The Federal Statistical Office (FSO) of Switzerland has announced that, in 2019, almost a million of the country’s resident population were dual Swiss nationals. The share of the dual passport-holders increased from 14% to 19% between 2010 and 2019. Simultaneously, the naturalisation rate dropped by 3.2 per cent in 2019 compared to 2018.

Of these, 35 per cent had dual citizenship at birth, while 65 per cent became Swiss citizens through naturalisation. The most common second citizenship is the Italian one (24 per cent of dual citizenship holders), followed by French (11 per cent), German (9 per cent), and then Turkish, Portuguese, Serbian and Kosovan.

Almost 60 per cent of the French-Swiss became dual nationals at birth, compared to 44 per cent of the Italian-Swiss and 30 per cent of the German-Swiss who hold the passports of both countries. Citizens of the Balkan states, including Kosovo, North Macedonia, Serbia and Turkey, along with Portuguese nationals were among those who mostly obtained Swiss citizenship through naturalisation.

The dual citizenship landscape among the Swiss cantons is diverse. Almost a half of the resident population of the canton of Geneva has dual nationality, while in Uri and Appenzell Inner Rhoden, only around five per cent have this status.

For more information, check out our country profile pages, a report published through the Federal Commission on Migration and this NCCR policy brief.