The Tourist Visa: Staying in Spain and the Schengen Area

The most up-to-date guide on the Schengen (tourist) visa, category C on the web, and for those traveling to Spain in particular

What is the Schengen visa?
What are the Schengen-area countries? Where is the Schengen visa valid?
Who needs a Schengen visa and who doesn’t need one?
How long is the Schengen visa good for?
Can I leave and enter the Schengen area more than once?
Where can I apply for the Schengen visa?

What is the Schengen visa?

In a nutshell, the Schengen visa, category C, also known as a standard tourist visa for Europe, is a short-term visa that allows you to travel to, stay in, and travel freely within the Schengen-area countries as a tourist, student, or business person. (In this article we will only concern ourselves with category C of the Schengen visa, which is intended for short stays, unlike category A, which is an airport transit visa intended for brief stop-overs at airports for people of certain nationalities, etc.) Note that the Schengen visa does not allow you to reside, work, or be self-employed in Spain or any of the Schengen-area countries. Those activities, regardless of their duration, are governed by separate visas and legislation. 

The Schengen visa gets its name from the Schengen acquis, which commonly refers to the sum of two international agreements (the 1985 Schengen Agreement and the 1990 Schengen Convention) and the related European Union laws and regulations made possible by the 1999 Treaty of Amsterdam. The Schengen acquis concerns itself with the free movement of persons and provides for shared rules regarding short-stay visas, the absence of internal borders, shared rules for external borders, and the creation of the Schengen Information System database (SIS), as well as customs, judicial, and police cooperation and the sharing of information in order to combat trafficking, fraud, illegal immigration, and other crimes.

Making things a bit more complicated is the fact that being part of the Schengen area, being bound to the Schengen acquis, and/or being part of the European Union are not the same thing with regard to the Schengen visa. But I’ll explain more on this later.

What are the Schengen-area countries? Where is the Schengen visa valid?

For the purposes of the Schengen (tourist) visa and Schengen border controls, the current Schengen area is composed of 22 European Union countries – Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, and Sweden – in addition to two associated countries, Norway and Iceland.

The Azores and Madeira, as part of Portugal, and the Canary Islands and Balearic Islands, as part of Spain, are included in the Schengen area. Ceuta and Melilla – Spain’s autonomous cities in northern Africa – are a special case: they are part of the Schengen area, but border control is still in force there. France’s overseas possessions, on the other hand, are considered to be outside of the area.
Ireland, the UK, Cyprus, Bulgaria, and Romania are all members of the European Union and the Schengen acquis. However, Ireland and the UK have reserved the right to only subscribe to certain provisions of the acquis and do retain their own border controls. Cyprus, Bulgaria, and Romania, on the other hand, do plan to fully participate in the Schengen area, but this has not been implemented as of yet. 

Liechtenstein and Switzerland are not European Union members (though Liechtenstein is a member of the European Economic Area), but they are subscribers to the Schengen acquis, and like Cyprus, Bulgaria, and Romania, their participation in the Schengen area has not been implemented yet. 

Who needs to apply for a Schengen visa and who doesn’t need one?

You do not need to apply for a Schengen (tourist) visa to travel to Spain and the Schengen area if you meet the following conditions:

1. You have a valid passport or travel document.
2. You plan to stay in the Schengen area for a maximum of 90 days.
3. You are a passport holder of one of the following countries: Andorra, Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Brunei, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, El Salvador, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Guatemala, Holland, Honduras, Hong Kong and Macao (China), Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Malta, Mexico, Monaco, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Panama, Paraguay, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Korea, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States, Uruguay, or Venezuela.

(Note that EU citizens do not need a visa to travel anywhere within the Schengen area, and neither do their official family members, i.e. spouses, when in possession of a valid residence permit from a Schengen member country, excluding permits from Ireland or the UK.)

If you meet the three conditions listed above, then you are exempt from the visa requirement, though you are considered as if you were in possession of a Schengen (tourist) visa when you enter the Schengen area. Exceptions include being deemed a “threat to public policy or national security” to any Schengen-area country or having earned the dubious honor of being banned from the Schengen area as recorded in the Schengen Information System database (SIS). However, even though you don’t actually need to apply for the Schengen (tourist) visa, as a short-stay traveler without additional authorization you must still abide by the limitations of the Schengen visa (i.e., the maximum length of stay). 

If you are planning to stay in the Schengen area for less than 90 days, but you are a passport holder of a country on the following list (or if you do not currently have a country or are a national of a non-recognized country), then you will need to go ahead and apply for a Schengen (tourist) visa: Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, Angola, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belarus, Belize, Benin, Bhutan, Bolivia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cambodia, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Central Africa, Chad, China, Colombia, Comoro Islands, Congo, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Côte d’Ivoire, Cuba, Djibouti, Dominica, Dominican Republic, East Timor, Ecuador, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Fiji, Gabon, The Gambia, Georgia, Ghana, Granada, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Guyana, Haiti, India, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Jamaica, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Kiribati, Kuwait, Laos, Lebanon, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Macedonia, Madagascar, Malawi, Maldives, Mali, Marshall Islands, Mauritania, Micronesia, Moldova, Mongolia, Montenegro, Morocco, Mozambique, Myanmar, Namibia, Nauru, Nepal, Niger, Nigeria, North Korea, Northern Marianas, Oman, Pakistan, Palau, Palestinian National Authority, Papua-New Guinea, Peru, the Philippines, Qatar, Russia, Rwanda, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Solomon, Sao Tome and Principe, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Serbia, Sierra Leone, Somalia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Suriname, Swaziland, Syria, Tajikistan, Taiwan, Tanzania, Thailand, Togo, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Tuvalu, Uganda, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, Uzbekistan, Vanuatu, Vietnam, Western Samoa, Yemen, Zambia, or Zimbabwe.

If you are a national of a country that does not appear in this section on the two lists of countries, then please check with your nearest embassy or consulate of Spain or Schengen-area country regarding your particular visa requirements.

If you are not a citizen of a European Union country AND you plan to stay in Spain and/or anywhere in the entire Schengen area for more than 90 days in any 180-day period, then you will need a work, residence, long-term, and/or other type of visa (depending on what you plan to do) from the country you currently live in to do so. 

Last but not least, no matter what your nationality is, if you already hold a valid residence permit with a Schengen member country (except for residence permits issued by Ireland or the UK), then that is automatically considered equal to a Schengen visa (which is only valid up to 90 days) when traveling to other Schengen countries, but you will still need to carry a valid passport or travel document issued from the country where you hold citizenship.

…Continue reading PART 2 of
The Tourist Visa: Staying in Spain and the Schengen Area, Schengen Visa Spain

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Last updated 18 05 2011