France student visa fee
What a France student visa costs, taken from the government's own published fee page. The application fee is rarely the whole cost, so the charges that sit beside it are set out below as well.
At a glance
| Visa | VLS-TS "étudiant" — the long-stay visa that doubles as a residence permit (visa long séjour valant titre de séjour) for courses longer than 90 days. It is not a Schengen visa and it is not a separate permit: for your first year the visa itself IS your residence permit, provided you validate it online within three months of arriving. A VLS-TS for study is valid for a maximum of one year; staying longer means applying to your prefecture for a residence permit, between four and two months before it expires. |
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The fee, as published
The consular long-stay visa fee is €50. It is not the only charge, and the others are easy to miss when budgeting. Campus France charges its own Études en France (EEF) processing fee, which you pay after your file is validated and then declare on the portal — the amount is set by Campus France India, not by the consulate. TLScontact, which runs the visa centres, charges a service fee on top, though Campus France notes that recipients of a qualifying scholarship, and students going for a licence, master or doctorat, receive an exemption letter for it once the EEF application is processed. Confirm each amount at the point of payment rather than from a guide: three different organisations set three different charges here.
What else this fee sits alongside, in France
There is nothing to budget for speed. Campus France publishes no paid priority service for student visas. The Etudes en France step comes first regardless, and nothing you pay at the centre moves it. If someone offers to sell you priority processing, ask which official page it comes from.
Lodged through VFS Global, collecting applications for France-Visas in India, whose own service charge is set by the operator and is not in the figure above. Centres.
And the largest number is not a charge at all: the funds France requires you to hold, not spend. What France asks you to show.
Budget separately for document costs — attestation, translation, courier — and for each dependant, who is charged as their own application.
Before you budget from this page
- Open the official source at the foot of this page and confirm the current figure.
- Check that your own route — the specific subclass or category — carries the same fee.
Visa fees move on government timetables, not annual ones. The verification date at the foot is the honest limit of what this page can tell you.
Fees — FAQs
2 questions
Generally not — application fees are usually charged for processing rather than for a decision. Confirm it on France's own fee page, linked at the foot of this page.
In nearly every route, yes — paid online during the application. Budget for the exchange rate and card charges on the day.
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Sources
Checked against these sources on 10 November 2026.