Russian international passport at the consulate in Lisbon: queue, documents, timescales and fees
In Portugal, Russian international passports are issued in one place only — the consular section of the Russian Embassy in Lisbon — and the longest part of the process is not making the passport but waiting for a slot to apply: people talk about six months and about being number four hundred and something on the waiting list. So you need to start not when your passport is about to expire, but a year to eighteen months in advance. Everything else is collected here: which passport to choose — the ten-year biometric one or the old-style five-year one, when you can get a second passport alongside your current one, how the online queue works and what gets you thrown out of it, what to fill in and what to bring for an adult and for a child, how the section photographs babies, how much the fee is and how you pay it, how long the passport takes and how to tell it is ready, who can collect it, and what to do if your international passport has already expired or been lost. The procedure, timescales and amounts come from the consular section’s own pages and from the fee schedule approved by embassy order of 26 December 2024; everything else comes from conversations with people who have been through it.
Where to go and what is actually done there
Russian international passports in Portugal are issued by the consular section of the Russian Embassy — Av. das Descobertas, 4, in the Restelo district of Lisbon. Telephone +351 213-011-606, email consul@embrussia.ru. The section’s general opening days are Monday to Friday from 9:00 to 13:00, but passports have their own arrangements: applications are accepted on Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays and by appointment only, and finished passports are handed out on the same four days on a walk-in basis.
The embassy and the consular section are at different addresses, and people mix them up on the very day of their appointment. You need the section on Av. das Descobertas. To get there, take bus 723, 751 or 149 — towards São Francisco Xavier hospital — or the Cascais line train to Algés station, then walk up Av. Dom Vasco da Gama.
What is not done here: the consulate does not replace or issue Russian internal passports — only the Interior Ministry offices in Russia issue them. You are required to have an internal passport if you are registered at an address in Russia; if you are not registered, the passport is not compulsory, but you can get one on any trip back.
And one more thing many people do not know: you can apply for an international passport at any Russian consulate in the world, not necessarily in the country where you live. When the Lisbon queue gets really long, people fly to Madrid, Milan, Bonn or Brussels — and that is perfectly legal. You will have to collect the finished passport where you applied.
“Internal passports are only done in Russia, for the international one you have to join the (online) queue at the consulate, you’ll be able to book in about six months”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkchatporto04.08.2026
“They accept you at any consulate. I did my daughter’s passport in Bonn. There was no queue there at all.”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkru_Portugal_pt04.08.2026
Which passport to choose: ten years or five
The section issues two kinds of passport, and you choose which one.
The new-generation passport — biometric, valid for 10 years. You do not bring photos: a member of staff takes your picture when you apply. Fingerprints are taken from the age of 12. The passport itself is printed in Russia, so it takes longer.
The old-style passport — non-biometric, valid for 5 years. You bring your own photos, and no fingerprints are taken. It is printed on the spot, and in conversations it comes out noticeably faster — sometimes within a few days.
The section itself advises adults to get the biometric one: it has more security features and meets current international requirements. To that it is worth adding what people say more often in the chats: some EU countries have stopped accepting old-style Russian passports, and with a five-year passport you risk being refused not in Portugal but at a border or at another country’s visa centre. The five-year passport makes sense when you need it urgently or when it is for a small child — there is a separate step on children below.
There is no need to rush the choice: you can apply as far in advance as you like, and the law sets no penalty for applying late. The section only asks you not to let it get to the point where both passports — the international and the internal — have expired at once.
“FYI A fair number of EU countries no longer accept non-biometric Russian passports. As for how long the biometric international passport takes at the consulate after you apply: 4 and 5 months, but for some it may be quicker — in these cases they weren’t in a hurry.”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkchatlisboa02.07.2025
“The 10-year international one takes 2-3 months, but they don’t do it for babies”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkberemennost_portugal06.08.2026
A second passport alongside your current one
A Russian citizen is entitled to hold two valid international passports at the same time, and the second one is issued without cancelling the first. This is the only case in which a new passport is issued without the previous one being declared invalid.
Two conditions cause the confusion:
— a second passport can only be biometric, valid for ten years; a five-year passport cannot be a second one; — it is issued with exactly the same details as the first, including the Latin spelling of your first name and surname.
