Every guide in this series uses acronyms that Brazilian immigration law treats as second nature and that everyone else has to learn from scratch: VITEM, CRNM, RN, CNIg, DOU, MJSP. This page exists so you never have to guess what one means, and so every other article in this series has somewhere to send you when it uses one in passing.
Legal instruments
Lei de Migração (Lei nº 13.445/2017) Brazil’s Migration Law, the foundational statute governing immigration since 2017. It replaced the previous, dictatorship-era immigration law and reoriented Brazilian policy around a human-rights framework rather than national-security control.
Decreto nº 9.199/2017 – the executive decree that regulates how the Migration Law is applied in practice. Where the law sets principles, the decree sets procedure.
Resolução Normativa (RN) – a regulation issued by the National Immigration Council (CNIg) that sets the specific, detailed requirements for a given residency category: minimum income, investment thresholds, documentation. This is the layer that changes most often and the one worth double-checking before relying on any guide, including this one.
Portaria Interministerial – a joint regulation issued by two or more ministries (typically Justice and Foreign Affairs) covering matters like family reunification (Portaria Interministerial nº 12/2018) or visa and residency processing procedures.
Diário Oficial da União (DOU) – Brazil ‘s official federal gazette. Many residency authorizations only become legally effective once published here, and several application deadlines (like the 30-day window to register your CRNM after an in-country residency approval) are counted from the date of DOU publication, not the date of the decision itself.
Visa categories (VITEM and beyond)
VITEM – Visto Temporário, or Temporary Visa, followed by a Roman numeral indicating the specific category. Not every VITEM number is in common use, but the ones that come up throughout this series include:
- VITEM IV — Student visa, for enrollment at a Brazilian educational institution recognized by the Ministry of Education (MEC).
- VITEM V — Work visa, for foreigners with a job offer from a Brazilian employer.
- VITEM XI — Used in connection with family reunification cases in some contexts.
- VITEM XIV — Digital nomad visa, created under Resolução Normativa nº 45/2021, for remote workers employed by or contracting with companies outside Brazil.
VIPER – not an official government term, but the immigration industry’s informal name for investor-based residency, covering two distinct legal instruments: investment in a Brazilian company (RN nº 13/2017) and investment in Brazilian real estate (RN nº 36/2018). See our dedicated guide for the difference between the two.
Visto de Cortesia, Oficial, Diplomático – special visa categories for those traveling on official government or diplomatic business, distinct from the ordinary categories covered throughout this series.
Registration and identification
CRNM (Carteira de Registro Nacional Migratório) – the National Migratory Registry Card, Brazil’s equivalent of a permanent resident card or green card. Every foreigner granted a visa or residency authorization must register with the Polícia Federal and obtain this card, typically within 90 days of entry (for consular visas) or 30 days of DOU publication (for in-country residency approvals).
RNE (Registro Nacional de Estrangeiros) – the older identification system that the CRNM replaced. You may still encounter this term in older documents or in casual conversation, but new registrations are issued as CRNMs.
CIN (Carteira de Identidade Nacional) – Brazil’s newer, unified national identity document, being rolled out to replace the old state-issued RG for Brazilian citizens, with integration for foreign residents also underway. It is a separate system from the CRNM, though the two are gradually being connected.
CPF (Cadastro de Pessoas Físicas) – the individual taxpayer registry number issued by the Receita Federal (Brazil’s federal tax authority). Every foreigner who wants to be a partner in a Brazilian company, buy property, open a bank account, or handle almost any formal transaction in Brazil needs one – including non-residents who never plan to live in Brazil.
SISMIGRA – the Polícia Federal’s internal migratory registration system, referenced in some official guidance and error messages during the CRNM process.
Agenda Web – the Polícia Federal’s online appointment scheduling system, used to book the in-person appointment required to register for a CRNM.
MigranteWeb – the Ministry of Justice’s online system for filing residency authorization requests, particularly for investment-based categories.
Institutions
CNIg (Conselho Nacional de Imigração) – the National Immigration Council, the body within the Ministry of Justice responsible for issuing the Resoluções Normativas that govern most residency categories.
MJSP (Ministério da Justiça e Segurança Pública) – the Ministry of Justice and Public Security, which houses CNIg and reviews most residency authorization requests.
Polícia Federal (PF) – the Federal Police, responsible for registering foreign residents, issuing CRNMs, and enforcing immigration status within Brazil, including overstay fines and deportation proceedings.
Itamaraty – the informal name (from the palace that houses it) for Brazil’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which oversees consulates abroad and the visa issuance process before you ever reach Brazilian soil.
INCRA (Instituto Nacional de Colonização e Reforma Agrária) – the federal agency responsible for authorizing foreign acquisition of rural land, a separate and stricter process than buying urban property.
Receita Federal (RFB) – Brazil’s federal revenue service, responsible for CPF registration, income tax administration, and determining tax residency status.
Status and process terms
Autorização de Residência – a residency authorization requested directly from the Ministry of Justice, typically used when the applicant is already legally present in Brazil, as opposed to a temporary visa applied for at a consulate abroad.
Autorização Prévia – prior authorization, requested from within Brazil or in advance of travel, to support a consular visa application in categories (like investment-based residency) where the underlying condition needs to be verified before the visa itself is issued.
Permanência Irregular – irregular stay, the administrative (not criminal) status of someone who has remained in Brazil beyond their authorized period, subject to a daily fine.
Deportação – the administrative removal of a foreigner in an irregular migratory situation, distinct from expulsão (expulsion), which is tied to criminal conduct rather than simple overstay.
Naturalização – the process by which a foreigner becomes a Brazilian citizen, as opposed to recognition of nationality by descent (jus sanguinis), which applies to people with a Brazilian parent or grandparent and is legally a different category (originary nationality, not naturalized).
Registro Tardio – late registration, the cartório (notary office) procedure used to register the birth of someone with Brazilian ancestry who was never registered as Brazilian at birth – the mechanism behind most citizenship-by-descent cases.
União Estável – a legally recognized stable union, Brazil’s equivalent of a registered domestic partnership, treated as equivalent to marriage for most legal purposes including immigration, and available to same-sex couples on the same terms as different-sex couples.
Why this page exists
Every other article in this series links back here the first time it uses one of these terms in depth, rather than re-explaining VITEM or CRNM from scratch each time. If you found this page directly because you searched a specific term, the linked guides above go considerably deeper into whichever process that term belongs to.
FAQ
What’s the difference between a VITEM and a CRNM? A VITEM is the temporary visa that gets you into Brazil for a specific purpose; the CRNM is the residency card you register for once you’re here and your status is approved – they’re sequential steps, not alternatives to each other.
Is VIPER an official visa category? No, it’s an informal industry term covering two separate, official programs: business investment residency (RN 13/2017) and real estate investment residency (RN 36/2018).
What replaced the old RNE card? The CRNM. If you hold an older RNE card, it generally remains valid until its own expiration or your next renewal, at which point you’d be issued a CRNM instead.
Is naturalização the same as citizenship by descent? No, naturalização applies to someone becoming Brazilian through residency and application; citizenship by descent recognizes someone who was arguably already Brazilian by birth through a parent or grandparent, via a different legal process (registro tardio).
Where do these definitions come from? Primarily the Lei de Migração (Lei nº 13.445/2017), Decreto nº 9.199/2017, and the specific Resoluções Normativas and Portarias cited throughout this series, each linked guide cites the specific instrument relevant to that topic.
Still not sure which category or term applies to your situation? Souza & Santos Advocacia translates Brazilian immigration bureaucracy into plain answers for foreign nationals, in English and Portuguese.
Souza & Santos Advocacia
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