Moving to Paraguay from Italy

Step 1

The documents an Italian citizen assembles

Paraguay's Dirección Nacional de Migraciones (DNM) expects a specific, modest set of documents. As an Italian national you gather these at home, before you fly:

• An Italian passport valid well beyond your planned travel — check the expiry date now, not at the airport.
• Your birth certificate (certificato di nascita, or estratto per riassunto dell'atto di nascita) from the Comune that holds your record.
• A Certificato del Casellario Giudiziale — the national criminal-record certificate. Italy consolidated its old certificates into this single document, which can be requested at any Procura della Repubblica regardless of where you were born. It is typically issued same-day in person and is valid for six months, so do not order it too early. This is the police record Paraguay expects from Italian citizens.
• Your marriage certificate (certificato di matrimonio) from the Comune, if you are married and applying as a couple.
• Unlike documents issued in Spain, Italian documents are in Italian and will each need a sworn translation into Spanish — and every document must also be apostilled. See Step 2 for the order in which these steps happen.

Step 2

Apostilles — Italy splits this across two authorities

Italy belongs to the Hague Apostille Convention, so Paraguay accepts an apostille and you skip consular legalization entirely. The catch: Italy uses two different apostille authorities depending on the document type, and sending a document to the wrong one is the most common delay for Italian applicants.

• Administrative and civil-status documents — your birth and marriage certificates, issued by a Comune — are apostilled by the Prefettura (the Ufficio Territoriale del Governo).
• Judicial documents — your Certificato del Casellario Giudiziale, as well as notarial deeds — are apostilled by the Procura della Repubblica. The Prefettura cannot apostille a criminal-record certificate, and the Procura cannot apostille a Comune certificate.
• After the apostille, each document needs a sworn translation into Spanish by a translator matriculated with Paraguay's Supreme Court — done in Asunción, where getting it right the first time matters.
• Sequence matters: apostille in Italy first, then translate in Paraguay, so the apostille itself is captured in the sworn translation. Confirm the order with whoever guides your file.

Be honest with yourself

AIRE is not the same as ending your Italian tax residency

This is the section most relocation marketing skips. Italy — unlike the United States — taxes by residence, not by citizenship, so leaving genuinely can end your Italian tax bill. But two things commonly get conflated. The first is AIRE: any Italian citizen who moves their habitual residence abroad must deregister from the Comune and enrol in the Anagrafe degli Italiani Residenti all'Estero within 90 days. AIRE registration is a legal obligation and the clearest administrative evidence that you have left — but it does not, by itself, make you a non-resident for tax. Italian tax law (Article 2 TUIR) still treats you as resident if, for most of the year, you are physically present in Italy, keep a habitual abode there, or keep your domicile — your principal centre of social interests, which can mean your family — in Italy. The Agenzia delle Entrate and the Guardia di Finanza are alert to people who register with AIRE while their real life stays in Italy. Separately, Italy operates a reversed-burden-of-proof presumption for citizens who move to jurisdictions on its tax-haven blacklist; Paraguay is not on that list, so that specific presumption does not automatically attach to a move to Paraguay — but the ordinary residence tests still apply in full. The honest summary: Paraguay's territorial system can be a real and lawful improvement on your tax position, provided you genuinely move your life and your centre of interests. Speak to a cross-border accountant who knows both Italian and Paraguayan rules before any tax-driven decision.

Getting there

Flights, timeline, and your first weeks

A realistic picture of the move itself:

• There are no direct flights from Italy to Asunción. Common routings connect through Madrid (where Air Europa runs a non-stop onward leg to Asunción), São Paulo, or Buenos Aires — budget a full travel day each way.
• Document preparation — ordering certificates, two different apostille authorities, sworn translation in Paraguay, and courier time — typically runs several weeks from Italy. Pace it against your criminal-record certificate's six-month validity so it does not expire before your DNM appointment.
• You do not need a visa to enter Paraguay as an Italian tourist; EU citizens enter visa-free for up to 90 days. You begin the residency process in person, after you arrive, at the DNM.
• Paraguay keeps an embassy in Rome if you need a document checked or a question answered before you fly.

FAQ

Moving to Paraguay from Italy — FAQ