The application process is the usual one: the same queue, the same form, the same fee. What puts people off is something else — the form and the conversation with staff use the word ‘replacement’ everywhere, and there is no separate ‘second passport’ service in the booking system. You book an ordinary passport application appointment and tell them when you apply that the passport is a second one and the first must not be cancelled.
Why this is useful in practice: one passport sits at a visa centre or another country’s consulate while the second stays with you — you can fly on it and use it to prove your identity. And one more argument people repeat in the chats more than any other: a second passport is a way of getting round the queue in time. You get it years before the first one expires, so by the time you need a replacement you already have a valid document.
“You can have two valid international passports at the same time. Two 10-year ones. Or a 5-year one plus a 10-year one”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkleft4portugal20.08.2026
“None. I just got myself a second international passport. You can have two passports. It even says on the consulate website that you can get a second international passport regardless of how long the first is valid for. My son and husband got their second international ones here too, my son’s old one was still valid for more than 3 years at the time.”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkpequenos_PT20.02.2025
The online queue: people book six months ahead
Booking is only possible through the Russian Foreign Ministry’s system — lisboa.kdmid.ru. You create an application, get a number on the waiting list and check for yourself whether your turn has come.
How long you wait. In conversations from 2025–2026, it takes anywhere from six weeks to six months from application to appointment; people have mentioned being number 460 and 657 on the list, with the queue moving 8–15 places a day. The opposite also happens: the section suddenly opens lots of slots a month ahead. The conclusion is simple and unpleasant: start not a month before your passport expires, but a year before.
The section has set out separate booking rules, and if you break them your application is deleted without warning:
— the application gives the details of the person who will come to the appointment; each family member books separately; — for a passport for a child under 18, you book in the parent’s name, not the child’s; — if one person has two applications for the same service, both are deleted, with no way of restoring them; — 5 days before the appointment you receive an email with a link; you must confirm the appointment via that link no later than 2 days before, or the application will be cancelled (if you booked less than 5 days ahead, you do not need to confirm); — the application must be checked at least once every 30 days — otherwise it is deleted automatically — but no more than 24 times a day: doing so gets you blocked with no way of being unblocked; — applications made by bots are deleted.
There is a separate trap with email: Gmail blocks the @kdmid.ru mail domain, and the booking system’s emails never reach it. The section explicitly advises booking with an email address in the .ru domain. If your appointment confirmation email has not arrived, this is usually why, not because you have been forgotten.
“the Consular Section of the Russian Embassy in Lisbon has opened loads of slots for September for replacing/getting an international passport, whoever needs one, get in quick) I was 460+ in the queue for two months and it didn’t move. If anyone needs reminding, I can send instructions on how to change it.”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkchatlisboa20.08.2026
“Queue for an international passport at the Russian embassy I’ve been booked for a new international passport at the Russian embassy for three months already, and I checked every day as you’re supposed to. And the queue moved 8-15 places every weekday. But for the last few days it’s not moved at all on either application. Thanks!”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkru_Portugal_pt04.10.2024
The application form: fill it in at home, print it with the barcode
The form is prepared in advance on the Russian Foreign Ministry’s websites: for a biometric passport — zp.midpass.ru, for an old-style passport — passportzu.kdmid.ru (form 2P). At the consulate nobody fills it in for you, and they hardly ever correct it, and a mistake in the form is grounds for refusing your documents.
How you print it matters too:
— the biometric passport application — 1 copy, on a single sheet, printed on both sides, plus a separate sheet with the barcode, printed together with the application; staff scan this barcode when you apply; — the five-year passport application — form 2P: 2 copies for an adult, 1 for a child under 14, 2 from the age of 14; each copy on a single sheet, printed on both sides; — if your surname, first name or patronymic has been changed two or more times, you need a separate annex to the application with the old and new details.
The form asks for your address twice. Place of residence is the one on your Russian registration; actual place of residence is your Portuguese address. If you have no registration in Russia at all, you just give your actual address, and not being registered does not in itself stop you applying.
