The European Union is working toward changing its entry process for foreigners, and I imagine people will have mixed feelings about this. In mid-2024, I covered how the European Union planned on introducing a new system for entering and exiting the region, though it was delayed. There’s now a new launch date, so let’s go over the details.
In this post:
European Union replacing passport stamps with biometrics
The European Union plans to gradually introduce its new electronic Entry/Exit System (EES) for foreign visitors. This will start to be rolled out as of October 12, 2025, and the expectation is that it will be fully operational by April 10, 2026. With this development, visitors from most countries will no longer get their passports stamped.
Instead, under the new system, foreign visitors entering the European Union will have their fingerprints and face scanned digitally upon entry. That biometric data will then be used to confirm a visitor’s entry and exit from the European Union.
To use this system, travelers will need a biometric passport. These have been issued in the United States since 2007, so at this point, everyone in the United States with a passport should have one. Visitors who don’t have a biometric passport will have to go through a longer process, and won’t be able to use self-service passport control lanes.
As the European Union’s commissioner for home affairs describes this:
“At every single airport, every single harbor, every single road into Europe. We will have digital border controls. When that happens, it will be goodbye to passport stamping, hello to digital checks.”
Note that this development is separate from the new European Travel Information and Authorization System (ETIAS), which is expected to be implemented as of April 2026 (though may be delayed again). Once this is introduced, up to 1.4 billion people from 60+ visa waiver countries will need to obtain a travel authorization prior to traveling to the European Union.
This is a common sense development
Passport stamps are kind of a funny thing, and the idiom “too much of a good thing is a bad thing” comes to mind. Some people get really excited by passport stamps, because of course they can be a fun memory of the places you’ve traveled to. However, for frequent travelers, these stamps can become a pain, since your passport can fill up pretty quickly, requiring you to get a new one.
The novelty of passport stamps aside, using biometric data and making the system electronic is just generally a smart move in terms of border security. Also, this new system should increasingly allow travelers to use automatic gates for entering countries, which is a positive development as well.
Bottom line
The European Union plans to implement a new electronic system for entering and leaving the region. With this, we’ll see biometric data required from travelers, rather than reliance on passport pictures and stamps. The plan is now for this to be gradually introduced as of October 12, 2025.
Separate from this, next year we should see a new travel authorization requirement introduced in the European Union, for those arriving from many countries. Of course it’s possible that either or both of these initiatives are delayed further.
What do you make of the EU phasing out passport stamps, and switching to biometric data?
The first thing that came to mind is an ability to conserve pages for those places that still require a stamp and/or a visa. American passports pages cannot be added anymore.
The German Passport Stampers Workers Union will be pissed! If they have to go from four total in/out stamps to a quick photo, their numbers will decrease by at least 50%! Strike! Strike! Strike!
Workers of the World Unite!
I'm a little sad to lose the old days where people collected and counted their passport stamps.
But speaking as somebody who's bopped in and out of the Schengen area a bunch of times in the last couple of years, the border officials have trouble keeping track of which nearly identical stamp (esp if it was low ink) they're matching up to stamp you in or out of the zone. Technology is the way to go with this...
I was just thinking how lame Schengen area stamps were anyway. Just got back from a trip to Spain and Portugal with my daughter, but she only got stamps in France because we transferred at CDG both ways.
Note: I’ll take lamer passport books over having to clear border control in every country any day.
I am curious about logistics when leaving the Schengen Area to a third country by land. A simple example: somebody flies to Vienna, then continues to Budapest by train, still inside Schengen, and takes another train to Belgrade, Serbia. Are they going to stop the train at the border and force non-EU passengers to go through the biometric gates for exit controls? Are they planning on having mobile emigration terminals instead?
Similar procedure was...
I am curious about logistics when leaving the Schengen Area to a third country by land. A simple example: somebody flies to Vienna, then continues to Budapest by train, still inside Schengen, and takes another train to Belgrade, Serbia. Are they going to stop the train at the border and force non-EU passengers to go through the biometric gates for exit controls? Are they planning on having mobile emigration terminals instead?
Similar procedure was in place for Singapore-Kuala Lumpur trains.
I would assume there would be controls either on the train, or at either the point of embarcation (Hungary) or desmbarkation (Serbia).
That is how the Eurostar works. There is a separate platform for Eurostar trains and passengers where controls are done.
But I just got a new passport with extra pages!
