How long does Spain take to decide an entrepreneur residence permit?

Checked on 2026-10-25

The UGE-CE must decide the entrepreneur residence permit within 20 working days of the electronic application; ENISA's mandatory report on your project must come within 10 working days of that. If no decision arrives in time, the permit counts as granted. Applying from abroad, the consulate then has 10 working days for the visa.

Key facts

What	The source says	Source
Who decides the permit	The Large Companies and Strategic Groups Unit (UGE-CE) handles it online; the Directorate-General for Migration grants it	Ley 14/2013, art. 76.1
Deadline for the permit	20 days from the electronic application, counted as working days (Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays don’t count)	Ley 14/2013, art. 76.1; Ley 39/2015, art. 30.2
ENISA report	Requested by the UGE-CE itself; mandatory; issued within 10 working days	Ley 14/2013, art. 70.1
No answer by the deadline	The permit counts as granted (positive administrative silence)	Ley 14/2013, art. 76.1; Ley 39/2015, art. 24.1
Visa, if you are abroad	You ask for the visa once the permit is granted; the consulate decides in 10 working days, longer only when the Schengen prior consultation applies	Ley 14/2013, arts. 70.1 and 75.5
Police security check on visas	The police have 7 days to answer the consulate; no answer counts as favourable	Ley 14/2013, art. 62.6
While you wait	Applying extends your current residence or stay until the decision	Ley 14/2013, art. 76.1
Collecting the visa	Within 1 month after the favourable decision is notified (Washington consular section)	Consulate page, “Collecting the visa”

Two steps when you apply from abroad

First the permit. You (or a legal representative) apply online to the UGE-CE (Ley 14/2013, art. 69.1). The UGE-CE asks ENISA for its report on your project, and ENISA has 10 working days to issue it (art. 70.1). The whole permit decision is due within 20 working days of the electronic application (art. 76.1).

Then the visa. For applicants outside Spain, the law says the permit and the visa are requested through a single application that starts the two procedures one after the other (art. 69.1), and that once the permit is granted you apply for the residence visa (art. 70.1). Visa applications under this part of the law are decided and notified within 10 working days (art. 75.5). The Spanish consular section in Washington says the 10 days run from the day the consular section forwards the documents through the visa system, not from the day you hand them in at its visa centre, and can be extended when an interview or extra documents are requested.

What “positive silence” means for you

If 20 working days pass without a decision on the permit, the law treats it as granted (Ley 14/2013, art. 76.1). Ley 39/2015 says the end of the deadline without a notified decision lets the applicant treat the application as approved, unless a law says otherwise (art. 24.1).

If the permit is refused, the decision can be appealed with a recurso de alzada (Ley 14/2013, art. 76.1).
If you are already in Spain legally, applying keeps your current residence or stay valid until the decision (art. 76.1).

Sources

Change history

2026-10-25: Page created

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