outcome.

Second, the application will not be processed until the fee has been paid in full.

Third, all transfer fees and currency exchange fees fall on the applicant, and the authority states plainly that the full EUR 350 must be lodged to the Department’s account — an underpayment delays the file, so the transfer must be instructed with the bank charges allowed for.

Fourth, payment is by electronic transfer only, and the reference field must contain exactly two pieces of information, the word step and the passport number, and nothing else.

The authority also states that incomplete applications will be returned, meaning a documentary omission consumes the fee already paid.

The programme page does not mention a residence registration fee, but the registration page of the immigration service does: a person granted permission to reside under the Start-up Entrepreneur Programme by letter from the Minister must register that permission, and the registration fee is EUR 300 per person, where applicable.