A passport card may be coming next to replace the traditional booklet. It will probably take a while as many countries may continue requiring empty pages for visas and entry/exit stamps.
People with dozens of credit cards tracking your every purchase wherever you go….are worried about passports with chips?
Credit cards don't require your biometrics.
I and so many others use facial recognition to log on our accounts on iPhone
Your facial recognition on iPhone is stored locally. Apple does not have access to it
The requirement for chips in passports came from the U.S.
Also, it was the U.S. who required every country to have five year passports while the U.S. retained ten year.
I so do not like this. That's too darn invasive. What's next placing a chip?
Mind prints. Can be helpful for scanning for subversive thoughts. That or rectal probes. Either way, it'll be grosser and weirder and way more intrusive.
Thank whatever god you believe in / don't believe in that you weren't born gen alpha or later. They're good and fuqq'd
Where would this chip be placed that you mentioned? Like in the passport?
@Bob
No. Somewhere in your body. Tagged like a pet.
Seems like a step backwards. They obviously don’t need to implant hardware to track you cameras everywhere and facial recognition technology.
Isn't this already happening? Landing at CDG from the US, you just put your passport on the scanner, look at the camera and presto, you're into baggage claim. Is that different?
What happens when you exit out of Madrid and they stamp your passport with an exit stamp? Next time you try to visit you’ll run into problems because you have an exit with no entry. This happened to me.
You still get stamped in/out in the current system, unlike EU citizens.
Trumpshould demand that passport stamps be kept (or reinstated) or he begins bombing Brussels in 60 minutes.
Some countries will stamp your passport if asked. This is the best way as a compromise for those who want stamps and those who do not.
While I could understand the sentimentality around European passport stamps if they actually showed the countries visited, in reality it is just the first Schengen port of entry, often unrelated to the final destination. I have a ton of FRA stamps that have nothing to do with visiting Frankfurt or even Germany. I just gives me a memory of repeated visits to the Senator lounges.
And even when you do have different countries, they all look the same.
Whilst great for Americans and other westerners, this “common sense” thing is not common sense for an individual from a country with weak or even medium strength passport. The records of stamps are very important for these people because it helps with visa applications to western countries or countries with strict visa requirements. Personally I also do not like this phase out as I enjoy the stamps on my passport. Looking at the many shapes...
Whilst great for Americans and other westerners, this “common sense” thing is not common sense for an individual from a country with weak or even medium strength passport. The records of stamps are very important for these people because it helps with visa applications to western countries or countries with strict visa requirements. Personally I also do not like this phase out as I enjoy the stamps on my passport. Looking at the many shapes and designs of stamps just gives a joy.
I respect your opinion and share it, despite the strength of my passport
Eve, it's refreshing to hear your counter-argument to what is a very euro-centric development with little regard for how things work in the rest of the world.
They obviously aren't worried about your stamps, otherwise the same countries you mention who are worried about it, wouldnt make this policy.
This will create some chaos for immigrants that need to prove their movements, either time in or out of the countries for residency renewals, tax status, citizenship applications, etc.
The domestic agencies often rely on stamps, but new methods will have to be established. (In the meantime, I’ll be keeping an envelope of boarding passes, I guess.)
What I wonder is what those of us who need to get periodic security clearances are supposed to do when going over our previous seven years of foreign visits. I’ve relied heavily on passport stamps for those in the past.
Same and it will get worse and you will be treated like a devious criminal for any mistake. May as well start ordering your steaks well done with ketchup and limp French fries to get on the good side of TACO
Fwiw, I keep an Excel log of all the things that eqip asks for - including foreign travel. So when it comes up, I can just consult the log without having to try to remember anything.
You'll take notes and preserve documents.
How are people not creeped out by this?
I am extremely creeped out by this. Number one reason I enjoy period films and television shows, to vicariously experience a time when digital big brothers weren't able to see just about every d@mn movement I make
@CB
How are you not?
Lol. As if you're not being tracked. I was able to FOIA request most of my travel record (back to the mid 1980s) ...
I'm generally a skeptic of overlying on digitalization, because there is always a bigger risk if things fail. And I quite like my passport stamps. That said, given this and the ETIAS travel authorization has been delayed quite a bit so far, the jury is out as to whether the Entry/Exit System will actually be rolled out by the spring of next year. Given the slow pace and bureaucracy, as well as the varied realities...
