Your result
Portugal — Citizenship by Descent
Possible
Being born in Portugal can make you Portuguese, but it depends on your parents' situation at the time — and the rule was tightened on 19 May 2026.
There are two ways it works. If at least one of your parents was also born in Portugal and was living here when you were born, you are Portuguese by origin, whatever their status was. Otherwise you can claim by declaration if, at the moment of your birth, one of your parents had been legally resident in Portugal for at least five years. That five years used to be one year; the 2026 law raised it, and the change is not retrospective in the way people assume — what matters is the rule in force when the claim is made, so a claim lodged before 19 May 2026 is decided under the old one-year rule.
If you are under 18 there is a further route: the Government grants nationality to minors born in Portugal where a parent has been legally resident for five years and the child is in school here, and that procedure is free.
What to do next: find out exactly what status your parents held on the date you were born, and for how long before it. Residence permits, renewal records and AIMA files are the evidence, and the date of the first permit is usually the fact that decides it.