“1) Russian passport 2) copy of the Russian passport — first page + registration, both pages need to be on one sheet 3) current international passport 4) copy of the first page of the international passport 5) application form (you can download it on the consulate website or fill it in in the Biopassport app) Print the form itself on 1 sheet double-sided, and on a separate sheet — the page with the qr codes”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkru_Portugal_pt21.08.2023
“After filling in the application I managed to book an appointment 1.5 months later (I checked every other day, a slot came up when I checked in the morning). From handing in the documents at the Russian consulate, the finished passport takes 3 months. You must bring a copy of your international passport (birth certificate, if it’s for a child), the internal passport is advisable but not compulsory. When you hand in the documents, the consulate staff scan the QR code you get when you fill in the form online — make sure you keep it (we forgot, and spent ages sorting it out afterwards).”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkleft4portugal06.12.2023
How your name will be spelt in Latin letters and how to fix it
The form transliterates your first name and surname itself, according to Foreign Ministry rules, and the result often differs from what is written in your Portuguese papers: by default, Irina Gonçalves Ferreira as written in Cyrillic will become Irina Gonsalvesh Ferreyra rather than Irina Goncalves Ferreira.
This is how you fix it. The form itself has a tick box, ‘change the spelling of first name/surname’ — you tick it and enter your own version. The section then asks for a reasoned application addressed to the head of the consular section, together with originals and copies of documents that show the spelling you want: a marriage certificate, a child’s Portuguese birth certificate, a previous passport. Without such an application, the transliteration will be automatic.
Why it is worth the trouble. Everyone here knows you by the Latin spelling of your name: AIMA, the tax office, your bank, your insurer, your school. If your residence card says Goncalves and your new passport says Gonsalvesh, you are two different people to any office, and from then on you will have to prove otherwise with certificates. For children, the simplest thing is to ask for the spelling to be exactly as on the Portuguese birth certificate.
The spelling of the name in Russian is a separate story, if the child was born here and is Filipe or Chloe on the certificate. The Cyrillic version is taken from the notarised translation of the certificate, and that is what staff will put in the passport — which means you need to agree the spelling with the translator before you go to the consulate. The section itself has a list of consular translators.
“I’ve seen questions in this chat about how a child’s name is spelt in a Russian international passport. Here’s how it worked for us. When you fill in the international passport application on the consulate website, once you enter the full name in Russian, the transliteration lines fill in automatically. If the suggested spelling isn’t what you want, you just need to tick the box ‘change the spelling of first name/surname’. Then you enter your own version. Then, once the whole passport application is ready, you need to download it and print it.”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkberemennost_portugal22.02.2024
“This year we got a new international passport for our youngest at the Russian embassy in Lisbon, when we handed in the documents they asked us to write the English transliteration Santos, like on the Portuguese BI, and not Santush. They did it”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkberemennost_portugal15.09.2026
What an adult needs to bring on the day of application
The section’s list for an adult applying for a biometric passport:
— international passport — original and a copy of the photo page; — Russian internal passport (if you have one) — original and a copy of the photo page, plus a copy of the page with the residence registration stamp; — application form, one copy, and the separate sheet with the barcode; — annex to the application, if your first name or surname has been changed two or more times.
For a five-year passport, add 4 identical colour photos, 3.5 × 4.5 cm to the same list, and hand in the application in two copies.
Three rules that get people turned away:
Documents are accepted all at once or not at all. If one copy is missing or there is a mistake in the form, the appointment ends there, and your next booking will be several months away.
Originals are compulsory. The section specifically warns that for passport appointments you must come with the originals and copies of valid documents proving your identity and citizenship.
Foreign documents need an apostille and a translation. Any paper issued by another country’s authorities (a Portuguese birth certificate, a marriage certificate) must be apostilled and translated into Russian with notarial certification; if a foreign notary certified it, their certification must also be apostilled and translated.
How long the appointment itself takes: in people’s accounts, about an hour including the wait, the photo and the fingerprints.
