UAE Golden Visa Emirates ID Cost 2026: AED 100 a Year

The one Golden Visa cost that changes with the length of your permit

Almost every fee on a Golden Visa quote is the same number whether the permit runs five years or ten. The Emirates ID is not. The ICP prices the card at AED 100 for each year of residence, which means the UAE Golden Visa Emirates ID cost is AED 500 on a 5-year permit and AED 1,000 on a 10-year one before a single service fee is added. That is a AED 500 swing per person on the same application, and we have yet to see a provider quote that explains which one it assumed.

The reason it gets glossed over is that the official portal never puts a price on it. The u.ae Emirates ID page is unambiguous that the card is mandatory — it is mandatory for all UAE citizens and residents to apply for an Emirates ID — and it covers renewal timing, biometrics and the late fee in detail. It does not publish a fee. It points to the ICP instead, and the ICP publishes the schedule on the individual service pages rather than in one table anybody is likely to find.

So we went and read those service pages, line by line, and set them against what Dubai Land Department prints for the same card inside a Golden Visa total. The two do not agree, and the gap is worth knowing about before you accept a bundled figure.

• The card fee scales with the years of residence granted, not with the qualifying route.
• The official portal publishes the obligation and the penalties, but no price.
• The ICP publishes the price, one service page at a time.
• A flat Emirates ID figure on a quote is a rounding decision somebody made for you.

What the ICP publishes: AED 100 a year, plus AED 100 smart services

The ICP's New Identity Card Issuance service page is the primary source for a first Golden Visa card. For residents it states issuance at AED 100 per year, smart service fees at AED 100, and an urgent service at AED 150. Service completion is stated as five days. Citizens sit on a different schedule entirely — AED 100 for a five-year card under 21 and AED 200 for a ten-year card over 21 — which is a common source of confusion when a figure gets quoted without saying who it applies to.

The renewal page repeats the structure in almost identical words: renewal fees for the identity card of residents, for each year of residence, AED 100, with a smart application fee of AED 100. Renewal is also stated at five days, and the page adds a requirement worth diarising — to renew the Emirates ID, the passport must be valid no less than three months. A Golden Visa holder arriving with four weeks left on a passport has a problem the fee schedule will not solve.

The steps are the same on both pages: submit through the chosen channel, review the retrieved data, attach documents if the integration does not pull them, pay, complete fingerprints and signature at a service centre where required, then receive the card by courier or collect it. The u.ae page adds that anyone aged 15 and over must complete the fingerprint and signature procedures, which is why the biometrics appointment is not something a provider can do on your behalf.

• Residents, new card: AED 100 per year of residence.
• Residents, renewal: AED 100 for each year of residence.
• Smart service fees: AED 100 per application on both issuance and renewal.
• Urgent service: AED 150, on top of the above.
• Stated service completion duration: five days.
• Renewal requires a passport valid for no less than three months.
• Fingerprints and signature required in person from age 15.

These are the figures published on the ICP's own service pages at the time of writing in 2026. Government fees are set by the authority and change without notice, and the ICP publishes them per service rather than in a consolidated schedule. Confirm the current fee on the service page before budgeting against any line above.

Why Dubai Land Department prints AED 1,153 for the same card

Dubai Land Department runs its own Golden Visa service for property investors, and unlike almost everyone else it publishes a full itemised breakdown. On the investor page the lines are medical examination AED 700, Emirates ID for 10 years AED 1,153, confirmation of residency permit for 10 years AED 2,856.75, Dubai Land Department fees AED 4,020 and administrative fees AED 1,155, totalling AED 9,884.75, with processing stated at seven to ten business days.

Set the Emirates ID line against the ICP schedule and it does not reconcile cleanly. Ten years at AED 100 is AED 1,000. Add the AED 100 smart service fee and you get AED 1,100. DLD prints AED 1,153, which is AED 53 more, and DLD does not itemise what the extra covers. We are not going to guess at it: the honest position is that one authority publishes a per-year fee and another publishes a bundled figure for the same card through its own channel, and the AED 53 sits inside the second one unexplained.

