French Level for a Visa or Residence Permit

A French long-stay visa requires no French at all. The language condition starts at the first renewal, once you are in France and applying for a residence permit - and since 1 January 2026 those thresholds moved up a full step, with a certificate now required where attendance at classes used to be enough.

This article covers each rung of the residence ladder, what level it now demands, what proof is accepted, and how much study each step actually represents. If your target is the passport rather than the card, the naturalisation rules are covered separately in the guide to French levels for citizenship.

Where on the ladder does French actually become a requirement?

Four stages, and only three of them ask for a language level.

Read the third column against the fourth and the shape of the reform is clear: every rung moved up one step, and the multi-year permit acquired a certification requirement it never had.

The change comes from décret no. 2025-648 of 15 July 2025, applying law no. 2024-42 of 26 January 2024. It applies to the filing date: a complete file received on or before 31 December 2025 is assessed under the old rules.

Immigration rules change and préfectures vary in how they apply them. Treat this as orientation and confirm your own case on service-public.gouv.fr or with your préfecture before booking anything.

Why does the visa itself ask for nothing?

Because it is decided abroad, on a different question. A long-stay visa file is about your purpose of stay, your means of support and your accommodation - student, employee, visitor, family. No consulate asks you to conjugate anything.

That is exactly why the requirement surprises people. The mental model most new arrivals carry is that the language question was settled when the visa was granted. It was not settled; it was deferred, and the deadline is your first renewal, typically about a year after arrival.

The practical reading: your first year in France is the study window, and it is enough time. A2 sits at roughly 160 to 200 guided hours in the usual teaching convention, which is a realistic year at a few hours a week - the arithmetic by study pace is in how long it takes to learn French.

What does A2 actually mean?

A2 is the second of the six CEFR levels and the point at which you stop needing English to get through an ordinary day.

At A2 you can handle a shop, a doctor’s appointment, a train ticket and a short exchange about your job or your family. You can talk about the past, which is the real content of the level: the passé composé and the imparfait both live here, and so does the choice between them.

• Je suis arrivé en France en septembre. - I arrived in France in September.
• Je cherchais un appartement près du travail. - I was looking for a flat near work.

Grammatically, A2 covers the past tenses, object pronouns, y and en, the future, the present conditional and the first relative pronouns. The full unit-by-unit list is on the A2 curriculum page, and where it sits in the wider sequence is in French grammar by CEFR level.

What does the jump to B1 involve?

More than the single letter suggests. B1 is where you move from transactions to opinions: holding a position, narrating an experience, following a discussion on a familiar subject, writing a structured complaint.

The usual convention puts B1 at roughly 350 to 400 cumulative guided hours from absolute beginner - a little over double the A2 figure. Grammatically it brings the plus-que-parfait, the gérondif, the passive, reported speech, and the relative pronouns dont and lequel.

First applications for the ten-year carte de résident filed from 2026 also require the civic examination on French history, institutions and the values of the Republic. It is a separate condition from the language certificate, it is administered in French, and passing one does not exempt you from the other. The practical effect is that the real language demand sits slightly above the certificate you present.

Which proof is accepted, and which should you choose?

Two families of document, and the difference matters more than the difficulty does.

Diplomas, which never expire. DELF A2 or DELF B1, issued by France Éducation international on behalf of the French Ministry of Education. Once you have it, it is permanent, and a higher diploma satisfies a lower requirement.

Tests, valid two years. The TCF IRN - Intégration, Résidence et Nationalité - is built specifically for these procedures, and the TEF has an equivalent version. Both produce an attestation with a two-year clock.

That clock is the trap. Residence files can sit for months, and an attestation that lapses mid-procedure is a document you have to buy twice. DELF sessions are less frequent but the diploma removes the problem permanently for roughly the same preparation. If you have no deadline pressure, take the diploma. The two families are compared side by side, scoring included, in DELF, DALF, TCF or TEF: which one do you need.

Does the OFII integration contract still count?

It still exists, and it is still useful - but it is no longer the proof.

On arrival you sign the contrat d’intégration républicaine with the OFII, which includes civic training and, if your assessed level is below the target, free French classes. Some categories, including talent-passport holders and their families, are not required to sign it at all.

What changed in 2026 is the status of that training. Attending the classes used to satisfy the multi-year permit; now a certificate at the required level is a separate condition on top. The sensible way to read it: the OFII hours are free preparation, and the test is the deliverable. If your assigned training stops at A1, you are still short of the A2 the permit now asks for, and closing that gap is on you.

What should you do about it?

Work backwards from your renewal date, not forwards from your arrival.

If your first renewal is roughly a year away and you are starting from zero, A2 is comfortably reachable at a few hours a week, provided the hours are real. If you are already at A2 and the ten-year card is the next milestone, budget for the gap being larger than it looks and add the civic exam to the plan.

Whatever the target, the fastest route between two CEFR levels is volume of input you can mostly follow rather than more grammar explanation - the method is in how to learn French by reading, and it is why Gallus grades its stories across all 61 levels of the A1 to C1 curriculum instead of sorting them by topic.

And check the current rule before you pay for anything. This area moved once in 2026 already.