“A short report on the international passport (biometric). I waited exactly six months for an appointment to apply. Applied today. I had the form from the consulate website filled in beforehand, copies of the main pages of my current international and internal passports, a copy of the registration page. The originals of both passports. The queue + the application (plus photo and fingerprints) took just over an hour. The consulate staff are very friendly and upbeat. Payment €87.04, cards only! The official wait is 3 months, but they said it might be quicker (but no less than two).”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkleft4portugal14.08.2025
For a child: citizenship first, then the passport
A child born in Portugal cannot get a Russian passport until their citizenship has been registered: first the section stamps the birth certificate to confirm citizenship (by then the certificate must be apostilled and translated), and only then accepts the passport application. These are two separate appointments, but they are often done on the same day: people email the section in advance asking for the child’s passport to be done at the same time, and hand everything in on one visit.
The application is made by a legal representative — a parent, adoptive parent or guardian — with the child present, at any age, even a baby. What to bring:
— the representative’s valid international passport — original and copy; the section stresses that this is compulsory; — the representative’s internal passport, if they have one, with copies of the photo page and the registration page; — a document proving the legal representative’s rights — usually the birth certificate naming the applicant as a parent, original and copy; — the child’s birth certificate with the citizenship stamp, original and copy; — the child’s international passport, if they have had one — original and copy; — from the age of 14, the child’s internal passport; — the application form and the barcode sheet.
Fingerprints are taken from the age of 12; not from younger children.
A separate point on adding a child to a parent’s passport. A child can be added only to a non-biometric passport and only until the age of 13 years and 6 months, and such an entry serves as the child’s travel document only until 14. After that, the child must have their own passport. And most importantly: not all countries and not all airlines recognise the entry — the section names Iberia, which requires a child to have their own passport. Having their own passport does not stop a child also being entered in a parent’s.
“Citizenship and the passport are 2 separate processes. You need to book on the consulate website to get citizenship. Citizenship — they put a stamp granting citizenship on the birth certificate. After that you apply for the passport. For children they let you hand in the passport documents together with getting citizenship, without a separate booking. If there are no problems with the passport blanks, it’s all fairly quick.”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkberemennost_portugal03.09.2026
“In May I booked a citizenship appointment within a few days, wrote to the consulate email asking them to do my child’s passport at the same time and we handed everything in on the same day.”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkpequenos_PT10.10.2025
Photos: who is photographed at the section and who brings their own
The rule is simple: for a biometric passport you do not hand in photos — staff take your picture when you apply; for a five-year passport you bring your own printed photos.
How many printed photos you need for a five-year passport: for an adult, 4 identical colour photos, 3.5 × 4.5 cm; for a child, 4 of the child and another 2 of the legal representative. The section has set out separate requirements for the photo: the face, seen from the front, takes up 70–80% of the frame, the background is white with no shadows or other objects, the eyes are open and not covered by hair, the mouth is closed, and tinted glasses and uniforms are not allowed; headwear only for religious reasons and only if the oval of the face can be seen. There is one more subtlety for the old-style passport: the bottom right-hand corner of the photo must be left clear — that is where the passport’s hologram will go.
And this is the reason this page exists at all. The biometric photo is taken sitting down, and the child has to sit still and straight for a few seconds, holding their head up: there must be no other people or objects in the frame. If this is not possible, the section tells you to get an old-style passport, and for children under 5 it explicitly recommends the five-year one with studio photos — its own equipment cannot produce a photo of the required quality.
This is where parents hit a fork in the road: a second passport can only be biometric, which means that with a small child you have to choose between a second passport with the consulate’s own photo and a five-year one, which is issued as a replacement for the previous one. We covered this case separately for a reader — A second international passport for a son at the consulate in Lisbon.
“For the 5-year one you need to bring your own photos (which is what we did, we even printed them at home), and for the 10-year one they photograph you at the consulate. And a child won’t look at the camera properly”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkberemennost_portugal26.10.2025
“At the consulate they strongly recommend doing the five-year one. They print it quickly.”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkberemennost_portugal28.05.2025
How much it costs and how you pay
The fee is taken at the section’s cash desk on the day you apply, and only by bank card or by bank transfer to the details given at the cash desk: cash is not accepted at all.
The fee schedule was approved by embassy order of 26 December 2024. The amounts in it are in dollars, with euros alongside at a fixed rate of $1 = €0.95795:
— biometric passport for an adult — $90, €86; — old-style passport for an adult — $35, €34; — biometric passport for a child under 14 — $50, €48; — old-style passport for a child under 14 — $15, €14; — amending a passport that has already been issued — $10, €10.
