What shapes the cost and timeline of Irish citizenship by descent

No marketing spin — here's an honest look at what moves the cost and the timeline of the Irish citizenship-by-descent process, so you know what you're signing up for before you start.

What the cost is made of

There are two separate parts, and it helps to keep them apart:

• Government fees. Ireland's Department of Foreign Affairs charges a fixed fee to enter a birth in the Foreign Births Register (FBR), and the Irish passport is a separate fixed fee afterward. These are the government's charges — the same whoever prepares your file. We give you the current figures for your situation when we map out your case.
• Our fee for running the case. A flat fee, agreed up front, before any work begins. It depends on how many people in your family are applying, how complex your line is, and which records we have to procure — including any Irish civil-record searches when a birth or marriage is hard to locate. You'll have a clear price for the whole process before you commit to anything.

We don't publish a one-size headline number, because the honest answer depends on your family. After a free assessment we lay it all out — government fees and our fee — in one clear picture.

What moves the timeline

From a complete application, the Foreign Births Register is processed by the Department of Foreign Affairs in Dublin. Two things decide how long the whole thing takes:

• Document gaps. The clock effectively starts when your file is complete. Missing an Irish civil record or a U.S. marriage certificate is the most common delay — so the real timeline is "time to assemble the chain" plus "time in the queue."
• The queue itself. Government processing times have swung over the years with demand. We give you the current realistic range for your case, not a best-case promise.

What an Irish passport unlocks

An Irish passport is an EU passport. That means the right to live, work, study, and retire in any of the 27 EU countries — no visa, no sponsorship. Your children, once they inherit the citizenship, get the same. And Ireland allows dual citizenship with no restriction, so you keep your U.S. citizenship.

The honest part

If your line doesn't qualify — a great-grandparent with no registered parent before your birth, or a connection too distant to carry — we'll tell you before you spend anything. Start with a free assessment and we'll read your case against the law, then give you the real numbers for your own situation.

Information current as of June 2026. We update this guidance when the rules change.