The practical lesson is not that either number is wrong. It is that AED 1,153 is a Dubai Land Department channel figure for a 10-year investor permit, and reading it as the national price of an Emirates ID is a mistake. If your permit is not a DLD-processed investor permit, the ICP's per-year arithmetic is the schedule to ask your provider about.

• DLD investor Golden Visa, published total: AED 9,884.75 for the main applicant.
• Of which Emirates ID for 10 years: AED 1,153.
• ICP arithmetic for the same term: AED 1,000 plus AED 100 smart services.
• Unexplained difference: AED 53, not itemised by DLD.
• DLD also publishes AED 5,774.50 per dependant for a 10-year family residence permit, AED 318.75 to open the family sponsorship file, and AED 100 added for each sponsored person.

The DLD figures above are the ones published on its investor Golden Visa service page and apply to that service. They are not a national fee table, and the Emirates ID line in particular should not be transplanted onto an application processed by a different authority.

The arithmetic for a 5-year and a 10-year Golden Visa

The official portal splits the Golden Visa by term. It lists ten years for investors in public investments, people of exceptional talent, humanitarian pioneers and outstanding university students, and five years for real estate investors, entrepreneurs and outstanding high school students. Which bucket you land in decides your Emirates ID bill as directly as it decides your residence.

On the ICP schedule a 10-year card is AED 1,000 in card fees plus AED 100 smart services, so AED 1,100, or AED 1,250 with the urgent service. A 5-year card is AED 500 plus AED 100, so AED 600, or AED 750 urgently. Nothing about the more expensive card is better; it simply covers twice as many years, and it is the only line on a Golden Visa quote where paying more is straightforwardly buying more.

Across a household the numbers stop being incidental. Every person on the application holds their own Emirates ID, and unlike the medical fitness test there is no age threshold that lets children out of it — the card is mandatory for all residents. A family of four on 10-year permits is around AED 4,400 in Emirates ID fees alone; the same family on 5-year permits is around AED 2,400. Neither figure appears on most quotes as its own line.

• One adult, 10-year permit: AED 1,000 card plus AED 100 smart services, AED 1,100.
• One adult, 5-year permit: AED 500 card plus AED 100 smart services, AED 600.
• Urgent service on either: add AED 150 per application.
• Family of four, 10-year permits: approximately AED 4,400.
• Family of four, 5-year permits: approximately AED 2,400.

These totals assume the ICP's published per-year fee and one smart service fee per application, and they exclude typing centre charges and any provider handling fee. Confirm your own permit term before multiplying, because the term is set by the route the application is approved under.

Renewal, the 30-day grace period, and the AED 20-a-day fine

The Emirates ID expires with the residence permit, so a Golden Visa holder renews the card on the same cycle as the visa — roughly once a decade on a 10-year permit, which is exactly the interval at which people forget the rules. Both the u.ae page and the ICP renewal page set out the penalty in the same terms: a fine of AED 20 for each day of delay, up to a maximum of AED 1,000.

The window is more generous than it first appears. The ICP's FAQ states a grace period of 30 days from the card's expiration date to complete the renewal procedures, and the u.ae page notes the card can be renewed as early as six months before it expires. So there is a seven-month window in which no fine applies at all, and the AED 20 per day starts counting only after it closes.

The cap is where the number gets uncomfortable. AED 1,000 is reached in 50 days of delay, and on a 10-year permit that maximum fine is almost exactly what the card itself cost. Nobody sets out to pay it. It is what happens when the permit is renewed on time by a provider and the ID is left to the applicant, or when the holder is out of the country when the card quietly expires.

• Renewable from as early as six months before expiry.
• Grace period: 30 days from the expiry date.
• Late fine: AED 20 per day, capped at AED 1,000.
• The cap is reached after 50 days of delay.
• Renewal fee is the same AED 100 per year of residence, plus AED 100 smart application.

