If you plan to visit the Schengen Area for more than 90 days, you have a couple of options available to you. If you’re already in the Schengen Area and you want to stay for more than 90 days, you have less options but its still possible to legally stay for over 90 days.
You have a couple of options, some requiring pre-planning and others relatively effortless. For anyone planning to backpack Europe for any longer than 3 months, I highly recommend getting a working holiday visa. These visas will allowed you unrestricted travel within Schengen for a year. The only catch is that you have to apply for the visa from your home country. Other options include study visas and long-stay visas.
Whatever you heard, read online, or have been told, do NOT be attempt to overstay your visa free days, not even by a single day. You could find yourself fined, deported, and banned from Europe. Even after you ban has ended, you could be denied entry on future trips.
The easiest but also the least known way to stay in Schengen for over 90 days is by using bilateral agreements, which pre-date Schengen. You could theoretically stay in Schengen indefinitely, as long as you kept to the correct countries. With no paperwork, visas, applications, or messing around involved at all.
Learn more about Schengen, overstaying, the Entry/Exit System (EES), and ETIAS.
Schengen Double-Dip
This strategy used to be possible, but a change to the 90/180 day rule has made this option now obsolete.
With the Schengen Double-Dip, you simply use the 90 days in a 180 day period rule to your advantage. This trick is useful if you’re doing a long distance hike or cycle trip, or if you want maximise the warmer months in Schengen.
WORKING HOLIDAY VISA
A handful of countries (including Australia, Canada, and New Zealand) have bilateral working holiday visa agreements with Schengen states. A working holiday visa will allow you to stay in Schengen for up to a year. The only draw back is that you have to apply for this visa from your home country. My advice is, even if you don’t plan to work, get one of these visas before you go and it will most definitely come in use down the track if you plan on staying in Schengen over 90 days.
Australia has bilateral working holiday visa agreements with the following countries:
Australia does NOT have working holiday agreements with the following countries:
Study VISA
A number of Schengen states grant Student Visas if you are enrolled in an approved course. These visas are granted where study will exceed 90 days. As well as paying for the visa, you also need to pay for your course, and some countries will require information on where you will live while you study.
LONG STAY VISA + RESIDENCE PERMIT
A long-stay ‘D’ visa / residence permit entitles the holder to enter the Schengen Area and remain in the issuing state for a period longer than 90 days but no more than one year. The holder of a long-stay visa is entitled to move freely within the Schengen Area for a period of up to three months in any half-year. Most Schengen states offer national long-stay ‘D’ visas / residence permits, however these usually need to be obtained in advance through the embassy/consulate of that state. There are only two countries which provide long-stay visas useful to travellers; France and Sweden.
Austria: Apply for a temporary residence permit or a ‘Red-White-Red Card’ (issued to permanent immigrants) after arrival, rather than in advance through an Austrian embassy/consulate.
France: offers a one year Long Stay Visa for tourists. You can only apply for this visa from your home country. There are a lot of documents you need to send in with your application which can be painful. While you are entitled to stay in France for a year, you cannot work, you need proof of accommodation in France, and technically you’re not allowed to cross over into any other Schengen country.
Germany: Apply for a residence permit after arrival.
Estonia: Apply for a category ‘D’ long-stay visa (which also allows you to work) for €80. You must apply for the visa in advance at an Estonian foreign mission after your employer has completed a ‘registration of short-term employment’. For stays over 6 months, you can apply for a temporary residence permit for employment after arrival in the country.
Hungary: Apply for a residence card from the regional directorate of the Office of Immigration and Nationality within 90 days of arrival.
Latvia: Apply for a residence permit after arrival as a self-employed or business person.
Netherlands: Australians are are not required to obtain a long stay visa for stays up to 90 days.
Norway: Australians who have qualifications as a skilled worker are permitted to stay in the country without a visa for up to 6 months to seek employment as a skilled worker or a specialist, as long as they register with the police within 3 months of arriving in Norway.
Sweden: has a Visitor’s Permit for stays over 90 days and up to 365 days. To get a permit you must:
- Have received an invitation from the person you intend to visit.
- Be able to provide for yourself for the duration of your stay in Sweden.
- Have a passport that is valid for at least three months after the last date of your visit.
- Have a return ticket or the money to buy one.
