ACR I-Card Philippines: When You Need It and How to Get It

Sooner or later every foreigner who stays in the Philippines for more than a holiday meets three letters: ACR. The ACR I-Card is the plastic card that shows the state knows you are here, where you live and on what status. It is not a visa and it does not give you any right to stay. It is proof that you are registered. Who needs it, at what point, and how you get it is set out by the Bureau of Immigration, and the rules are clearer than the queues suggest.

What the ACR I-Card is

ACR stands for Alien Certificate of Registration. The "I" stands for identity: the full name is Alien Certificate of Registration Identity Card. It replaced the old paper certificate, and you will still see the Bureau refer to "paper-based ACR" holders, people registered before the plastic card existed.

The legal root is old. The Alien Registration Act of 1950 requires foreigners residing in the Philippines to register, issues a certificate as evidence of that registration, and obliges a registered foreigner to show the certificate on demand of an immigration officer or the police. The ACR I-Card is today's form of that certificate, and the Bureau's own renewal page still names the Act as one of the grounds for replacing a card.

How seriously the Bureau takes it shows in its own enforcement notes. In a March 2026 arrest report it described a foreign national who could not present a valid passport and ACR I-Card as "rendering him undocumented". The card is not a formality you can put off for a quiet month.

When you need an ACR I-Card

There are three common situations, and most readers fall into one of them.

As a tourist staying longer than 59 days

Most Western passport holders enter the Philippines without a visa and receive an initial admission of 30 days. The Bureau's visa waiver and extension page shows the first extension of 29 days, which takes you to day 59. After that the rule is plain: a foreign national whose stay will exceed 59 days must extend with the Bureau, and the ACR I-Card issuance page names exactly this group as applicants: holders of a temporary visitor's visa or tourist visa "who have stayed for more than fifty-nine (59) days in the Philippines".

So the answer to "do I need an ACR card as a tourist" is: yes, from the extension that takes you past 59 days. The Bureau states that the ACR I-Card application "must be submitted together with the application for visa", which for a tourist means together with that extension. If you plan to stay for months on the tourist extension route, the card is part of it from the third month on.

One detail many people miss: the extension fee table lists a separate charge for the re-issuance of the ACR on a later entry, when you come back on a new trip and again stay past 59 days. A card from last year's trip does not simply carry over without the Bureau dealing with it again.

As a holder of a resident or long-stay visa

If the Bureau grants you a visa, the card follows the visa. The issuance checklist asks new applicants for the order of the Board of Commissioners granting the visa, and the renewal checklist names the visa types it covers: immigrant visas including the step from probationary to permanent resident, temporary resident visas, treaty trader visas, pre-arranged employee visas, special investor and working visas in Subic, Clark and the Cagayan economic zone, and student visas. If you marry a Filipino citizen and take the 13A marriage visa, or hold a work visa, the ACR I-Card is your registration document for that status.

Holders of a retirement visa issued through the Philippine Retirement Authority should ask the PRA which card covers them, because the Bureau's checklists are written for visas the Bureau itself grants. Which visa route fits you at all is a separate question, set out in our comparison of the SRRV, the 13A and the tourist extension.

Children, and voluntary applicants

Children are registered too. Under the Alien Registration Act the parent or guardian registers a child under 14, and the child registers in person on reaching 14. The Bureau's renewal page lists "re-registration of alien upon reaching the age of 14" as a reason to renew the card. There is also a voluntary application for a foreign national who wants the card without being obliged to hold one; it is filed at the Bureau's main office.

How to get the ACR I-Card

The procedure is the same at every authorised office. The Bureau's pages set out these steps:

• •Fill in the application form and attach the documents on the checklist.
• •Submit the complete application.
• •The Bureau checks its database for any derogatory record.
• •You receive an Order of Payment Slip (OPS).
• •You pay the fees and hand in a copy of the official receipt.
• •After evaluation and approval the card is printed.
• •You collect it with your claim stub and an ID.

For a tourist, all of this rides on the extension you are filing anyway. For a visa holder, it follows the approval of the visa.

Documents for a first card

The issuance checklist (BI Form 2014-08-005) lists for new applicants:

• •the completed application form;
• •for visa holders, a certified true copy of the order granting the visa (pulled internally for verification);
• •a photocopy of the passport bio-page and the pages with the visa implementation and your latest admission with authorised stay;
• •photocopies of the official receipts for the fees;
• •two 2x2 photographs on a white background, taken within the last three months.

The general instructions on the same form are worth reading before you start. Entries must be in English, in capital letters, using English characters only: the Bureau's own example is "Muñoz", which goes in as "MUNOZ". Documents are filed in a legal size folder in the order of the checklist, and the Bureau says it will not act on incomplete or incorrectly filled forms. You show your original passport at the counter, and it is handed back.

If you file through a representative, the checklist asks for the representative's Bureau accreditation ID or an original special power of attorney for each applicant.

