Ceremony after Citizenship approval

Hello everyone,

I’d like to know how long does one have to book a ceremony after receiving the approval email?
I’ve been following the processing times for citizenship and passport application, and we might be going on holiday just after my partner’s approval if everything goes as planned. The passport might not arrive on time for our flight, so we are considering booking the citizenship for after we come back, that might be around two months after approval. Is that going to be a problem?? (That’ll be around October/November).


Thanks in advance.

You must attend the ceremony within 3 months of the date of your approval advice.
See > https://www.gov.uk/citizenship-ceremonies
You can try and book a private ceremony if that service is offered - an additional fee will be charged by the council.

Make sure you book a ceremony as soon as you get your approval. Note that the council may not be able to offer many date, depending on their own schedule, so it is possible you may need to amend the trip.

alterhase58 wrote: ↑

Thu Jul 02, 2026 2:57 pm

You must attend the ceremony within 3 months of the date of your approval advice.
See > https://www.gov.uk/citizenship-ceremonies

I believe that won't be problem then. We have applied in June, according to processing times, applications are taking around 4 months for approval, so that'll probably be around October. Our council holds ceremonies every Thursdays but what I'm afraid of is, the Passport processing times, as we are flying beginning of November. Timeframe will be quite tight. But if we get approval in October and book ceremony for December that'll still be two months, which is within the time limit.

We don't want to do the ceremony before our flight, in case the passport doesn't arrive on time and we have trouble coming back into the country. I believe after the ceremony, your current visa (ILR) isn't valid anymore, is it?

Thank you all for the replies.

Your ILR will cease to be valid the day you attend the ceremony. Once you receive an approval you will need to inquire with the council about a date that suits you, depending on what they have available. Just remember that you can't know for sure when the approval will come, some take a shorter time than others, so you should try to limit longer stays out of the country in the medium term, to give you some flexibility to attend the ceremony within the 3 months.