Indefinite Leave to Remain

You may qualify for Indefinite Leave to Remain after 3, 5 or 10 years under certain routes.

The UK offers several routes to Indefinite Leave to Remain

Important Notes
You can lose your ILR status if individual remains out of the UK for more than 2 years on a single occasion or when it appears that an individual only spends short periods of time to retain their status and does not appear to have made the UK their main home.

You should lodge your application not more than 28 days before the completion of the qualifying period.

You are eligible for ILR if you have spent 5 years or more in one of the following categories:

• UK Ancestry
• Investor Visa
• Entrepreneur Visa
• Sole Representative Visa
• Health and Care Worker Visa
• Skilled Worker Visa
• Global Talent Visa
• Bereaved Partner (within the 5-year period)
• Victim of Domestic Violence (within the 5-year period)

You can apply to settle in the UK if you’ve been in the UK legally for 10 continuous years (known as ‘long residence’).

Settling (known as ‘indefinite leave to remain’) means you can stay in the UK without any time restrictions.

You must also have:

• been in the UK legally for 10 years (known as your ‘continuous residence’)
• kept to the terms of your UK visa

If you’re aged 18 to 65 years old, you must:

• pass the Life in the UK Test
• prove you have sufficient English language skills

Your 10-year qualifying period starts from either:

• when you arrived in the UK with a visa
• when you were given permission to stay in the UK

Continuous residence is time you’ve spent in the UK without gaps.

You can leave the UK during the continuous residence for up to:

• 180 days at a time
• 540 days in total