In short: with Ukrainian temporary protection you can apply for arraigo (residence based on social ties) without giving up protection first. SEM Instructions 2/2026 set aside the rule that you must not hold another permit (art. 126.h) and count your time under temporary protection toward the 2 years of continuous stay (art. 126.b). The form is EX-10 and the fee is 38.28 €. The office has 3 months to decide and, if it does not answer, the application counts as refused. The permit lasts 1 year and includes work authorisation.
In person or by representative? Mixed. The person applies in their own name; a legal representative only steps in if the applicant is a minor or has a disability (art. 130.1). The form is filed at the Immigration Office (Oficina de Extranjería) of your province (appointment) or, for social and sociolaboral arraigo, through Mercurio. Socioformativo arraigo is listed as in person only (sheet 30). The TIE card is requested in person at the police.
Which type of arraigo fits. Common requirements (arts. 126 and 130):
- 2 continuous years in Spain before you file. Information sheets 28 and 30 add that absences in that time cannot exceed 90 days.
- No criminal record in Spain or in the country where you lived during the 5 years before entering Spain.
- Fee paid.
Then each type asks for something of its own:
- You work or have a contract: arraigo sociolaboral (art. 127.b). One or more contracts adding up to at least 20 hours a week, with pay not below the minimum wage (SMI) in proportion to the hours, and an employer who meets art. 74 except the national employment situation test. Once the application is admitted for processing you can work provisionally (art. 130.5). Card: arraigo sociolaboral.
- You do not work and have family with legal residence: arraigo social (art. 127.c). Spouse, registered partner, parents or children with legal residence, plus financial means: 200 % of the IPREM in total (100 % for the upkeep of the relative with legal residence and 100 % for yours, available in Spain, according to sheet 28). The IPREM is the public income indicator; the euro amount is on its card. Without such ties, a social integration report from your regional government or town hall is enough. Cards: arraigo social and integration report.
- You study: arraigo socioformativo (art. 125.1.d), with its own rule. The fourth instruction says that whoever can use art. 191 must apply for that modification. Whoever cannot applies for this arraigo without art. 127.d being applied. It is enough to show that you do one of the activities in art. 52.1 and that you continue it when you extend. These include, among others, higher education, bachillerato and intermediate vocational training, volunteering, and Spanish courses at an official language school or at a centre accredited by the Instituto Cervantes. Sheet 30 and the EX-10 do not reflect this yet (see “What is not confirmed”). Card: arraigo socioformativo.
- Family member of a Spaniard (spouse, partner, child under 26, parent of a Spanish minor): not arraigo. The fifth instruction allows it with temporary protection by another route: residence as a family member of a Spaniard with temporary protection (EX-24).
- Parent of a minor who is a citizen of another EU, EEA or Swiss state: arraigo familiar (art. 127.e), with no minimum time in Spain and a 5-year permit (arts. 126.b and 125.2), card arraigo familiar. The other types are in types of arraigo.
What changes with temporary protection.
- Art. 126.h does not apply. In ordinary arraigo it requires that you do not hold another permit or have another procedure open (second instruction, paragraph 1).
- Time under temporary protection counts toward the 2 years (second instruction, paragraph 2).
- The EX-10 has no box for temporary protection: you tick “Residencia inicial” and the type of arraigo. As our own suggestion, not an official requirement, you can add a cover letter citing SEM Instructions 2/2026 (the second instruction, or the fourth if you study).
- Forms EX-31 and EX-32 belong to other routes (the 20th and 21st additional provisions of the Regulation), not to this procedure: sheets 28 to 30 ask for the EX-10.
How, where, how much and when.
- Form: EX-10, “Solicitud de autorización de residencia por circunstancias excepcionales”, in the official list of forms (our forms card).
- Fee: form 790, code 052, heading 2.3.1: 38.28 € (Order PJC/617/2025), payable within 10 working days of filing.
- Deadline: 3 months from when the application reaches the register of the competent body. No answer counts as a refusal (negative silence): see what to do. If something is missing, the office gives you up to 15 days to complete it (art. 130.3) and, if you do not, it closes the file.
- Permit: 1 year, with authorisation to work as an employee or self-employed (under socioformativo, up to 30 hours a week as an employee, art. 131). The TIE is requested within 1 month of the notification (how to get the TIE).
- Afterwards: when the year ends it can be extended. For social and sociolaboral the extension requires active job search and registration with the public employment service, unless there are justified reasons (art. 132). Sheet 29 also provides for switching to a residence and work permit under art. 191.
