A second passport for UK citizens: an additional British passport or a second citizenship

Who HM Passport Office gives a second British passport to, fees from £102, the letter and travel plans, the overlap passport, and a second citizenship through Irish descent, investment and naturalisation.

In detail

A second passport in the UK means one of two things. The first is a second British passport: HM Passport Office issues an additional passport to people whose work or travel needs it, for example while the first one sits at an embassy for a visa. The second is a second citizenship: the UK allows dual citizenship, so a British citizen who takes another country's passport stays British.

Rules and fees follow HM Passport Office guidance and GOV.UK in 2026.

A second British passport: who gets one

An additional passport is a second passport of the same type held at the same time. HM Passport Office issues it when you show a genuine need:

• business travel that needs visas, when one passport is with an embassy while you travel on the other;
• travel between countries with political differences, where a stamp from one can stop entry to the other;
• frequent travel: airline crew, haulage and food sector workers, frequent business travellers, students and the people travelling with them;
• government staff who travel for work.

One case is fixed in the guidance: if your passport carries an Israeli stamp or visa and you travel from Israel to Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria or Yemen, the additional passport is issued. An additional passport comes with full validity, and a third one is possible with a senior officer's approval.

How to apply and what it costs

You apply online or by post and explain the need in a covering letter. The fee is that of a regular passport.

• Letter: on company headed paper, signed and dated within 6 months of the application, from a senior person in your organisation or your client; the self-employed write it themselves.
• Travel plans: a schedule of trips, or a signed covering letter explaining the need if there is no schedule yet.
• Overlap passport: airline crew, haulage and food sector workers and government staff who cannot be without a passport during renewal get the new one first and return the old one within 3 months.

The second passport is not renewed automatically: each renewal comes with fresh evidence of the need. If you only run out of pages, the 54-page frequent traveller passport solves it with one document.

A second citizenship: the UK allows it

Dual citizenship is allowed in the UK. You keep British citizenship when you take another, and you do not ask anyone for permission. What matters is whether the other country allows it: Ireland, Portugal and the Caribbean investment countries do, while India and Japan ask you to keep one.

• Irish by descent: with a grandparent born on the island of Ireland, you register in the Foreign Births Register: €278 for an adult, €153 under 18. A parent born in Ireland makes you Irish automatically.
• By investment: Caribbean programmes such as Antigua and Barbuda and St Kitts and Nevis are compared in Caribbean citizenship by investment.
• By residence: naturalisation after living in the country, as in Irish naturalisation or Portuguese citizenship.

Back home you enter the UK on your British or Irish passport: British dual citizens cannot get an electronic travel authorisation, so the British passport is kept valid. The UK rules in detail are in UK dual citizenship rules, and all countries' rules are in which countries allow dual citizenship.

Which second passport fits your case

For the right to live in the EU, an EU passport such as the Irish one opens all member states; a passport by investment gives visa-free travel and a place to move to quickly.

FAQ