Skip navigation
Select your language
» Articles » EUSS Changes to qualifying continuous residence period
02/07/2025
Immigration

EUSS - continuous residence changes

EU Settlement Scheme (EUSS): Changes to Continuous Qualifying Period Definition

The EU Settlement Scheme (EUSS) allows EU, EEA, and Swiss citizens living in the UK before 11 pm on December 31, 2020, and their families, to secure the immigration status they need to stay in the UK.

Current rules

If EUSS applicants:

  1. meet the requirements of the Immigration Rules, they get settled status (indefinite leave to remain/permission to stay) after five years of continuous UK residence; or
  2. don’t have 5 years’ continuous residence, they receive pre-settled status (five years’ limited leave to remain/permission to stay).

Under current rules, pre-settled status holders must maintain continuous UK residence to qualify for settled status. ‘Continuous residence’ means that they have not been absent from the UK for more than six months in total in any given 12-month period.

In January 2025, the Home Office started a process to automatically switch eligible pre-settled status holders to settled status, without the need to make a further EUSS application.

New rules from 16 July 2025

The Home Office have acknowledged that there has been some confusion about EUSS residence rules and that some pre-settled status holders had inadvertently broken their continuous residence by exceeding the permitted absences.

To rectify this, the Home Office have changed the Immigration Rules to enable pre-settled status holders to be granted settled status where they have been resident in the UK for at least 30 months in the most recent 60 month period. These absences can be taken at any time in the preceding 60 months, and must not exceed 30 months in total.

The changes will apply under both the automated process, and where people make applications for settled status. These changes were announced on 24 June 2025 and rules will formally change from 16 July 2025.

If you have previously been refused settled status on the basis of your continuous residence, and you meet the criteria above, then we encourage you to make another application, or to wait for the automated process.

You will find details of the required evidence to demonstrate UK residence here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/eu-settlement-scheme-evidence-of-uk-residence