I'm generally a skeptic of overlying on digitalization, because there is always a bigger risk if things fail. And I quite like my passport stamps. That said, given this and the ETIAS travel authorization has been delayed quite a bit so far, the jury is out as to whether the Entry/Exit System will actually be rolled out by the spring of next year. Given the slow pace and bureaucracy, as well as the varied realities in each nation, it wouldn't surprise me if the rollout was delayed another year or two.
For what it is worth, I entered the Schengen area ~12 days ago via AMS and got to experience the biometric kiosks and the passport stamping. I left via FRA and that was still passport stamping only.
Curious how this will be 'phased'... If I enter a port that is digital, but then try to exit a port that isn't digital and is looking for an entry stamp? Although it seems these days very rarely do they actually look for an entry stamp although it has happened to me now and then
I got shit from the immigration officer in the MUC FCL because I had entered using the e-gates and didn't have an entry stamp. He made me show my proof of *inbound* travel. (I have since learned that despite being enrolled in Germany's EasyPass system and eligible for e-gates, I still have to voluntarily go to the kiosk to get a stamp.)
I hate this - I don't care about the ETIAS or fingerprinting, I just hate the fact everywhere's doing away with passport stamps :(
Same. Not a fan of queues, but it's a nice pastime while traveling to flip through my passport stamps.
I do not understand why people "collect" these, but there are weirder collectors. They should install a "Stamp Your Passport" machine. Let those wanting stamps buy a pretend passport. At the end of border control, you can have your pseudo-passport stamped by the machine for a fee. Kids would love it.
This is lame and digitizing the world is creepy.
Photos are fine but fingerprinting is just so time consuming and resource intensive. Plus fingerprinting doesn’t work well for a good subset of the population.
The UK’s egates work just fine without fingerprints and that should be good enough.
I'm all for phasing out passport stamps SO LONG AS there is an easy way for visitors and residents to access an authoritative entry/exit record. There are many life circumstances when a person needs to definitively prove dates of country entry and exit.
@rrapynot - I went to three countries last year (NZ, AU and SG, from the UK) and didn't get a single stamp. In fact, I don't think I actually spoke to anybody in the airport on entry.
Yes, most developed countries have besides those in Schengen already done away with routine stamping
Will miss the stamps but I’m all for reducing wait times to clear immigration.
ESPECIALLY in Brussels. (Yuuuuuuuuuck....!)
I think this only applies to Schengen countries, not the EU. Even though Schengen is governed by the EU, some countries in the EU are not part of Schengen (Ireland, Cyprus) while some non-EU countries are part of Schengen (Switzerland, Norway, Iceland).
Nice and confusing.
Literally had my passport stamped in Italy today after going through a self-service e-gate where my biometric passport was scanned and my picture taken. Just silly. Went through the same type of e-gate in the UK this weekend, no stamp. Not that it really matters, the extra 15 seconds didn’t really impact my travel day, but it sure seemed behind the times.
Makes you wonder if and when passport books will be phased out. I mean if you don't get a stamp anymore, what's the purpose of all those pages?!
Plenty of other countries still stamp passports. Even countries that have eGates still stamp your passport if you need a visa to visit or even put a whole page visa sticker in your passport.
Travel around Africa and the south Pacific (among other regions) and you realize quickly that there aren't all that many pages!
Right. My wife and I have an upcoming trip to southern Africa that apparently will require up to eight pages in each of our passports. Fortunately, we learned our lesson years ago and always request thick passports (double the usual number of visa pages) when we renew. One year we had to go to a US embassy abroad to get our passports "amended" to add pages. That's no longer an option nor is getting thick passports at renewal.
I can't see passports being phased out anytime soon. Many countries still prefer physical or paper forms of identity for security and/or infrastructural reasons. And it's going to take at least a few decades to even the developed world in line, let along the third world.
Having had to get my passport replaced early this year due to running out of pages after 3 years (I forgot to check the box to get a big one on renewal!) I can attest there are still many many countries that stamp. Albeit a good number were EU stamps...
“… I forgot to check the box to get a big one on renewal!”
Passports that used to come with extra pages are no longer available in the USA, unfortunately. If your thin passport fills up, you’ll have to get a new one.
It seems that ICAO is proposing digital travel credentials and biometrics to replace boarding passes which seems to be a step towards a full biometric ecosystem.
https://www.biometricupdate.com/202504/global-airports-approach-replacement-of-passports-with-face-biometrics
https://identityweek.net/icao-dtc-could-change-travel-rulebook-but-dtc-types-2-and-3-eliminating-passports-not-here-yet/