Becoming French: naturalisation for Britons after the 2026 clampdown

Taking French citizenship is the quiet ambition of a lot of long-settled Britons — a passport that puts EU free movement back within reach, without giving up the British one. But the rules got markedly harder on 1 January 2026: a jump to B2 French and a brand-new written civics exam. Here's what the route really looks like now, and how to give yourself the best shot.

Written by the Pimpernel team · Updated for 2026 · About a 12-minute read

The short version

You keep your British passport. France allows dual nationality and so does the UK — becoming French means no renunciation on either side.
The main route is naturalisation by decree after 5 years' settled residence. It's discretionary: the state's line is that citizenship is a favour, not a right, and even a qualifying applicant can be refused.
The language bar rose to B2 (from B1) on 1 January 2026 — written and spoken. A DELF B2 diploma is valid for life; the TCF/TEF tests expire after two years.
There's a new civics exam since January 2026: 40 multiple-choice questions, 45 minutes, 80% to pass, on French values, institutions, history and daily life.
You'll need stable resources and a clean tax record — income not mainly from benefits or from abroad, taxes up to date, no serious criminal record, and genuine integration (with real weight on secularism and equality).
The application is entirely online via ANEF, followed by an entretien d'assimilation. Budget realistically for 18–24 months or more, especially in busy préfectures.
You become French on the day your decree is published in the Journal Officiel.

For a Briton who's built a life here — the house, the friendships, the tax returns, the slow accretion of belonging — French citizenship can feel like the natural full stop. Post-Brexit it carries a very practical bonus, too: it hands back the freedom of movement across the EU that the referendum took away, and it does so without asking you to hand in your UK passport. But if you're weighing it up in 2026, you need to know that the goalposts moved this January, and moved in one direction: harder. Let's take it as it now stands.

Before anything else, the reassuring bit. You do not have to give up being British. France recognises plurinationalité and imposes no renunciation; the UK is equally relaxed. Service-Public spells it out with the exact example of a Briton acquiring French nationality and keeping their British one. So this is addition, not exchange.

The route, and the two new gates

The path most long-settled Britons take is naturalisation par décret — the residence-based route. The headline requirement is five years of habitual, continuous residence (there's a reduced two-year track for graduates of French higher education and a handful of other cases). But the character of the process matters as much as the timeline: it is discretionary. The interior ministry's repeated refrain is that "la naturalisation n'est pas un droit" — it is not a right. You can tick every box and still be adjourned or refused. That's not meant to deter you; it's meant to explain why presenting an exemplary, well-evidenced file matters so much.

The shape is unchanged; the difficulty isn't. The B2 requirement and the civics exam are the new, non-negotiable hurdles as of 1 January 2026.

Gate one: B2 French

Until the end of 2025, the language requirement was B1. From 1 January 2026 it's B2 — a solid step up, tested in both written and spoken French, and it applies to applications lodged after that date (and to earlier files still awaiting documents). B2 is comfortable, functional French: you can hold your own in a meeting, follow the news, argue a point. It's achievable for most settled Britons, but it's not something you fake in a fortnight.

A timing decision worth getting right

The DELF B2 lasts for life — the tests don't

You can prove B2 two ways: a language test (TCF or TEF, in their "integration/nationality" versions) or a diploma (DELF B2, or a DALF at C1/C2). The tests are valid for only two years; the DELF B2 diploma never expires. If you're planning ahead — and given the queues, you should — sitting the DELF once removes the risk of your proof lapsing while your dossier crawls through the system. Note too that the old ENIC-NARIC "comparability" attestations for foreign qualifications stopped being accepted on 1 January 2026.

Gate two: the new civics exam

This is genuinely new for 2026 and catches people off guard, because it replaces informal questioning with a real, standardised test. It's 40 multiple-choice questions in 45 minutes, and you need 80% — 32 out of 40 — to pass. The five themes are Republican principles and values, how the French political system works, rights and duties, a slice of history, geography and culture, and the practicalities of living in French society. You prepare from the livret du citoyen, the state's citizen's handbook, and you sit the exam at an approved centre. Applicants over 65, and medical or disability cases, are exempted; most people aren't. An 80% pass mark on French civics is not a formality — treat it as an exam to revise for, because it is one.

