🇵🇱 Poland

Do you need to do anything?

If you presented your international passport when you received your PESEL number, you do not have to file anything: UKR status was extended automatically until 04.03.2027. If you have changed your passport since then, update the document data at any urząd gminy — it is free and your PESEL number does not change. If, however, your PESEL UKR was granted solely on the basis of a declaration of identity, without a passport, you had to confirm your identity with a valid international passport at any urząd gminy by 31.08.2026. Whoever failed to do so loses UKR status and temporary protection from 01.09.2026: the PESEL number remains, but the status in the register is changed to NUE and the legal basis of stay disappears. That deadline has already passed (today is 08.09.2026). Official pages describe the loss of status itself and publish no procedure for restoring it after the deadline — so what follows is not an official procedure but a practical step: go to the urząd gminy with your passport as soon as possible, and at the same time ask the voivodeship office or the Urząd do Spraw Cudzoziemców for an individual explanation and about another basis for legalising your stay (an ordinary zezwolenie na pobyt czasowy under the Aliens Act). Important: the CUKR residence card will not work in this case — UDSC states outright that without a valid PESEL number with UKR status a foreigner cannot obtain a CUKR card, and MOS requires that you hold UKR status on the very day the application is filed. To have a basis of stay after 04.03.2027, file an application for a CUKR residence card no later than 04.03.2027 — but only if you meet all of the conditions at once: you are a Ukrainian citizen or a family member of one; you are staying in Poland legally under temporary protection; as of 04.06.2025 you held a PESEL number with UKR status; on the day of filing you hold a PESEL number with UKR status based on a valid international passport registered at any gmina; and you have held uninterrupted UKR status for at least 365 days (365 consecutive days in any period, not necessarily immediately before filing). For children born in Poland from 24.02.2022 the last two conditions do not apply; instead, the mother must already have been issued a CUKR card. If even one condition is not met, CUKR is not your route — look for another basis of stay. The application is filed ONLY electronically through the MOS portal (mos.cudzoziemcy.gov.pl), logging in via login.gov.pl and signing it (trusted profile, qualified or personal signature). The applicant must sign in person — a proxy cannot file it, and a paper application will be left unexamined. Before filing you must pay 100 zł for issuing the card and a 340 zł stamp duty, and attach a digital photo. Processing takes 180 days; the card is issued for 3 years. If the application was filed on time and has not been decided by 04.03.2027, your stay is deemed legal until the day you collect the card (or it is annulled because you did not collect it within 60 days of the summons), or until a refusal or discontinuance decision becomes final. On the dates: Polish official sources operate with 04.03.2027 — both for UKR status and as the final deadline for filing a CUKR application. At EU level protection has been adopted in advance until 04.03.2028, but the published Polish deadlines are tied to 04.03.2027, so do not delay filing. Sources: gov.pl/web/uw-swietokrzyski/ukr-cukr---najczesciej-zadawane-pytania; gov.pl/web/udsc/wazna-informacja-dla-obywateli-ukrainy-posiadajacych-numer-pesel-ze-statusem-ukr (27.07.2026); mos.cudzoziemcy.gov.pl — "CUKR" residence card. Source: https://www.gov.pl/web/uw-swietokrzyski/ukr-cukr---najczesciej-zadawane-pytania (checked 03.09.2026).