Your Vote Travels With You in the EU

If you are an EU citizen living in a member state that is not your home country, you still have the right to vote in certain elections there. This is called the right of EU mobile citizens — and millions of people across Europe are entitled to it but never use it.

Think of a Portuguese nurse working in the Netherlands, or a Spanish teacher settled in Ireland. Both can take part in local and European Parliament elections in the country where they live, not just back home. That is a powerful democratic right worth knowing about.

EU law guarantees you the right to vote — and to stand as a candidate — in two types of election in your country of residence: local (municipal) elections and European Parliament elections. These rights are set out in the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union and supported by specific EU directives from 1993 and 1994.

National elections, however, are not covered. If you are a German citizen living in France, you cannot vote in French presidential or parliamentary elections — only French nationals can do that. To vote in German national elections, you would normally register with your home-country authorities.

Registration rules differ from country to country, so it pays to check early. In Germany, EU citizens are automatically included on local electoral rolls once they register their address (Anmeldung). In Ireland and Spain, you usually need to apply separately to be added to the register in your local area.

Estonia offers a useful example of a digital-first approach — its e-residency and online public services make checking your registration status straightforward. Wherever you live, your local town hall, municipality website, or national electoral commission is the right place to start.

You can choose to vote either in your country of residence or in your home country for European Parliament elections — but not in both. When you register to vote in your new country, you declare that you will not vote elsewhere for that same election. This prevents any risk of casting a ballot twice.

Local elections work slightly differently: because each country's local elections are separate events, the double-voting rule applies specifically to European Parliament elections where the vote happens simultaneously across all member states.

Local elections decide who runs your schools, manages your streets, and shapes social services in your neighbourhood. If you live somewhere, those decisions affect you directly — and your vote helps shape them. In cities like Brussels, Amsterdam, and Barcelona, EU mobile citizens make up a significant share of the population yet often stay off the electoral roll.

“Democracy works best when everyone who lives in a community has a say in how it is run.”

Check your registration status before the next local or European election in your area. A five-minute visit to your municipality's website could be the most civic-minded thing you do this year.