From 14, a child pays the adult rate. The amount quoted at the cash desk may differ from the calculated one by a euro or so — people’s accounts mention both €86 and €87.04.
One more item of expense people forget: the apostille and notarised translation of Portuguese documents, if you need them, cost extra money and extra time, and you do not pay for them at the consulate.
“Russian passport, and copies of them — the photo pages and registration, if you have it, the form on the consulate website. The fee is 86 euros. This is about doing it at the consulate in Lisbon”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkru_Portugal_pt24.01.2025
How long the passport takes and how to tell it is ready
Under the rules, processing may not take longer than three months — for both the biometric and the five-year passport. In practice it varies a lot: the five-year passport is printed in Lisbon and sometimes handed out within a matter of days, while the biometric one is brought from Russia and in people’s accounts takes two to four months.
Whether a biometric passport is ready is checked on info.midpass.ru using the registration number from the receipt you get when you apply. The country and city in the form have to be selected manually — Moscow is set by default. The section treats as ready the statuses ‘Passport ready for collection’ or ‘Processing of the application completed’, and a completion level of 90% or more.
Whether a five-year passport is ready is shown on the section’s own home page, under the ‘Document readiness’ button, and is checked using the number of the receipt for the fee.
And now something the website does not say, but which comes up in conversations year after year: the status on the website gets stuck. People describe how the completion level sat at 80 for months while the passport had been at the section all along. So the rule is simple: if more than two months have passed or the status has not changed for a long time, call the section or email it, giving your application number. Quite often the status changes the same day after a call.
“I waited 4 months after handing in my documents for the finished passport, and for nothing. Three weeks later the website showed 80% ready. After 4 months I rang the consulate just in case, and they told me my finished passport had been sitting there for three months waiting for me. The status on the website just hadn’t changed for technical reasons. So wait for the 80% status and then write to or ring the consulate straight away. Good luck.”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkRussosEmPortugal30.09.2025
“Last year in February we created the applications Went to the consulate at the beginning of September Collected the passports in December”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkru_Portugal_pt27.02.2026
How a finished passport is collected
You do not book to collect it — you come and queue on a walk-in basis, and the booking system has no such service at all. The days are the same: Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. The section’s notices are inconsistent about the times: the opening hours page says 9:15 to 12:45, the collection page says 9:15 to 11:30, and a notice on the ‘Russian passport’ page from 15 May limits walk-in collection to 9:30 to 11:30 and no more than 30 people a day. Until this discrepancy is resolved, it is wiser to go by the narrowest window and arrive at opening time.
The passport is handed only to the person it was issued to: not to relatives or friends. For a child under 18, the passport is collected by the legal representative who made the application (it will not be given to the other parent); the child must come in person between 14 and 18, and under 14 does not have to.
What to bring:
— your previous international passport; — your Russian internal passport (for a child under 14 — the original birth certificate); — your own international passport, if the passport was issued for a child or for a person lacking legal capacity; — the receipt you got when you applied — that same sheet with the barcode and the application number; — the receipt for the fee.
And two deadlines that are easy to forget. A finished passport that is not collected within a year of issue is destroyed. And if you do not have a valid internal passport when you collect it, you will still be given the passport, but with a stamp saying the issue of the international passport has not been recorded in it. This stamp is later cancelled — at the section in Lisbon during collection hours, or in Russia on your first trip back, at the Foreign Ministry’s Consular Department in Moscow or at a Foreign Ministry office in any region. Until it is cancelled, you may have difficulties at the Russian border when leaving.
“Adding to my guide on the Russian international passport, since today I finally got round to collecting it. 1. When the passport is ready, you get an email (you don’t have to check on the website yourself). Mine was done in 4 working days. Come on any of the consulate’s working days. 2. To collect it you need to bring the applicant’s passport, and the child’s birth certificate, the payment receipt. I forgot the certificate, but they gave me the passport anyway. They said next time I’m at the consulate, bring it and they’ll put a little stamp on it saying the international passport has been issued (maybe I got a kind member of staff).”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkberemennost_portugal07.07.2026
“The website [link] shows that my passport is ready for collection. On the consulate’s booking website for international passports there’s only the option to hand in documents. I can’t see one for collection.”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkchatlisboa20.03.2024
If your international passport has already expired or been lost
Here everything comes down to one question: do you still have at least one valid document proving your citizenship?