The full document list by type and the box-by-box walkthrough of the EX-10 are in the PDF guide on this page. This card does not repeat them and may be incomplete.
Criminal-record certificate from Ukraine. Arraigo requires the certificate from the country or countries where you lived during the 5 years before entering Spain (art. 130.2; sheets 28 to 30). For someone who lived in Ukraine, that is the Ukrainian one (how to request it from Spain). A foreign public document needs an apostille or legalisation and a sworn translation into Spanish. According to the Embassy of Ukraine in Spain, the electronic extract from Diia carries no apostille and the consular certificate is not accepted by every Spanish body. The paper extract with an apostille is the one most likely to be asked for, it says. The apostille on documents of Ukraine’s Ministry of the Interior is affixed by that ministry (apostille for Ukrainian documents). The Embassy speaks of a translation with a notary’s signature; the Spanish sheets ask for a sworn translator, which is the one to follow. The office checks your record in Spain by itself, and police records appearing does not by itself mean automatic refusal (art. 130.2).
The certificate from Ukraine is not required if you have spent 5 continuous years in Spain right before filing (art. 130.2, point 1). Someone who arrived in March 2022 reaches that in March 2027; someone who arrived later, afterwards.
Arraigo or the change to a residence and work permit (EX-26). If you work or have a contract, the first instruction allows art. 191 to be applied to temporary protection (EX-26 card). The official differences:
- Duration: arraigo gives 1 year. Art. 191.3 provides for 4 years when you have at least 1 year of residence and your previous permit already allowed work. The temporary protection decision includes work authorisation (Order PCM/169/2022, art. 5.1). Whether offices apply it that way to temporary protection is not officially confirmed.
- Certificate from Ukraine: arraigo requires it. Sheet 55, which lists the documents for art. 191, does not include it.
- When arraigo remains the route: if art. 191 does not work for you because you have no contract or do not meet the conditions of art. 80 (the EX-26 card explains them), if you study without working, or if you fit arraigo social.
- They are not mutually exclusive: when the arraigo year ends, sheet 29 provides for moving to art. 191.
- With 5 continuous years in Spain: another route is national long-term residence. The sixth instruction counts the time under temporary protection in full (card for temporary protection).
After the grant: renouncing temporary protection. The seventh instruction puts the renunciation after you obtain the new permit, not before. It is an express renunciation (art. 24.1.d of RD 1325/2003) filed with the OAR form through the electronic register, and the receipt is shown when you request the TIE. With the renunciation the benefits of temporary protection end. What else is lost (housing in the reception system, aid) we have not checked. How to file it: renouncing temporary protection.
Dates of temporary protection. The temporary-protection TIE is valid until 4 March 2027 (Order INT/96/2026). The EU has already extended the protection until 4 March 2028 (Decision (EU) 2026/1912); the Spanish order for the cards is not on record as of 3 October 2026. Context and the other routes: SEM Instructions 2/2026.
What is not confirmed.
- Students (fourth instruction). Sheet 30 and the EX-10 do not reflect that art. 127.d does not apply: the training-centre box of the EX-10 only offers the courses of that article. There is no official clarification on whether offices will accept university studies or Spanish courses. Nor on whether they will still ask for the social integration report or require the full-time dedication that art. 52 defines. We have not found published cases.
- Sheets that predate the Instruction. Sheets 28 to 30 date from April 2026 and do not mention temporary protection. Sheet 29 does not repeat the 90-day absence limit that sheets 28 and 30 contain.
- Proof of the 2 years. The sheets give registration at the town hall (empadronamiento), public medical records and other official documents as examples; they do not name the temporary-protection decision or TIE. Whether those serve as proof is not officially clarified.
- Arraigo social. It is not clarified whether a relative who also holds temporary protection counts as holder of a residence authorisation for art. 127.c.
- Certificate from Ukraine. The sheets do not say how long the certificate stays valid for the immigration office, and we have found no official alternative for someone who cannot obtain it (search 2026-10-03).
- EX-26 with temporary protection. Sheet 55 dates from August 2025, before the Instruction, and there is no published management criterion on how to apply art. 191.3 to temporary protection.
- Fee in 2026. The 38.28 € is the amount in Order PJC/617/2025, whose consolidated text was last updated on 16.06.2025; the order provides for annual updating. Check the amount on form 790 the day you pay.
- Real cases. We have found no public accounts of an arraigo applied for from temporary protection (see “Community experience”).
Official source: SEM Instructions 2/2026 (PDF) · RD 1155/2024, consolidated text · EX forms, Migraciones.
Informational only; check the official source and a professional for your specific case.