ANEF explained: France's residence-permit portal, start to finish

There was a time, not so long ago, when getting a French residence permit meant a dawn queue outside the préfecture, a numbered ticket, a functionary behind glass, and a folder of papers you'd photocopied at the tabac the night before. Much of that is gone now, folded into a single website with the very French name of Administration Numérique pour les Étrangers en France — the ANEF. Everyone just says "anef", to rhyme roughly with "a chef".

On a good day it is a genuine improvement: you upload your life from your kitchen table, pay online, and watch the status change. On a bad day it is a beige screen that has rejected your proof of address for the third time without telling you why, while your current card ticks quietly towards its expiry date. This guide is written for both days. We'll go through it in the order it actually happens — account, application, the wait, the documents that keep you legal, and the things that go wrong — so that by the end the portal holds no more mystery, even if it still holds a queue.

What ANEF actually is (and what it replaced)

ANEF is the Ministry of the Interior's online portal for almost everything to do with the residence permits of non-EU nationals. If you are British and moved here after Brexit, that means you. It handles first applications, renewals, changes of status, duplicate cards for loss or theft, and the payment of the fees attached to all of them. It sits at one address, which is worth committing to memory or bookmarking properly rather than reaching via a search engine, because convincing lookalike sites exist:

administration-etrangers-en-france.interieur.gouv.fr

The thing to understand is that ANEF is a front door, not a decision-maker. Behind it still sit the préfectures and their staff — real people reading your dossier — but the paperwork, the payment and the tracking have moved online. This is why the portal can feel oddly two-faced: slick and instant when you're uploading, then silent for weeks while a human somewhere works through a pile. Both things are true at once, and holding that in mind will save you a good deal of frustration.

Not every permit type has migrated, and the coverage keeps widening. Student permits, passeport talent, vie privée et familiale, visitor and salaried categories are all handled online. If you fall into an unusual category and the portal can't find your case, that's the signal to contact your préfecture directly rather than assuming you've done something wrong.

Getting an account: your numéro étranger

Everything on ANEF hangs off two things: an account, and a numéro étranger — your foreigner number, the reference the whole system uses to know who you are. There are two ways you arrive at this point, and which one applies to you depends on how you got here.

If you came on a long-stay visa

Most Britons moving over now do so on a visa de long séjour, which within its first months must be "validated" online — a separate step, on a separate government site, that effectively switches your visa on as a residence permit for its first year. That validation usually generates your numéro étranger. When it later comes time to renew, you log in to ANEF, and if you use the same email address throughout, your existing record is often waiting for you. This is the single best housekeeping habit in French immigration admin: use one email address for everything, from visa to validation to ANEF, and never let it lapse.

If you're applying from scratch

If you don't yet have a number — say you're changing status from within France — you create the account directly. The flow runs roughly like this, and takes about ten minutes:

1. Go to the portal and choose Particuliers, then Créer mon compte.
2. Indicate that you are a foreign national (Je suis un étranger).
3. Enter your passport number, an email address and a mobile number.
4. Verify your identity — either through FranceConnectA single secure login that opens more than a thousand French government services. if you already have a French login, or by email and SMS codes if you don't.
5. Receive your numéro étranger and set a password.

Write the number down somewhere permanent. You will be asked for it more often than you expect, sometimes years later, and hunting for it inside old emails at a stressful moment is a rite of passage worth skipping.

Making an application, step by step

Whether it's a first permit or a renewal, the shape of an ANEF application is the same, and it rewards preparation. Gather everything before you start, because a half-finished dossier that times out is a special kind of misery.

You'll first choose the permit category — étudiant, passeport talent, vie privée et familiale, visiteur and so on. Choosing correctly matters, because it determines both the documents you'll be asked for and the fee. If you're unsure which category your situation falls under, that's a question worth resolving before you touch the portal, because switching category midway is not a two-click affair.

Then comes the upload. The exact list varies by category, but almost every dossier wants: a valid passport, proof of address dated within the last three months, evidence of your resources or income, proof of health cover, and a digital identity photograph. That last one has a wrinkle worth knowing.