Your international passport has expired, but your internal one is valid. Your application for a new passport will be accepted as usual; for a child under 14, a birth certificate with the citizenship stamp will do instead of an internal passport.
Both have expired. Your passport application cannot be accepted. First comes the procedure for checking whether you do or do not hold Russian citizenship: a separate citizenship appointment, a free-form application and a questionnaire, one Tipo Passe photo (the standard Portuguese passport-size photo) and anything that may prove citizenship — expired passports, a birth certificate, documents on a change of name, an employment record book, a military ID. Copies, even notarised ones, will not do: originals are required. The check takes two months from the day your application is registered, with an extension of no more than a month; you are told the result within three working days, and an extract from the decision is issued on request. Only after a positive decision can you apply for a passport — so the whole process gets several months longer, plus a new queue.
The good news: since 22 July 2026 this check has been free — Russian Government resolution No. 925 abolished the fee for it. In older conversations in the chats it is still listed as paid (under the fee schedule of 26 December 2024 — $65, €62); that is no longer the case.
Your passport has been stolen or lost. A new one will not be issued until the old one has been declared invalid, so first you submit a separate application for that. If the details of the lost passport are unknown, the section itself requests them from wherever it was issued — and that takes more time. The requirement for the original internal passport still applies, and without it the citizenship check begins again.
You urgently need to go to Russia but have no passport. For this there is a certificate of return — a temporary document that only entitles you to enter Russia; if you fly via third countries, you cannot leave the transit zone with it. You need an application, two photos 3 × 4 or 3.5 × 4.5 and the original internal passport. If you have no internal passport, your identity is confirmed by two Russian citizens over 18 with valid passports: they come to the section in person and sign the application in front of a member of staff. Hence the requests for ‘two witnesses needed’ that regularly pop up in the Lisbon chats. If there are no witnesses, the section asks the Interior Ministry at your place of residence for confirmation, but that takes several working days and depends on luck. A police report on the theft is not compulsory, but it is attached if you have one; it does not need to be translated.
How to report a theft to the police and what to do next — in the guide How to contact the police in Portugal.
“From my own experience I can say that you can apply for an international passport even if it’s already expired, but if you have a valid internal Russian passport, they’ll accept it .”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkleft4portugal10.10.2025
“I changed mine with an expired international and internal passport, you have to go through the procedure to confirm citizenship.”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkleft4portugal25.08.2026
You have the passport — what to update in Portugal
A new passport means a new number, and that is the number offices here know you by. Go through the list yourself — nobody will remind you.
AIMA and your residence permit. Your residence card was issued with your old passport’s details, and the number must match when you renew. What exactly AIMA requires — updating your details in advance or attaching the new passport when you renew — depends on the case; the renewal process is covered in the guide Residence permit in Portugal.
Do not throw away your old passport. It contains the visa you entered on and your entry stamps — you will be asked for them both when renewing and at the border. If your old passport is cancelled when the new one is issued, it is still returned to you.
Bank, insurer, plane tickets, school. Your passport number is in contracts and bookings; a mismatch surfaces at the worst possible moment — at the check-in desk or when transferring money.
The spelling of your name. If the Latin spelling has changed in your new passport, check it against your residence card and your Portuguese documents: a one-letter difference turns you into another person for any office. In such cases the consular section issues a certificate stating that both are one and the same person.
Before you travel, check that your passport is valid for the whole trip and that the entry rules are the same: how days are counted and what is checked at the border is explained in the guide Passport control in Portugal and the EES system.