Lost, damaged, or out of date: the replacement schedule

Replacement is the one Emirates ID cost that is not priced per year, and it is not cheap. The ICP's replacement service page lists fees for issuing a replacement ID card, lost or damaged, at AED 300, with smart service fees of AED 100 and an urgent service at AED 150 available only at the Authority's own service centres. Service completion is again stated at five days.

The same page carries a separate line that catches people out: ID card replacement for a data update, available at the Authority's service centres, at AED 150. A change of name or a corrected passport number is a replacement in the ICP's terms, priced differently from a loss, and it is not covered by having renewed the card recently.

There is also an asymmetry in the express service worth knowing before you rely on it. The u.ae page states that the 24-hour urgent service is available to UAE nationals and GCC residents for first-time registration, renewal and lost or damaged cards, while expatriates can access it only for replacements. A Golden Visa holder who needs a first card in a hurry does not have the same express route as a citizen who needs one.

• Replacement for a lost or damaged card: AED 300.
• Smart service fees on a replacement: AED 100.
• Urgent replacement: AED 150, at ICP service centres only.
• Replacement for a data update: AED 150.
• 24-hour urgent service: expatriates can use it for replacements only.

Replacement fees are published per service by the ICP and change without notice. The urgent service is stated as available only at the Authority's service centres, so a typing centre or an app submission may not be able to offer it.

Where the Emirates ID sits in the whole Golden Visa stack

The Emirates ID is one of four costs that live outside the residence permit fee, and the only way to sanity-check a bundled quote is to see all four at once. The permit fees are published by the residency authority. The medical fitness fee is published by a health authority. The Emirates ID is published by the ICP. Health insurance is a commercial product priced by an insurer and appears in no government table at all.

For scale: GDRFA Dubai's golden residence lines come to AED 1,640 before the stated per-year increase, made up of AED 1,100 for the permit, AED 500 inside the country, AED 20 delivery and AED 10 each for the Knowledge and Innovation Dirhams. The ICP's own residency renewal schedule is AED 100 application, AED 100 per year of the permit and AED 100 smart services. Neither includes a dirham of Emirates ID, and neither is incomplete on its own terms.

Which makes the Emirates ID, at AED 1,100 on a 10-year permit, comparable to the residence permit fee itself — and larger than it on some renewal paths. That is a strange thing for a cost to be when it appears on so few quotes as its own line. Ask for it separately, and ask for it per person.

• GDRFA Dubai golden residence: AED 1,640 total before the stated per-year increase.
• ICP residency renewal: AED 100 application, AED 100 per year, AED 100 smart services.
• Emirates ID: AED 100 per year of residence, plus AED 100 smart services, per person.
• Medical fitness in Dubai: AED 250 to AED 1,020 per person aged 18 and over.
• UAE health insurance: required, priced by the insurer, in no fee table.

These lines come from four separate published schedules rather than from one official total, and adding them together produces an estimate rather than a quoted price. Confirm each with the issuing authority before relying on a sum.

The absence rule is what turns a card renewal into a trip

Golden Visa holders sit outside the ordinary residency rule that a permit lapses after a long absence — the official portal describes the ability to stay outside the UAE for longer than the usual six months needed to keep a residence visa valid. That exemption protects the permit from cancellation. It does not stop the permit, or the Emirates ID attached to it, from reaching its expiry date on schedule.

So the pattern we see is a holder who has legitimately been living elsewhere for years, flying in to renew, and discovering that the trip carries a medical fitness test, an in-person biometrics appointment for everyone aged 15 and over, a passport that must have three months left on it, and a live UAE health insurance policy. The AED 1,100 card fee is rarely the expensive part of that week.

Arrange the UAE-licensed policy before the trip rather than on arrival, and treat travel medical cover as what it is: insurance for the journey, not for the requirement.