BVA Processing Times

§4 StAG Feststellung

2–3 years, per the German missions' own guidance. BVA itself publishes the underlying numbers on one short page: about 1,000 new Feststellung applications a month arrive (“monatlich ca. 1000 neue Anträge auf Feststellung”), files are worked “in der Reihenfolge des Eingangs” — in order of receipt — and on that basis BVA says a processing time of two years is “leider nicht ungewöhnlich” (unfortunately not unusual). The same page opens by saying the duration is “aufgrund der verschiedenen Lebensgeschichten hinter jedem Antrag sehr unterschiedlich”. Complex multi-generation chains with repeated Nachforderung cycles run longer. We do not publish a band for “clean” cases, because no such statistic exists: answering the Bundestag in 2011 (Drucksache 17/5727), the Federal Government stated that the average processing duration “wird statistisch nicht erfasst” — is not statistically recorded. That answer is old, and we cite it for the fact that the number was never kept, not as a reading of the current queue.

§5 StAG Declaration

BVA publishes no processing time for §5 at all. The last published case counts show files decided in December 2024 had waited about 26 months, and that wait has been lengthening by roughly four months every six months. A community Freedom of Information request to the BVA produced monthly §5 counts for August 2021 through December 2024, compiled at german-citizenship.github.io. By December 2024 the BVA had received 35,102 declarations and decided 8,874 of them — 25% — leaving 26,228 pending. Reading those counts in order of receipt, the wait for files being decided ran 10 months (December 2022), 14 (June 2023), 18 (December 2023), 22 (June 2024) and 26 (December 2024). That trend, not any single number, is the thing worth planning around. No data has been published since December 2024, so nobody — including us — can tell you the observed wait today.

On the backlog: 26,228 pending files at the 2024 decision rate of 261 per month is roughly 101 months, about 8 years, to clear the queue that already existed at the end of 2024. That figure assumes only that BVA throughput stays flat, and throughput has in fact been rising (2,540 decisions in 2022, 2,935 in 2023, 3,129 in 2024). You may see a figure of “125 months” or more circulating from the same dataset. That number additionally assumes the 2024 filing rate continues unchanged until the 2031 deadline; it is an extrapolation, not a measurement, and the same model yields a different answer for every month you file in. We do not publish it.

You become German on the day BVA receives your declaration — not on the day the certificate arrives. The BVA's own Merkblatt (Stand: Oktober 2025) states that citizenship is acquired “mit dem Zeitpunkt des Eingangs der Erklärung beim Bundesverwaltungsamt.” Once BVA confirms the conditions are met, the Urkunde certifies a status you already held from your filing date. The queue delays your proof and your passport, not your acquisition date.

§5 requires no unbroken citizenship chain — the broken chain is the reason the route exists. It does still require a documented descent chain: the Merkblatt asks for your birth or descent certificate, your marriage certificate, the birth or descent certificates of the relevant parent and where applicable grandparent, your parents' and grandparents' marriage certificates, proof of that ancestor's German citizenship, and a copy of your current foreign passport. That is a shorter ancestral chain than a multi-generation §4 Feststellung, which lowers Nachforderung risk — but it does not move you up the queue.

And §5 asks for one thing §4 never does. The declaration requires a police certificate covering your whole country of residence, in the original, no more than six months old. For a US applicant BVA names the issuer: “In den USA Lebende müssten eine Auskunft des Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) vorlegen” — a state or county check will not do, because the certificate “muss sich auf den gesamten Staat beziehen”. An FBI Identity History Summary has its own lead time and its own six-month clock, so order it to land near the end of your document-gathering, not at the start.

Art. 116(2) Restitution

No official processing time is published for this route. Neither the BVA nor the Federal Foreign Office publishes a figure for Art. 116(2) restitution. The Foreign Office states only that processing times “vary greatly” with each applicant's circumstances, that the BVA frequently has to request further records from German authorities, and that applications are worked in order of receipt. We would rather tell you the number does not exist than invent a range you might plan around. Nobody publishes what makes an Art. 116(2) file move faster either, so we name no factor.

Month 0 — Submission

You may submit your package directly to the BVA in Cologne, or hand it to your competent German mission, which forwards it on. BVA presents these as equal options — the consulate is a convenience, not a gatekeeper. Going through a mission adds transit time that nobody quantifies: the German Embassy in Vienna says only that “längere Postlaufzeiten” (longer postal transit times) must be expected.

The Eingangsbestätigung (acknowledgment of receipt)

BVA does not publish how long this takes, and we are not going to guess. What BVA does state, under the “Antwort abwarten” step of its Feststellung der deutschen Staatsangehörigkeit beantragen instructions page, is what the letter is for: “Sie erhalten von uns eine Eingangsbestätigung, mit der Ihnen auch das Aktenzeichen des Bundesverwaltungsamtes mitgeteilt wird. Dieses Aktenzeichen geben Sie bitte künftig bei jedem Schriftwechsel an.” It carries your file reference, and you quote that reference in all future correspondence. It confirms the file is open and queued; nothing substantive has happened yet. Save it.

