How to get a DigiD in the Netherlands

The short version

• DigiD is the login for Dutch government services. It is an account, not a card.
• You need a BSN and an address registered with your gemeente before you can apply. Registering as a non-resident works differently.
• You apply online at digid.nl, then wait for a letter with an activation code.
• Without one you cannot file a tax return, claim a toeslag, or use Mijn DUO.
• The app's ID-check accepts Dutch identity documents only, so most internationals cannot add it.

How to get a DigiD is the short part. Qualifying for one is where you can get stuck, because DigiD assumes the Dutch state already knows who you are and where you live.

So the order is fixed. Address, then gemeente registration, then your BSN, then DigiD. The application itself takes a few minutes and the rest is waiting for the post.

What DigiD is

DigiD stands for digitale identiteit. It is one username and password, plus a second step on your phone, that logs you in to Dutch government services. Logius, the digital services agency of the Ministry of the Interior, runs it.

There is nothing physical. No card, no reader, no document to carry. The nearest thing you already have is your online banking login, and a DigiD is worth guarding about as carefully.

It works with government organisations and organisations with a public function: ministries and gemeenten (Dutch municipalities), the Belastingdienst (the Dutch tax office), health insurers, pension funds, and educational institutions. One account covers all of them, which is the point of it.

Nobody is legally obliged to have one. Government.nl states the practical position plainly enough. Without a DigiD you cannot arrange most of your affairs with government organisations online.

What you need before you apply

Two conditions, and the first gates the second. You need a BSN (Burgerservicenummer, the Dutch citizen service number), and you need to be registered with a gemeente in the BRP (Basisregistratie Personen, the Dutch population register). Both come out of the same appointment, so if you have not had it yet, start with how to get a BSN.

After that the list is short. A phone that can receive text messages, and an email address. That is all the application asks of you.

The address matters more than it looks, because it is where your activation code gets posted.

How to get a DigiD

You apply on digid.nl. You give your BSN and your details, then choose a username and a password. Save both somewhere you will find them again. You need them at the activation step, and that is the step people are unprepared for.

A letter with an activation code follows by post, sent to your registered address. It does not come by email.

When it arrives, enter your username, your password, and the code from the letter, either on digid.nl or in the DigiD app. Your account is live at that point.

Do not leave the letter sitting on a shelf. The activation code stops working after 21 days, and then the only way forward is a fresh application and another letter. Activate the day it lands rather than counting them.

What you use your DigiD for

Almost all of it is admin with a deadline attached.

Tax and allowances. Toeslagen such as zorgtoeslag (healthcare allowance) are applied for through Mijn toeslagen, which needs a DigiD, and the Belastingdienst warns that the portal is only available in Dutch. Your annual tax return runs through the same login.

Study. Mijn DUO asks for the DigiD app or DigiD with SMS verification, plus a BSN. Anything you need from DUO happens behind that login.

Health. Your insurer's portal and your medical records sit behind DigiD. Health data is also where the extra ID-check below comes in.

Your gemeente. Extracts from the BRP, reporting a move, and requests you would otherwise have to make at a counter. MijnOverheid, which the same login opens, is where a lot of official messages end up.

If you hold an EU passport, a few services take your own country's digital identity instead, and DUO says so directly for Mijn DUO. Worth a check before you assume you are locked out. Everything else expects a DigiD.

None of this is quite as absolute as it sounds. Where there is an online form behind DigiD there is usually a slower offline equivalent: the Belastingdienst will make you an appointment or point you at a benefits service point if you call, and DUO still accepts applications on paper. Treat those as the fallback they are, rather than a reason to put the application off.

The DigiD app and the ID-check

You can log in with the DigiD app, or with your username and password plus a code by SMS. Install the app. It replaces the password with a PIN, and it is the method organisations are moving toward.

Some of them want more than a login. For privacy-sensitive data, health information above all, they ask you to add an ID-check to your app and to renew it each year. The check reads the chip in your identity document, so your phone needs an NFC reader for it to work at all.

If you registered as a non-resident

An RNI desk (Registratie Niet-Ingezetenen, the register of non-residents) issues a BSN without a Dutch address, so the normal route has nowhere to post your letter. There is a separate application for that case, and for anyone with a BSN who lives abroad.

You need a valid passport or identity card, your BSN, an email address, and a phone that can receive text messages from the Netherlands. A driving licence is not accepted as identification on this route.

Instead of a letter you receive a service desk code, and you have 30 days to use it. You then collect the activation code in person at a DigiD service desk, at a Dutch embassy or consulate or a participating gemeente, or on a video call with Netherlands Worldwide. digid.nl lists the desks.

DigiD is not the part of moving here that anyone enjoys, and it is not meant to be interesting. It is the key to the rest of the admin: the tax return, the allowance you are entitled to, the message from your gemeente you would otherwise never see. Request it in the same week you collect your BSN, and the waiting happens while you are busy with everything else.