The e-photo, and why the booth matters

ANEF doesn't want you to upload a selfie. It wants an e-photo — a digitally signed photograph and signature produced by an approved Photomaton or Photo-me booth, the kind you find in shopping centres and larger mairiesThe town hall — the first port of call for a huge range of local admin.. The booth gives you a code and a physical slip; you enter the code into ANEF and it fetches the certified image. Trying to short-cut this with a phone photo is one of the most common reasons an application stalls. Find a booth that advertises agréé ANEF or "e-photo residence permit", and keep the paper slip until your card is in your hand.

Paying the timbre fiscal

French administration is fond of the timbre fiscal — a "tax stamp", which today is simply an online payment. Inside the application you'll pay yours by card, and for most residence permits it lands somewhere between €99 and €225 depending on the category. Keep the confirmation. If an application is refused or withdrawn, recovering a timbre is possible but tiresome, so it's worth being sure of your dossier before you reach the payment step.

Submit, and the portal issues you a récépissé more or less immediately — of which much more below. That récépissé is your proof that you have applied and are here legally while the machinery turns.

The three documents that actually protect you

If you remember nothing else from this guide, remember these three. Between them they are the difference between "my card is being processed" and "I can prove, to an employer, a landlord, a bank or a border guard, that I am legally here and allowed to work and travel." People get into trouble not because their application fails, but because they don't know which piece of paper to wave, and when.

The récépissé

The récépissé de demande is generated when you submit, and again when a favourable decision is reached. It's a downloadable document that stands in for your card while you wait. Depending on its wording it authorises you to remain in France and, crucially, often to keep working. Download it, print a copy, and keep the PDF somewhere you can reach from your phone. When someone official asks for proof of status and your new card hasn't arrived, this is usually what you show.

The attestation de décision favorable

When your dossier is approved, ANEF issues an attestation de décision favorable — confirmation that yes, the answer is yes, and the physical card is now in production. You'll typically be called (a convocation) to give biometrics and collect the card in person. Until you do, the attestation plus your récépissé carry your status.

The attestation de prolongation d'instruction — the quiet hero

This is the one almost nobody tells you about, and it is arguably the most useful artefact the whole portal produces. Suppose your current card is about to expire but your renewal is still being examined. The attestation de prolongation d'instruction legally extends your rights — to stay, to work, and to travel within Schengen and return — in renewable three-month stretches, precisely to cover that gap. It is accepted by employers, banks and border control. If you are ever in the nervous position of an expiring card and a pending dossier, this document is your friend, and knowing to download it turns a panic into a non-event.

Every ANEF status, and what it really means

The portal narrates your dossier through a series of statuses, and their blandness hides real meaning. Tap the one you're staring at right now — here's what each is actually telling you.

Step 1Dossier déposé — submitted

You've filed, and the clock has started. This is the moment your application officially exists. Nothing is required of you; the wait begins.

Step 2Dossier en cours d'instruction — under review

A human, or at least a queue destined for one, now has your case. There is nothing for you to do here except wait, and resist the urge to refresh. This is where dossiers spend most of their weeks.

BranchDemande d'éléments complémentaires — more documents wanted

The préfecture wants something else, or something clearer. Processing pauses while it waits for your reply, and you'll usually have around a month to respond. Importantly, the expiry date of your existing card doesn't move because of this — but do reply promptly, because the clock on the whole application is effectively parked until you do. Read the request carefully: it will name what's missing, though not always as plainly as you'd like.

OutcomeDécision favorable — approved

The good word. You'll receive your attestation and, shortly, a convocation to collect your card and give biometrics. Your downloadable récépissé bridges the gap until the card is physically in your hand.

OutcomeDécision défavorable — refused

The application has been declined. This is not necessarily the end of the road: you typically have a two-month window to lodge a recours gracieux (asking the same authority to reconsider) or to escalate to an administrative tribunal. A refusal is the point at which professional advice earns its fee, and quickly, because those two months are strict.