The rest of the file: money, taxes, and character

Beyond the two new gates, the long-standing conditions still apply, and the 2025 guidance to préfectures sharpened how they're judged. You need stable, sufficient resources — the current steer favours a track record like a permanent contract held for a year, or two years of continuous fixed-term work, over the five-year window — and your income must not come mainly from benefits, nor predominantly from abroad. You must be up to date with your taxes; arrears are a standard ground for refusal. You need a clean enough record (a French prison sentence of six months or more is disqualifying, terrorism offences absolutely so). And you must show genuine assimilation into the French community — with the current guidance placing explicit weight on laïcité (secularism) and equality between women and men. You'll sign the Charte des droits et devoirs du citoyen français as part of it.

Woven through all of this is the requirement that your centre of material and family interests is in France — your main home, your economic base, your close family. Keeping your principal home, your main income, or a spouse and children back in the UK is one of the commonest reasons a file is deferred, so if you're serious, your life needs to visibly point here.

The process, and the wait

You build and submit the dossier online through ANEF — paper is no longer accepted. Expect to supply your passport and titre de séjour, proof of five years' residence, your B2 language proof, your civics-exam pass, tax and income records, and apostilled, translated civil-status documents. The préfecture checks completeness, runs its background enquiries, and calls you to the entretien d'assimilation — an interview probing your French, your grasp of rights, duties and Republican values, and the genuineness of your integration. Then the file goes to the ministry for a decision: acceptance, ajournement (a deferral, often with a year or two's delay and conditions), or refusal.

If it's yes, your décret de naturalisation is published in the Journal Officiel, and the publication date is the day you legally become French. As for how long all this takes: nationally, a complete file commonly runs 12 to 18 months, but in high-volume préfectures — Paris, Marseille, Lyon, much of the Île-de-France — two years and beyond is normal. Keep your titre de séjour valid throughout; the citizenship queue doesn't pause your residence obligations.

A note on the fine print

Hard law versus guidance

The B2 requirement and the civics exam are set in a decree and an arrêté — hard law, in force. The broader tightening of how préfectures weigh resources, integration and conduct comes largely from a 2025 ministerial circular, which is guidance rather than statute and has been legally contested. In practice it's shaping decisions now, so plan around it — but if an official ever presents a single "automatic rejection" rule as black-letter law, it's worth checking whether that's the decree talking or the circular.

None of this should put you off if France is genuinely home. It should, though, make you prepare deliberately: get the DELF B2 banked, revise the livret du citoyen properly, get your taxes spotless, and assemble a file that leaves no obvious question unanswered. Given the discretion involved, a specialist immigration solicitor is often money well spent — not to game the system, but to make sure a strong case isn't sunk by a paperwork slip.

Not there yet — still on a residence permit?

Citizenship sits at the top of a ladder that starts with your titre de séjour. Our residency guide covers the permits, the Withdrawal Agreement card, and the renewals that keep your five-year clock ticking cleanly toward this.

Read the residency guide →

Building your French?

B2 is the new bar, and it doesn't happen by accident. Our free language walkthrough helps you work out where you are and what a realistic path to exam-ready French looks like from here.

Try the free language walkthrough →

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Pimpernel is building the practical side of British life in France — the tools, the calendar, and the guides like this one. Join the list for the changes to the citizenship rules before they catch you out, and the next pieces as they land.

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This guide offers practical, general information, not legal or immigration advice. Pimpernel are not immigration lawyers or officials. Naturalisation is discretionary, and the requirements — the B2 language level, the civics exam, resource and integration criteria, timelines and fees — changed significantly in 2025–2026 and continue to evolve, with some measures still being contested. How the rules apply depends entirely on your own circumstances. Always confirm the current position on the official interior-ministry and service-public sites, and take advice from a qualified immigration professional before acting.