University of Oulu

Work during study

A student holding a Finnish residence permit for studies may work in paid employment, in any field, for an average of 30 hours per week (raised from 25 hours by a legislative amendment effective 15 April 2022) — equivalent to an average of 120 hours per month or 1,560 hours per year. The weekly figure can be exceeded in some weeks as long as the yearly average stays at or under 30 hours, and a student may work full-time during holidays provided the same yearly average is respected. Diploma work or internships that are a credit-bearing, agreed part of the student's own degree are exempt from the hours limit entirely (unless registered as an internship only after the fact, in which case the 30-hour limit applies).

Post-study work visa

Residence permit for students and researchers to look for work or start a business . Up to 2 years
Available to someone who has held a Finnish residence permit for studies or for research and does not yet have a job, or has one that doesn't pay enough to qualify for a work-based permit. It must be applied for within 5 years of the study/research permit expiring. A first or extended permit under this route can be granted for up to 2 years in total, and can optionally be taken in up to three separate parts, each at least 6 months long, with the last part ending within 3 years of when the first part started. The permit carries an unrestricted right to work in any field while it is valid, so no new permit is needed the moment a job is found — though a graduate who does find qualifying work should still apply for a residence permit on the basis of that work (e.g. the 'degree completed in Finland' permit) before this one expires. Holding a full 2-year job-seeking permit does not, on its own, count as meeting the residence requirement for a permanent residence permit granted on jobseeking/business-founding grounds specifically — a graduate still needs to separately meet a permanent-residence application path's own requirements.

Route to permanent residence

A graduate who secures qualifying work can obtain a continuous residence permit (an 'A permit', e.g. the 'degree completed in Finland' work permit, which carries an unrestricted right to work) and, once holding a valid A permit, is on the path toward a permanent residence permit. As of a set of Aliens Act amendments that entered into force on 8 January 2026, the period-of-residence requirement for a permanent residence permit is no longer a flat figure: an applicant must choose an 'application path' with its own required period, and the Finnish Immigration Service's own page uses 6 years (2,190 days) as its example of the current standard continuous-residence requirement — up from the 4 years that applied to applications submitted before that date. 'Continuous residence' does not require physical presence the whole time: a person must have actually resided in Finland for at least half of that qualifying period (e.g. at least 3 years out of a 6-year period), with ordinary travel not breaking continuity as long as absences don't add up to more than half the permit's validity. A separate, faster P-EU (EU long-term resident) permit route, unaffected by the January 2026 change, still requires 5 years.

Route to citizenship

Finnish citizenship is decided by the Finnish Immigration Service (Migri) — the same authority that runs residence permits. Following amendments that entered into force 1 October 2024, the standard period-of-residence requirement is 8 years of living in Finland, reduced to 5 years if the applicant already meets the language-skills requirement for citizenship (Finnish or Swedish at least at 'satisfactory,' CEFR-equivalent B1, level) — Migri's own page frames this explicitly as one of several situations where the 8-year figure is reduced, alongside routes for a Finnish spouse, a Nordic citizen, and others. A further amendment took effect 17 December 2025 (chiefly changing income/livelihood documentation), underlining that this is an area under active reform and worth re-checking before relying on it. Finland permits multiple/dual citizenship: Migri's own FAQ states directly that acquiring another country's citizenship does not cause loss of Finnish citizenship, 'Finnish legislation allows multiple citizenship (dual citizenship)' — so becoming a Finnish citizen does not require renouncing an applicant's original nationality.

What the government currently prioritises

Finland gates its standard employment-based residence permit with a 'labour market test': an occupation is treated as short of labour — and the employer excused from having to prove no suitable local/EU/EEA candidate exists — when that occupation appears in the relevant regional Economic Development Centre's own work permit policy (classified at the 4-digit ISCO occupation-code level), or when it is designated a 'national labour shortage sector' by the Government's own Labour Force Barometer tool. Outside those listed occupations/sectors, an oversupply reading on the Labour Force Barometer generally blocks a new employment-based permit from outside the EU/EEA. Separately, a graduate who has completed their own degree in Finland can apply for the 'degree completed in Finland' work permit, which does not require a labour market test at all regardless of occupation. This dataset does not reproduce the specific regional or national shortage-sector lists themselves, which live on affiliated sites (elinvoimakeskus.fi, tyovoimabarometri.fi) outside migri.fi and change periodically.