“I got that kind of paper. Not because of a patronymic, but my surname in the new passport has a different letter. The consulate gave me a paper saying it’s one and the same person and my surname can be spelt this way or that. I did it through the translators, the consulate sent me to them.”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkleft4portugal13.07.2023
“Another useful thing is to check the spelling of the name (transliteration often causes problems and it’s a serious violation that the consulate doesn’t let through, just like mistakes in the passport number) In the letter, in the termo, in the insurance (especially that one, parents usually order it in Russian and the bank translates it automatically) etc :)”
Translated from Russian; the original is at the linkpequenos_PT25.08.2026
What to bring
- International passport — original and a copy of the photo page
- Russian internal passport (if you have one) — original, a copy of the photo page and a copy of the registration page
- Application form from the Foreign Ministry website, printed on a single sheet on both sides, and a separate sheet with the barcode
- Annex to the application, if your first name or surname has been changed two or more times
- 4 photos, 3.5 × 4.5 cm — only for an old-style passport; for a biometric one your picture is taken at the section
- For a child: birth certificate with the citizenship stamp (original and copy) and the parent’s valid international passport
- For a child aged 14 or over — their Russian internal passport
- A bank card for the fee: cash is not accepted at the cash desk
- The barcode receipt and the payment receipt — you are given them when you apply, and you bring them back to collect the finished passport
Where people most often trip up
- The queue to apply is longer than the time it takes to make the passport: book six months to a year ahead, not a month
- Your application in the queue is deleted if you do not check it for 30 days or if you create a second one for the same person
- You must confirm your appointment via the link in the email no later than two days before it
- The booking system’s emails do not reach Gmail: the @kdmid.ru domain is blocked, so book with an email address in the .ru domain
- For a child under 18, you book in the parent’s name, not the child’s
- Documents are accepted all at once or not at all: if one copy is missing, the appointment ends there
- A second passport can only be biometric and only with the same details as the first
- The form for a second passport still says ‘replacement’ — you tell them it is a second passport when you apply
- Babies are photographed at the section sitting down; if the child cannot sit still, the section advises a five-year passport with studio photos
- Fingerprints are taken from the age of 12 and only for a biometric passport
- A child can be added only to a parent’s non-biometric passport and only until 13 years and 6 months; some airlines do not recognise the entry
- The transliteration in the form is automatic: to make your surname match your Portuguese documents, you need an application and a supporting document
- The fee is paid by card at the cash desk on the day you apply; cash is not accepted
- Processing takes up to three months under the rules, but the readiness status on the website gets stuck: if it does not change for a long time, call
- A finished passport is kept for a year and then destroyed
- For a child, the passport is collected by the parent who made the application; it will not be given to the other parent
- If both your international and internal passports have expired, the citizenship check comes first — two months — and only then the passport application
- The citizenship check has been free since 22 July 2026: older conversations in the chats about a €62 fee are out of date
- You can apply at any Russian consulate in the world, but you will have to collect the passport where you applied
How it went for people
Six months in the queue, an hour at the appointment and €87 by card
One man described applying for a biometric passport step by step. He waited exactly six months for an appointment to apply. He came with the form from the section’s website filled in beforehand, copies of the main pages of his current international and internal passports, a copy of the registration page and the originals of both passports. The queue and the application itself, together with the photo and fingerprints, took just over an hour; the fee was €87.04, and only cards were accepted. He was told the official wait was three months, but warned that it might be quicker — though still no less than two. This is the most precise account of what application day looks like. August 2025.
The passport sat ready for three months while the website showed 80%
One man waited four months for his finished passport. Three weeks after he applied, the website showed it as 80 per cent ready — and it stuck there. He rang the section just in case, and was told the passport was ready and had been there for three months already: the status simply had not changed for technical reasons. Another person had described the same thing in the same words in the chat in the spring of that year. The lesson for everyone waiting: the percentage on the website is not the only source of truth, and a phone call to the section can sometimes save months. September 2025.
Both passports expired — and the process got longer by an ‘autobiography’
One man found that both his international and internal passports had expired. He could not replace the international passport straight away: he had to go through the procedure to confirm Russian citizenship — submitting an application in which, as he put it, he had to set out his whole life, ‘like an autobiography’. A couple of months later he was invited to apply for the passport. Exactly the case the section warns about in advance: do not let it get to the point where both documents are invalid. August 2026.
Retold in our own words from messages in open chats. The link leads to the full original message.