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Guest registration in Europe, country by country

Every country in Europe asks hotels to register the people who stay with them, and they all start from the same rule: article 45 of the Schengen Convention, which asks every establishment to have its foreign guests fill in and sign a registration form. Each country then sets its own way: Spain, Italy, Portugal and Slovenia want each guest's details sent online within a deadline, often 24 hours; France, Germany, Austria and the United Kingdom ask the hotel to keep the record and show it on inspection.

The deadline, who has to be registered and how long the record is kept change at every border, and sometimes inside one country. This page puts them side by side, each with its official source, so a hotel group can see in one place what each of its hotels has to do.

Three ways to comply

  • Sent online to the authority, within a deadline: Spain (SES.HOSPEDAJES), Italy (Alloggiati Web), Portugal (SIBA), Andorra, Slovenia, Croatia, Czechia, Luxembourg and Bulgaria, among others.
  • Uploaded as a file to a police portal: Catalonia, with the Mossos d'Esquadra.
  • Kept by the hotel and shown on inspection: France, Germany, Austria, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Poland, Greece, Malta, Cyprus, Denmark, Sweden, Iceland, Estonia and Latvia.
  • Switzerland sets the federal rule for foreign guests and leaves the channel to each canton.

Country by country

CountryWho is registeredHowDeadlineKept forOfficial source
Spain (rest of the country)All guestsSent online to SES.HOSPEDAJES (Ministry of the Interior)24 hours3 yearsRoyal Decree 933/2021
CataloniaAll guestsFile uploaded to the Mossos d'Esquadra portal24 hours3 yearsGeneralitat de Catalunya
Basque CountryTo be confirmedSent to the ErtzaintzaTo be confirmedTo be confirmedeuskadi.eus
AndorraAll guestsSent online to the police, through ROATTo be confirmedTo be confirmedLaw 16/2017, art. 48
PortugalForeign guestsSent online to SIBA3 working days (to be confirmed)To be confirmedSIBA user manual
ItalyAll guestsSent online to Alloggiati Web (Polizia di Stato)24 hours; 6 hours for stays of up to 24 hoursTo be confirmedAlloggiati Web manual
SloveniaAll guestsSent online to AJPES eTurizem12 hours, on arrival and on departureUntil the end of the following yearAJPES specification
CroatiaAll guestsSent to eVisitor, the tourist boards' system24 hours, on arrival and on departureTo be confirmedgov.hr
HungaryAll guestsSent through certified software (VIZA and NTAK)NTAK: 24 hoursUntil it has been sentAct CLVI of 2016
CzechiaForeign guests, EU citizens includedSent online to Ubyport (Police)3 working days6 yearsCzech Police
SlovakiaForeign guestsReported to the Border Police, on paper or online with an eID5 days2 years (the form)slovensko.sk
LuxembourgAll guests aged 15 and overSent online (fiches d'hébergement)24 hours6 monthsguichet.lu
BulgariaAll guestsSent online to ESTI (Ministry of Tourism)ImmediatelyAt least 2 yearsMinistry of Tourism
LiechtensteinAll guestsElectronic registration formImmediately2 yearsgesetze.li
SwitzerlandForeign guests (federal rule); several cantons ask for all guestsReported to the canton, through the channel each canton setsSet by each cantonSet by each cantonForeign Nationals and Integration Act, art. 16
FranceForeign guestsKept: individual police form—6 monthsservice-public.fr
GermanyForeign guestsKept: registration form (Meldeschein), signed on the day of arrival—1 year from departureFederal Registration Act, §§ 29–30
AustriaAll guestsKept: guest register (Gästeverzeichnis)24 hours7 yearsUSP (Austrian government)
United KingdomGuests aged 16 and overKept: hotel register—12 monthsSI 1972/1689
IrelandGuests who are non-Irish nationalsKept: hotel register—To be confirmedImmigration Act 2004, s. 10
PolandForeign guestsKept: signed registration form—To be confirmedSchengen Convention, art. 45
GreeceAll guestsKept: guest book stamped by the police—10 yearsmitos.gov.gr
MaltaAll guestsKept—2 years (the declarations)Immigration Act, Cap. 217
CyprusAll guestsKept—To be confirmedKDP 192/85
DenmarkGuests who are non-DanishKept—1 to 2 yearsExecutive Order 1354/2025
SwedenForeign guests, except foreigners registered as residents in Sweden; on a group trip, the group leaderKept: registration card signed by the guest, shown to the Police on request—3 monthsSwedish Police, PMFS 2015:6
IcelandAll guestsKept—At least 1 yearRegulation 1277/2016
EstoniaAll guestsKept—2 yearsTourism Act, § 24
LatviaForeign guestsKept—1 yearRegulation 226

A dash in the deadline column means the record stays at the hotel. “To be confirmed” means the official source leaves the point open, or we have yet to read it in an official text.

The Netherlands, Belgium, Norway, Finland, Lithuania and Romania join the table once we have read their rule in an official source.

This page is general information. For a legal decision, the official source of each country and your adviser are the reference.

What Vesia does

  • The guest fills in the online check-in with the fields their hotel's authority asks for: the place of birth where the authority wants it, and the country that issued the document, read from the document itself. Data the authority skips, the form skips too.
  • Where the record is kept at the hotel, Vesia keeps it for the time that country sets and deletes it when that time is up. The hotel's administrator exports a period of up to one year for an inspection, and the export stays in the activity log.
  • In Spain, Italy, Portugal and Andorra, Vesia prepares each guest's record in the authority's own format. Sending it with the hotel's own credentials is built and waits for the first hotel in each country to make its first live submission.
  • In Catalonia, Vesia prepares the Mossos d'Esquadra file, checks every stay and emails reception six hours before the 24 hours run out; reception uploads the file to the portal.
  • The credentials for each authority always belong to the hotel.

Frequently asked questions

Where does hotel guest registration in Europe come from? Article 45 of the Schengen Convention, which asks every establishment to have its foreign guests fill in and sign a registration form.

Which countries want each guest's details sent online? Spain, Italy, Portugal, Andorra, Slovenia, Croatia, Czechia, Luxembourg and Bulgaria, among others.

Where does the record stay at the hotel? In France, Germany, Austria, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Poland, Greece, Malta, Cyprus, Denmark, Iceland, Estonia and Latvia, among others: the hotel shows it on inspection.

Sources