Bringing Your Family to Georgia: Family Reunification and the Six-Month Rule

A spouse and children join a foreigner who holds a Georgian residence permit through family reunification: a permit of their own, issued by the Public Service Development Agency against the principal's permit, in practice with the same validity as the principal's. The file is the relationship, proved by marriage and birth certificates that have been legalised and translated. The rule that shapes the plan is a simple one: at the time of writing, the principal's permit must have more than six months left to run. That period is not in the Law's own text; it comes from the Government's rules or the Agency's practice. A first work residence permit issued to a new company's manager without turnover proof runs exactly six months, so a founder on that route cannot bring the family against it, and has to choose a sequence.

Family members join against the principal's permit

Family reunification is a ground for a residence permit under the Law of Georgia on the Legal Status of Aliens and Stateless Persons. The applicant is the family member, the basis is the residence permit of the person already here, and the Agency decides on documentary evidence, as it does on every route. Who counts as a family member is defined by the Law, as it reads at the time of writing: the spouse, a minor child, a fully dependent person who is a beneficiary of support or has a disability and is in the alien's care, and the parent of a minor alien. An adult child or the parent of an adult is not a family member under that definition, and the position of each relative is checked for the particular family. On the property and investment routes the position is simpler still: the spouse and children receive the same permit as the principal. A family reunification permit is a residence status. It is not tax residency, which ordinarily follows from 183 days or more of presence in any twelve months and is a separate question for each adult, and it is not the right to work.

The file is the relationship, legalised and translated

• The marriage certificate for a spouse and the birth certificate for each child, issued in the country of origin, legalised and translated into Georgian by a certified translator.
• The principal's residence permit or card, showing more than six months of validity left, and the principal's address in Georgia, which will be the family's address too.
• Each family member's passport, valid well beyond the permit period requested; a passport with under six months of validity is a blocker on every route.
• A criminal-record certificate where the rules require it for an adult applicant, legalised and translated in the same way.
• Proof of means to support the family in Georgia, where the rules ask for it, usually from the principal's income or bank balance; the current list is confirmed before filing.

Legalisation follows the country where each document was issued: an apostille for Hague Convention countries, consular legalisation, usually through the Georgian embassy, for the rest, and often neither where Georgia has a legal-assistance treaty with the issuing country, which covers much of the CIS and Central Asia. The last step is always a certified Georgian translation made in Georgia, and the translator spells every name exactly as it appears in the passport. Our article on apostille and legalisation explains the chain and the order that works.

The six-month rule decides the sequence

The rule interacts with the relief that new companies enjoy on the work route. Since the amendments of 2026, a founder whose company is no more than three months old and employs no more than three foreigners receives a first work residence permit without turnover proof, for six months. That permit never has more than six months left, so the family cannot file against it. The renewal, which needs Revenue Service proof of annual turnover of at least GEL 50,000 for each foreigner applying at the time of writing, is the first permit the family can rest on, and the family files once it has been issued. A founder who wants the family to arrive together, or who cannot wait for the renewal, looks at the property route, with real property other than agricultural land valued above USD 150,000 by a certified appraiser, or the investment route from USD 300,000, where the spouse and children receive the same permit from the start. Meanwhile, nationals of the visa-free countries may enter and stay for up to a year at the time of writing, so the family can be in Georgia while the permit sequence runs.

A spouse who wants to work needs their own right to work

A family reunification permit lets the spouse live in Georgia. It does not let them work. Since 1 March 2026 a foreigner who carries on activity in Georgia, as an employee or in their own name, needs the right to work under the Law on Labour Migration unless an exemption applies, and the Law's exemption list, as it reads at the time of writing, names no family member of a permit holder, so a spouse is treated like anyone else. A spouse hired by a Georgian employer is a labour immigrant whose employer applies for the right to work as part of hiring, with the employer's turnover proof for each foreigner it applies for; a spouse who wants to freelance as an individual entrepreneur applies as a self-employed foreigner, with the video interview and the turnover document the rule requires once the registration is more than three months old. The exemption list at the time of writing includes work or services for a non-resident connected with that non-resident's activity outside Georgia, so a spouse who keeps a remote job with a foreign employer may be outside the rule; the current list is checked before anyone relies on it. Our article on the 2026 work authorisation rule sets out the file.

Schools and healthcare: plan them with the permit timeline

• A child who arrives visa-free can be enrolled before any permit exists, so the school year, not the permit decision, sets the arrival date in most families' plans.
• Tbilisi has international schools teaching in English and other languages; public schooling is in Georgian. Places at the international schools are limited, so the admission calendar belongs in the same plan as the permit sequence. Fees and terms are the school's, and we do not quote them.
• Private clinics in Tbilisi and Batumi serve foreigners routinely and private health insurance is widely sold. Do not assume that a state programme covers a foreign family member; the position is confirmed on request.

What this article does not answer

It does not set out the principal's own routes and their conditions, which our residence permit guide for founders covers, and it does not give the state fees or the decision tracks, which are confirmed for each file. It does not define who counts as a family member in a particular case, which depends on the Law's definition and on the family's facts, and it does not cover family members of Georgian citizens, who have their own ground. It does not name a school or quote a fee, and it does not say what a state healthcare programme covers. We prepare the principal's file and the family's, in the right sequence, check the legalisation route for each certificate, start renewals 40 days before expiry for the whole family, and prepare the spouse's right-to-work file where one is needed. We do not control the Agency's decision and we do not promise a permit for anyone.