Why UK residents can’t use an EU pet passport anymore.

On 22 April 2026, the EU pet passport route stopped applying to GB residents. Passports issued before that date are no longer accepted as a GB-resident’s travel document into the EU.

The change is administrative. The biosecurity rules behind the passport, the microchip, the rabies vaccination, and the 21-day wait, are unchanged. What changed is the document the border officer expects to see.

The EU pet passport is a small blue booklet that records a pet’s identity, rabies vaccination, and certain treatments. Once issued, it stays with the pet for life. Every subsequent vaccination is stamped into the same booklet, and a single document carries the pet across borders inside the EU.

The booklet itself still exists, and EU member-state residents continue to use it. What changed for GB residents is that a UK-issued passport no longer counts as the travel document.

A GB resident now needs an Animal Health Certificate (AHC) for every separate trip into the EU. The AHC is signed by an Official Veterinarian within 10 days of arrival in the EU, and covers onward EU travel plus the return to Great Britain for six months from that arrival date.

The microchip, rabies vaccination, and 21-day wait sit behind the AHC the same way they sat behind the passport. The difference is single-trip rather than lifetime. A pet that travels four times in a year needs four AHC appointments.

There’s a separate Learn article on AHC validity that walks through the 10-day and six-month windows in detail.

The rule applies to residents of Great Britain (England, Scotland, and Wales). Northern Ireland residents are not affected. Under the Windsor Framework, NI continues to follow EU pet movement rules, and NI vets continue to issue EU pet passports that are valid for travel into the EU and back.

EU member-state residents are also unaffected. A pet passport issued in France, Spain, Germany, or any other EU country remains valid for that resident’s travel inside the EU and into Great Britain.

A pet passport issued to a GB resident before 22 April 2026 doesn’t disappear, but it can’t be used as the travel document for trips from Great Britain into the EU. The vaccinations and identity details inside the booklet are still accurate. The vet who issued it can read across to the AHC at the appointment for the next trip.

For owners with several years of stamped vaccinations in the booklet, the passport remains a useful record. Keep it. The chip number, the rabies-vaccination dates, and the OV’s signatures are exactly what the AHC appointment will need to reference.

Commercial moves never used the EU pet passport in the first place. The commercial track has always required a separate veterinary health certificate, pre-notification on the EU’s TRACES system, and inspection at the border control post. Nothing changed there on 22 April 2026. Switch the search on this site to commercial mode to see the right document for your corridor.

If you want to read the official guidance:

• APHA / DEFRA, Pet travel to Europe on gov.uk.
• The underlying EU rule, Regulation 576/2013, on eur-lex.europa.eu.
• European Commission, Movement of pets on food.ec.europa.eu.