RTL Today - Quick guide: Exchanging a foreign driving licence in Luxembourg

If you hold a foreign license, here's all you need to know before you hit the road.

Is my foreign license valid here?

If you obtained your license in an EU or EEA country, then it remains legally valid in Luxembourg. You can register your foreign license with the SNCA driving license office. Send a form (PDF in French here) to them by post, alongside a copy of both sides of your driving license and a copy of valid ID such as a passport - the address is here.

However, under certain circumstances permanent residents in the Grand Duchy do have to exchange their EU/EEA license for a Luxembourgish one:

If you wish to extend the right to drive to other categories, such as lorries or more powerful motorbikes.
If your right to drive has been restricted due to a court or administrative order.
If your right to drive has been revoked or temporarily banned due to a court or administrative order.

To exchange your license, you need to send a copy of it and your ID alongside a form, recent photo, tax stamp, bulletin no. 4 from the Luxembourg criminal records, to the SNCA driving license office. Full details on the requirements here.

What about if my license is from outside of the EU/EEA?

When you first move to the Grand Duchy, you can continue to use your license as you settle in. However, after one year of residence in Luxembourg, you must convert your license (while you can apply early, licenses won't be converted until you've spent at least six months here).

Conversion is relatively straightforward but does require some document prep-work. As well as the documents required to exchange (see above), you also need a criminal record check from whichever country or countries in which you lived covering the last five years, and a medical certificate from a local doctor.

An important note here: while the official information on Guichet/SNCA currently reads declares that you need "a criminal record extract (no more than 3 months old) from the country of origin covering the last 5 years," we have confirmed with SNCA that this is in fact not correct. It should be from your country of origin if that is where you spent the last five years, but if you are from country Y and lived in country X for, say, 5 years before moving to Luxembourg, the criminal record should be from country X. Thanks to one of our readers for getting in touch about this!

As above, you send the documents off to the SNCA driving license, alongside your foreign license, which will be held for the duration of your residence in the Grand Duchy. Further details here.

Conversion does not work for lorry or bus drivers. In these instances, you'll need to take a practical and theory test and apply for a new license (see below for more details).

What about Brexit?

If you're a UK national living in Luxembourg, you have until 31 December 2021 to exchange your UK driving license for a Luxembourgish one. If you moved here after 1 January 2021, you're treated the same as other non-EEA nationals and must convert your license within 12 months.