While 2023 was the highest year on record for people acquiring Luxembourgish citizenship, 2024 proved to be the lowest year since 2021 for new citizenship procedures.
Luxembourg’s Ministry of Justice has released its Nationality Statistics for 2024. In total, 7,415 people acquired Luxembourgish citizenship in 2024. This figure includes all paths to Luxembourgish citizenship, including those unrelated to citizenship through ancestry. This is a 38% total decrease from the 11,904 people who got Luxembourgish citizenship in 2023. The only year with a lower number since the passing of Luxembourg’s 2017 citizenship law was 2021. We will explain why below.
US and Brazil Figures
Reversing trends from the last several years, 2024 was the first year where Brazil fell from first place third place in terms of total Luxembourg citizenship procedures with 606 total procedures. The US once again came in 4th place with 475, nearly half of the number in 2023 (936). The top five nationalities applying were: Portuguese (1,267), French (975), Brazil (606), USA (475) and Belgian (366).
Notably, all countries experienced significant decreases in total numbers of procedures, excluding Portugal with a practically unchanged number year on year.
Statistics For Article 89
Out of the 7,425 Luxembourgish citizenship applications processed in 2024, only 163 individuals reclaimed citizenship through an ancestor who was alive on January 1, 1900 (as stipulated in Article 89 of the Luxembourg Nationality Law). This represents a significant decline from 4,930 in 2023.
As of January 1st, 2025, Ministry of Justice data indicates that 6,668 adults still have until December 31st, 2025, to submit a declaration to reclaim Luxembourgish citizenship. This group comprises 681 Americans, 2,893 Brazilians, and 3,094 others.
However, this number has likely already decreased. Since the citizenship process takes four months, this figure does not account for individuals who applied between September and December 2024. Anecdotal evidence suggests that in-person applications to reclaim citizenship began to rise again during this period. Additionally, some individuals have likely passed away or abandoned their intention to apply before the deadline.
Due to the four-month processing delay, the total number of individuals who will have reclaimed Luxembourgish citizenship through an ancestor alive on January 1st, 1900, will not be finalized until late January 2027.
Processing Time Impacts on Numbers
It may seem surprising that the total number of Luxembourgish citizenship applications dropped so dramatically in 2024. However, it’s important to note that Luxembourgish citizenship applications take four months to be processed and granted. As a result, the statistics for 2024 actually reflect applications submitted between September 2023 and August 2024.
On December 21, 2022, the Chamber of Deputies voted to extend the final deadline to recover Luxembourgish citizenship under Article 89 from December 31, 2022, to December 31, 2025. Before that date, most applicants believed that 2022 was the last possible year to reclaim their citizenship. Consequently, a significant portion of applicants rushed to submit their applications during the last four months of 2022 until the announcement of the extension. During October and November 2022, application rates reached over 100 per day.
The Ministry of Justice’s nationality statistics for 2023 reflect an influx of applications from Brazilians and Americans reclaiming Luxembourgish nationality. However, approximately 95% of the individuals included in these statistics had actually submitted their applications between September and December 2022. For example, all of LuxCitizenship’s clients applying under Article 89 completed their applications by December 15th, 2022.
The countries with the most people reclaiming citizenship through Article 89 in 2024 were Brazil (120) and the US (31). To date, 40,804 adults have reclaimed Luxembourgish citizenship through this path, including 12,389 Brazilians and 3,828 Americans.
Putting Things In Perspective
While the number of overall citizenship procedures and especially the number of people claiming dual citizenship through Article 89 were down in 2024 compared to other years, there are other trends where we see an important difference. The number of applicants applying for dual citizenship through a parent or grandparent who has or had Luxembourg citizenship (Article 23) only continues to grow year on year. Additionally, in the United States, the number of people acquiring proof of Luxembourg citizenship through continues to rise, with approximately 1,788 people obtaining citizenship through Article 7 (compared to 1,479 in 2023). All article 7 figures are our best estimates from combining various Luxembourg public data sources.
LuxCitizenship Statistics
Of the 31 American adults reclaiming citizenship in 2024, none were LuxCitizenship clients, as all our Article 89 clients had submitted their applications by the end of 2022. LuxCitizenship clients made up 105 (26%) of the 401 American adults who obtained Luxembourg citizenship under Article 23 in 2024. Based on an estimate of 1,788 minors and adults acquiring proof of Luxembourg citizenship in 2024, our clients would account for 16% (287).