The letter does carry one expectation, and it is where the 24-month figure further down this page comes from. Telling the Bundestag in 2011 how it managed applicants' expectations, the Federal Government said BVA “weist in seiner standardisierten Eingangsbestätigung vorsorglich darauf hin, dass mit einer Verfahrensdauer von bis zu 24 Monaten gerechnet werden muss, auch wenn die Feststellungsverfahren häufig nach kürzerer Zeit abgeschlossen werden können” — the standard acknowledgment warns of up to 24 months, while noting that cases often finish sooner. Fifteen years on we cannot confirm the current letter still says it, and BVA's own public pages now talk about two years rather than 24 months. Treat it as the origin of a number, not as a promise about your file.

Nachforderung (additional-document request)

BVA publishes no timetable for this, and it is triggered by review of your file rather than by a clock. On its own page answering how long a Feststellung takes, BVA says only that “nicht selten müssen nach Sichtung der Antragsunterlagen noch Unterlagen nachgefordert werden” — not infrequently, further documents must be requested once the file has been looked at — and adds that it sometimes has to make enquiries of other German authorities whose own turnaround it cannot influence. BVA publishes no breakdown of what it asks for, so treat this as the range of things a request can cover rather than a ranking: earlier-generation Standesamt records, additional naturalization certificates, clarified sworn translations, and — for complex cases — supplemental declarations explaining gaps in documentation.

Respond promptly. The Federal Government puts this squarely on the applicant (Drucksache 17/5727, 2011): the duration “hängt im Übrigen wesentlich von der Mitwirkungsbereitschaft der antragstellenden Personen ab” — depends substantially on the applicant's willingness to cooperate — and you have it “selbst in der Hand” to speed the procedure up by sending what is asked for promptly. What nobody publishes is an exchange rate between your delay and theirs, so we do not offer one. The mechanism that matters is simpler: BVA works in order of receipt and does not chase you, so an unanswered request leaves the file sitting.

Month 24 — still in the normal queue

The number attached to this milestone is an instruction rather than a forecast — it tells you when the authority considers a wait long enough to ask about, not when a decision is due. The German Embassy in London — and this is a UK instruction about the MISSION's own acknowledgment, issued once London forwards your file, not the BVA acknowledgment described in the milestone above — asks applicants to hold off on status inquiries entirely “innerhalb von 24 Monaten nach Erhalt der Eingangsbestätigung” — within 24 months of the acknowledgment of receipt — for the Feststellung route. (For the §5 declaration route the same embassy sets that at 30 months.) A second Nachforderung cycle may occur. Inquiries do not speed up processing and add administrative overhead.

The decision

BVA issues a decision (approval or denial). If approved, you receive an invoice for the €51 §4 fee, charged per person rather than per application. The other two outcomes are also priced, which few applicants expect: a refusal costs €25–€51 depending on the work BVA had already done, and withdrawing after processing has begun costs €38. BVA asks you not to pay until it invoices you. Pay promptly to receive the Staatsangehörigkeitsausweis. With the certificate in hand, you can then apply for a German passport at your nearest consulate — a separate application process with its own timeline, which the consulate quotes at the time.

Consider direct mail to BVA Cologne

You may file directly with the BVA rather than through a mission — there is no “if permitted” about it. BVA presents the two as alternatives in its own words — the application goes “bei Ihrer örtlich zuständigen deutschen Auslandsvertretung oder direkt bei uns”, and Merkblatt F §2 leads with the direct route: “Sie können Ihren Antrag direkt beim Bundesverwaltungsamt stellen” — and filing direct skips the forwarding leg entirely. Nobody publishes how long that leg takes, so we put no number on what you save. The trade-off is real in the other direction too: filing direct means no consular pre-screening, which is worth something if your package might be incomplete.

Use only sworn translators recognized by a German court

BVA's rule is absolute rather than a matter of degree: every foreign-language document needs a translation by a sworn (vereidigt) translator, and “Übersetzungen von nicht vereidigten Personen werden nicht anerkannt” — translations by anyone other than a sworn (vereidigt) translator are not accepted. A US “certified translator” is not automatically a vereidigter or ermächtigter Übersetzer. Verify credentials before paying for a full translation package. We do not publish how often this actually triggers a Nachforderung, because nobody counts it.

Include a well-organized family tree and source index

Though not formally required, a one-page family tree and a source index cross-referencing each document to specific claims on the Anlage V annexes makes your file easier to review, which is the thing that reduces Nachforderung risk. We used to attach a figure to that; we have removed it. Nobody can measure it — it would need the same application processed twice, once without the index — and BVA publishes nothing on the subject.

Already have a file open at BVA? Give it the Aktenzeichen

BVA runs §4 and §5 as separate procedures with separate forms, and publishes nothing about how it handles the same family arriving on both at once — so we can tell you neither that it copes nor that it does not. Our advice is the conservative one: pick the path that most clearly applies, submit only that application, and consider the alternate path afterwards if it is denied.

Art. 116(2) is a separate procedure

Art. 116(2)/§15 restitution is a separate procedure with its own BVA Merkblatt and its own forms, not a variant of the §4 application — and it is fee-free under §38(3) Nr. 1 StAG, where §4 is not. Start on the right track: filing the wrong one means the work of the application has to be redone on the correct form. We publish no comparison of the two queues' speeds, because BVA publishes no figure for this route at all.