What the ACR I-Card costs

The Bureau publishes these fees on its service pages, with the note that they are "updated as of 06 March 2014 and may change without prior notice". The amount on your Order of Payment Slip is the one that counts.

• •First card (issuance): USD 50 card fee plus PHP 500 express fee
• •Renewal: USD 50 card fee plus PHP 500 express fee
• •Re-issuance (damaged card, amendment): USD 20 card fee plus PHP 500 express fee
• •Re-issuance of a lost card: USD 20 card fee plus PHP 1,000 express fee
• •ACR I-Card waiver: PHP 510 application fee plus PHP 500 express fee

For tourists the card fee comes on top of the extension fees themselves, which the extension page itemises separately.

Where to apply in Davao

The issuance, renewal and re-issuance pages list the Bureau's main office in Manila and "other immigration offices" authorised for the transaction. For Mindanao residents the relevant one is the Davao Immigration District Office on the 2nd floor of NCCC-Victoria Plaza on J.P. Laurel Avenue, Davao City, listed with its email and phone numbers on the Bureau's contacts page. Ask there before you go whether your specific transaction is handled locally, and take the complete checklist with you.

Renewal, loss and changes

When the card has to be renewed

The renewal page names four reasons: the one-year validity of the card has run out, a child reaches 14, your visa status changes, or the card must be replaced under the Alien Registration Act. For a renewal you surrender the old card and file the form with a photocopy of your passport pages showing your current authorised stay; the checklist adds documents for particular visa types, for example the Board's order of approval for immigrant and temporary resident visas.

The change-of-status case matters in practice. If you came in as a tourist, held a tourist ACR I-Card and then marry and convert to a 13A, the card changes with you.

Lost or damaged card, or new details

A lost card, a damaged card and any change in what is printed on it go through re-issuance. The re-issuance checklist adds:

• •for a lost card: a letter requesting re-issuance, an affidavit of loss and a police report;
• •for a new name: the amended or corrected birth certificate, a court order where one applies, and an affidavit;
• •for a new nationality or civil status: the official document proving the change, such as a marriage certificate, and an affidavit;
• •for a new address: a certificate of residence from the barangay captain, a photocopy of the card and an affidavit of change of address.

The address case ties the card to your local paperwork. The Barangay Certificate you already need for banking and other offices is the same kind of document the Bureau asks for when you move.

Where a foreign document is needed, such as a marriage certificate issued abroad, the Bureau's checklist asks for the original, authenticated for use in the Philippines and translated into English if it is in another language. How that authentication works depends on the country that issued it. Since the Philippines joined the Apostille Convention, a document from most member countries needs only an apostille. The exception is a country that objected to the accession and has kept its objection: the Hague Conference status table shows Germany's objection of 2019 still standing, while Austria, Greece and Finland have withdrawn theirs. Documents from such a country go through legalisation instead, which the Philippine Consulate General in Frankfurt calls chain authentication: first the issuing country's own authority, then the Philippine embassy or consulate.

Travelling with an ACR I-Card

Three rules help when you leave the country.

Waiting for the card and must fly. If you have to leave in an emergency before your card is released, the Bureau offers an ACR I-Card waiver. It must be filed at least 48 hours before your flight.

Re-entry permit. Before the 2026 Holy Week, the Bureau reminded registered foreigners holding ACR I-Cards to obtain their re-entry permits ahead of time, at a Bureau office or at the one-stop shop at NAIA.

Emigration clearance. The same notice reminded foreign nationals who have stayed in the Philippines for more than six months to secure their Emigration Clearance Certificate before departure. On a long tourist stay that is a separate step from the card.

What the card does in daily life

The card is mostly about legal registration, and the law expects you to be able to show it when an immigration officer or the police ask. It also comes up well beyond the Bureau: a bank opening an account for a foreign resident will usually want to see your registration status, which is one of the points in why a Philippine bank says no.

It brings one duty with it. The Annual Report applies to all registered aliens and ACR I-Card holders except temporary visitor and tourist visa holders. If you hold the card on a resident or long-stay visa, you report to the Bureau in the first sixty days of each year; for 2026 the Bureau set the deadline on 1 March. The full routine, and who is exempt, is in our guide to the BI Annual Report.

Common mistakes

• •Waiting until "about two months". The line is 59 days. File the extension that takes you past it with the card application, not after.
• •Typing umlauts and accents. The form accepts English characters only. A rejected card because of wrong entries goes through re-issuance and costs a second fee.
• •Old photos. The photographs must be taken within the last three months, on a white background.
• •Losing the receipts. The checklist asks for copies of the official receipts, and the claim stub is what you collect the card with.
• •Forgetting the card when the status changes. A new visa means a new card, not a note on the old one.
• •Treating the card as permission to stay. Your authorised stay is in your passport and your visa. The card only proves that you are registered.

If you would rather have the extension calendar, the ACR I-Card and the paperwork around it handled as one plan for your stay in Davao, book a consultation or start from the overview of all Philippine visa routes.