The position as at 10 September 2026
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Is ETIAS operating?
NowETIAS is currently not in operation and no applications for travel authorisations are collected at this point.
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Published start date
Awaitednone published by the EU.
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Notice promised
AwaitedThe European Union will inform about the specific date for the start of ETIAS several months prior to its launch.
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Transitional period
Awaited6 months from the day ETIAS starts operating. During it, holding a travel authorisation will be optional. The Commission may extend this by delegated act for up to a further six months, renewable once, so six months is a floor and not a ceiling.
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Grace period
Awaited6 months following the end of the transitional period. During the grace period the requirement to hold a valid travel authorisation will apply, which is the difference between the two periods.
Official source Checked 10 September 2026 EU or national government source. Source
What the EU has published
The EU ETIAS portal carries a standing banner on every section page. As at 10 September 2026 it reads: ETIAS is currently not in operation and no applications for travel authorisations are collected at this point.
On timing, the portal commits only to advance notice: The European Union will inform about the specific date for the start of ETIAS several months prior to its launch. No revised date has replaced the Q4 2026 wording that the ETIAS section pages carried earlier in 2026 and no longer carry.
Official source Checked 10 September 2026 EU or national government source. Source
Two places a window is still written down
Saying the wording is gone would be too strong, and we checked this session rather than assuming it. It is gone from the ETIAS section pages. It survives in two places a reader is likely to reach, and both are recorded here rather than left for someone to find and conclude that this site is out of date.
The first is the portal's own news archive. A portal news article dated 15 April 2026 states that nationals of the United Kingdom will need an ETIAS travel authorisation starting from the last quarter of this year. The ETIAS section pages state no start date.
Official source Checked 10 September 2026 EU or national government source. Source
The second is a national government. UK guidance for British travellers, last updated in April 2026, states: From Autumn 2026, the EU is expected to start operations of the new European Travel Information and Authorisation System (ETIAS). No action is required from travellers at this point.
Official source Checked 10 September 2026 EU or national government source. Source
Neither is an announcement of a start date. One is an archived article phrased relative to the year it was written in, the other is one government's expectation of another's timetable. We record both, labelled, and we do not add either to the answer above, because the question that answer responds to is what start date the EU has published and the answer to that is still none.
What has been reported, and not published
Press reporting has gone further than the EU has. It is set out here because readers will encounter it, and it is labelled so that nobody mistakes it for an announcement.
EU to delay pre-authorised travel system after border chaos. US-style pre-checks unlikely to be rolled out this year.
Reported Press reporting by Financial Times, 7 July 2026. This is journalism, not an EU announcement, and the EU has published nothing to this effect. Source
We retested this source and reached it this session, having failed to in the previous one. What is quoted above is the headline and the standfirst, published 7 July 2026, and it is all we can quote: the article body sits behind a subscription and we have not read it. An earlier version of this entry carried a further claim about a management board meeting in September 2026 to settle a revised date. That claim did not come from the article, we could not verify it at any source this session, and it has been removed rather than carried forward.
What follows from the EU's own wording
Because the EU has committed to announce a start date several months before launch, and no date has been announced, a start within the next several months would be inconsistent with that commitment.
Expected This is our reading of official wording, not a statement by the EU. Source
What happens once a date is announced
The regulation sets out two consecutive periods after ETIAS starts operating. Both run from launch day, and because launch day has no published date, neither has a calendar date either. We state them as durations for that reason.
Both are on the timeline at the top of this page, which is where the sequence they belong to is visible, rather than restated here.
Regulation Checked 10 September 2026 EU law text. Source
Why this page carries an expiry
Every dated claim in our data layer has a date after which our build fails until someone re-reads the source. The launch entries on this page expire 30 days after they were last checked. That is deliberate: a tracker that quietly goes stale is worse than no tracker, and this niche is full of pages still stating windows that passed.
When this changed
The removal of the launch window is recorded as a dated entry on updates, along with the rest of what has actually happened. This page carries the live position; that one carries the history, and neither tries to do the other's job.
Common questions
Has ETIAS been delayed?
The EU has not announced a delay, because it has not announced a start date to delay from. What is on the record is that earlier wording naming a 2026 window is no longer on the ETIAS section pages, that it survives in an archived portal article and in UK government guidance, and that press reporting since has pointed to a delay. Those are three different kinds of statement and this page keeps them apart rather than averaging them into one.
Can I get an ETIAS now?
No. ETIAS is currently not in operation and no applications for travel authorisations are collected at this point. Any site offering to take an application or a payment today is not doing what it claims. See avoiding ETIAS scams.
Will I need one for a trip I am booking now?
Not for travel before the requirement starts, and there will be advance notice plus a transitional period after it. If you want to know whether the requirement will apply to you at all, you can check eligibility.
Last verified 10 September 2026. How we verify