BILATERAL AGREEMENTS
This is where things get interesting. Prior to the Schengen Agreement, states had their own legislation and bilateral agreements with other nations. After the signing of the Schengen Agreement, many of these former agreements became void, yet some states never rescinded their former agreements. Now here’s the cool part, this is an article from the Schengen Agreement:
CONVENTION: IMPLEMENTING THE SCHENGEN AGREEMENT (14 June 1985)
CHAPTER 4: CONDITIONS GOVERNING THE MOVEMENT OF ALIENS
Article 20: Paragraph 2
“Paragraph 1 shall not affect each Contracting Party’s right to extend beyond three months an alien’s stay in its territory in exceptional circumstances or in accordance with a bilateral agreement concluded before the entry into force of this Convention.”
Basically what that means is that bilateral agreements that predate the signing of the Schengen Agreement are still valid! So what are these bilateral agreements then? I’m glad you asked!
Australia has bilateral visa waiver agreements with the following states:
Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden.
These agreements allow Australian citizens to spend up to 90 days in EACH state (60 days in Belgium), without reference to time spent in other Schengen states. However, if you visit a Schengen state not included on the above list, the “90 days in a 180 day period for the Schengen area as a whole” rule applies.
Unfortunately Australia DOES NOT have bilateral agreements with France or Spain.
Canada has bilateral visa waiver agreements with the following states:
Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden.
These agreements allow Canadian citizens to spend up to 90 days in EACH state (60 days in Belgium and Portugal), without reference to time spent in other Schengen states. However, if you visit a Schengen state not included on the above list, the “90 days in a 180 day period for the Schengen area as a whole” rule applies.
New Zealand has bilateral visa waiver agreements with the following states:
Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland.
These agreements allow New Zealand citizens to spend up to 90 days in EACH state (60 days in Belgium), without reference to time spent in other Schengen states. However, if you visit a Schengen state not included on the above list, the “90 days in a 180 day period for the Schengen area as a whole” rule applies.
The United States has bilateral visa waiver agreements with the following states:
Belgium, Denmark, France, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain.
These agreements allow US citizens to spend up to 90 days in EACH state (60 days in Portugal), without reference to time spent in other Schengen states. However, if you visit a Schengen state not included on the above list, the “90 days in a 180 day period for the Schengen area as a whole” rule applies.
BILATERAL AGREEMENTS VS ENTRY/EXIT SYSTEM
The European Union will implement its new Entry/Exit System (EES) on external borders in late 2023. The EES will be a centralised database logging all entries and exits into and out of the Schengen Area. It will become impossible to overstay without being caught. The thing is, bilateral agreements that predate the Schengen Agreement would make a royal mess of the new Entry/Exit System. To solve this the Council of the European Union is in the process of changing Article 20:2 with the following:
Paragraph 1 shall not affect each Contracting Party’s right to extend beyond 90 days in any 180-day period an alien’s stay in its territory in exceptional circumstances or if in accordance with a bilateral agreement concluded before the entry into force of this Convention and notified to the Commission, provides a right to stay beyond 90 days in any 180-day period.
The stay of an alien in the territory of a Contracting Party may only be extended upon request of the alien and lodged with the competent authorities of that Contracting Party upon entry or during the stay of the alien at the latest [on the last day] [7 days before the last day] of his/her 90-day stay in any 180-day period.
In case where the stay is extended, the competent authorities of that Contracting Party shall enter the data related to the extension in the latest relevant entry/exit record in accordance with Article 17 of the Regulation establishing the Entry/Exit system.
The alien shall exit at the external borders of that Contracting party.
The competent authority that has extended the stay shall inform the alien concerned that the extension of stay is authorised only in the territory of that Contracting party and he/she shall exit at the external border of that Contracting party.
If/when this legislation comes into effect;
- You will be required to lodge a request with authorities for stays over 90 days.
- You can lodge this request upon time of entry or at any other time during your stay.
- The extension will only apply to the state in which you applied.
- The extension will be added to your information on the Entry/Exit System.
- You must exit the Schengen Area from the state where you lodged your extension request.
I hope the EU will one day remove the 90/180 day rule, allowing non-EU citizens unrestricted access (as a tourist) to the continent. If a visitor has cash and is spending it backpacking all over the continent, I don’t understand why its a problem. I hope you’ve found something useful on this page. If you think there’s anything missing, or if you find any of the above information has changed, please let us know!