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Competent authority for visa applications
All the information concerning visa applications for Belgium is available on the website of the Immigration Office of the FPS Home Affairs, which is the competent Belgian authority for access to the territory, stay, residence and removal of foreigners in Belgium.
1. At which embassy or consulate shall I introduce my visa application?
You should apply for your visa in person at the Belgian embassy or consulate which is competent for your country of residence, where you will be requested to communicate your travel destination as well as the circumstances of it. In a number of cases, you can lodge your visa application through an external service provider (outsourcing partner). In some very specific cases, you can also be exempted from personally lodging your application. If you want to know more about it, please contact the relevant embassy or consulate.
Contact details Belgian embassies and consulates
If you apply for a short stay visa (up to 90 days), some countries offer the possibility of having your visa application treated by another Schengen country Belgium has concluded a representation agreement with.
Note: representation in the matter of visa only concerns Schengen visa applications (short stay up to 90 days) for:
- Tourist visits
- Visits to family or friends
- Cultural or sports manifestations
- Business trips
- Short traineeships
- Transit through the Schengen area
Long stay visa applications (more than 90 days) or short stay visa applications aiming at a longer stay in Belgium (e.g. marriage in Belgium), are not covered by the representation agreement and must hence be lodged with the relevant Belgian embassy or consulate.
If you want to find out which Belgian embassy or consulate is competent for you visa application, or in order to verify which embassy is competent for your country of residence and whether Belgium is represented by a Schengen partner for short stay visa, please consult the documents below. If there is no Belgian embassy or consulate in your country of residence, you should apply to the Belgian embassy or consulate responsible for that country (and usually located in a neighbouring country).
2. How do I extend my visa in Belgium?
When your request for an extension of stay has been approved by the Immigration Office, you must make an appointment by using the link that has been sent to you. Meetings are possible on Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 9:30 am to 11:30 am. The visa counter is located in the FPS Foreign Affairs (rue des Petits Carmes 27, 1000 Brussels).
Show up with your passport; payments are only made by Bancontact.
3. Cash payments not accepted anymore
Do you need a new passport? To extend your visa or to legalise a document? The consular offices of the Foreign Affairs in Brussels no longer accept cash payments. You may now pay only by credit or debit card (Bancontact, Maestro, Visa, Mastercard) or receipt of postal payment.
4. Information on the GDPR
- General Data Protection Regulation. Information to be provided to applicants concerning the processing of personal data in the Visa Information System (VIS) provided upon short stay visa applications
- Privacy statement. Processing of personal data in the context of a visa application
- Agreement regarding the joint processing of personal data in the framework of short stay or long stay visa applications. This document is not available in English. Please refer to the information in Dutch (PDF, 1.42 MB) or in French (PDF, 1.29 MB)