FinalPrêt à être édité — ready to print

Your card is in production. You're over the line; it's now a matter of manufacture and collection.

Why ANEF keeps asking for the same document

This is the complaint we hear most, and it drives otherwise calm people to distraction: you upload your proof of address, it's rejected; you upload it again, rejected again; nothing tells you what's wrong. Nine times out of ten the problem is not the content of the document but its form. Work through this list before you upload anything a second time.

First, legibility and format. ANEF wants clear PDFs or high-quality scans, not dim photographs taken at an angle with a thumb in the corner. A crisp scan or a proper "scan to PDF" from a phone app beats a snapshot every time. Second, file size and type: oversized files, unusual formats, or password-protected PDFs (some bank statements arrive locked) will be silently refused. Remove any password and export a clean copy. Third, dates: "proof of address within three months" means exactly that, measured from the day you upload, and a bill from four months ago will bounce however valid it feels. Fourth, the right document for the box: uploading a perfectly good electricity bill into the slot that wanted a rental contract will read as "missing", because the system is matching slots, not reading minds.

The e-photo deserves its own mention here, because a self-taken photo dropped into the identity-photo slot is a frequent cause of a loop that feels personal but isn't. If that slot keeps rejecting you, it's the booth code you're missing, not your good looks.

When you've genuinely done everything right and it still loops, the honest truth is that ANEF has its off days, and human help exists. Free assistance is available through associations and solidarity organisations who do this daily, and public libraries and France Services points can sit with you. There is no shame in it; even the French find this hard, and the platform runs in French only.

Timelines, and the golden rule of renewals

Here is the sentence to tattoo somewhere sensible: start your renewal well before your card expires — two to four months is sensible, and earlier is better. Processing commonly runs two to six months, and while the attestation de prolongation exists precisely to cover an overrun, you do not want to be relying on it because you left things late. Begin early, and the prolongation becomes a comfortable backstop rather than a lifeline.

Two more timing points earn their keep. If you move house, you must declare your change of address within three months — and a stale address is a classic reason renewal correspondence goes astray. And if you travel while a dossier is pending, carry your récépissé or prolongation; returning to France without proof of a live application is a border conversation nobody enjoys.

What's new for 2026

Two changes are worth flagging because they catch people out. The first is the civics requirement: from the start of 2026, a civics test applies to multi-year residence cards, the ten-year carte de résident, and naturalisation. Expect a test of around 45 minutes on French values, history, institutions and daily life, a pass mark near 80%, a fee in the region of €69, and validity of about four years. Alongside it, several permits now expect demonstrable French at roughly A2 level — the kind of thing our language guide is built to get you to without pain.

The second is a broader push towards simplified, near-tacit renewals for some long-term permits, handled as an online declaration rather than a full re-application. Where it applies it's a genuine mercy; where it doesn't, the full process above still stands. Because these rules are moving quickly, treat the exact figures here as current-for-2026 and worth a sanity-check against the official site at the moment you apply — which is exactly the sort of change we track on the noticeboard.

When to stop clicking and get help

ANEF is designed for self-service, and most people do get through it alone. But there are moments to reach for a human: a décision défavorable with its two-month appeal clock; a category or status change you're unsure of; a dossier stuck far beyond the usual window with no message explaining why; or simply a level of French that makes a French-only legal process a genuine barrier. Immigration lawyers and specialist advisers exist for exactly these, and the free associations and France Services points exist for the rest. Knowing when to ask is not failure; it's the same judgement you'd use with any officialdom in any country.

Handled with a little foresight — one email address, an early start, clean PDFs, the right three documents saved to your phone — ANEF turns from an ordeal into ordinary admin. Slow, occasionally sullen, but navigable. And once you've been through it once, the second time is remarkably calm.

Fees, deadlines and portal steps described here are current for 2026 and drawn from official sources, but French immigration rules change often and vary by préfecture and permit type. Pimpernel are not immigration lawyers. Always confirm the specifics for your situation on the official ANEF site (administration-etrangers-en-france.interieur.gouv.fr) or with a qualified adviser before acting. This guide is general information, not legal advice.