Student money in Sweden: CSN, the 15-hour rule and the fribelopp

The programme starts on Monday, the rent is due on the 25th, and you have read three different answers about whether you can work. Two separate authorities decide your student economy, and they do not talk to each other. Here is what each of them actually says in 2026.

Two systems, one wallet

CSN decides whether you get studiemedel, the Swedish grant and loan. Migrationsverket decides what your permit lets you do. Neither one asks the other, and a decision from one of them does not fix a problem with the other.

The short version for money: if you are here on a residence permit for studies, you are outside the CSN system and inside a maintenance requirement instead. If you live here on a permanent permit or with protection status, you are inside the CSN system and your permit does not limit your work.

Can you get studiemedel at all?

As a foreign citizen you must clear two separate tests, and CSN sends two separate decisions: one on your right to Swedish student finance, one on the studiemedel itself.

From outside the EU/EEA, the ordinary route is a permanent residence permit. CSN normally grants the right from the week Migrationsverket granted the permit. Permanent right of residence works too, as does a decision granting international protection, a permit under the Qualification Regulation, or a permit for particularly distressing circumstances.

A residence permit based on family ties can qualify in certain cases, with an important exception written out on CSN's own page: a time-limited permit as the family member of a person with a work permit normally does not, because the permit rests on work rather than on family ties.

For EU/EEA citizens the routes are different. Permanent right of residence after five years, or a lasting connection: at least two years of work in Sweden at 50 per cent or more, two years married to or cohabiting with someone here, or arriving before the age of 20 with a parent who lives and works here.

If you are an asylum seeker who has never held a residence permit, there is no studiemedel.

What studiemedel pays in 2026

Full-time studies, with the full loan taken, pay 3 398 kr a week. That is 1 030 kr in grant and 2 368 kr in loan. A normal payment covers four weeks, which is 13 592 kr, and it lands on the 25th of each month you study, in advance.

The loan carries interest of 2.135 per cent for 2026. You can take the grant only, or borrow less, but a week counts as used either way.

The other conditions are the ones people trip on. You must study at least 50 per cent for at least three weeks, register on every course you start, and pass enough credits to keep the money coming. Higher education is capped at 240 weeks in total. You can apply from the autumn term of the year you turn 20 for upper-secondary level, and the right to borrow shrinks from the year you turn 51.

Some payments block studiemedel for the same period: etableringsersättning, activity support, sickness or activity compensation, and student finance from another country, among others. Income support, housing allowance and child allowance do not.

The fribelopp, and the trap in it

You may earn money while you study, up to a limit called the fribelopp. It is counted per calendar half-year, January to June and July to December, and it falls the more weeks of studiemedel you take in that half-year.

For full-time studies in 2026 the limit is 172 041 kr with 10 weeks of studiemedel in the half-year, 143 358 kr with 15 weeks, 114 676 kr with 20 weeks and 80 257 kr with 26 weeks.

The trap is the summer. Pay counts towards the calendar half-year in which it is paid out, so a well-paid July and August land in the same half-year as the autumn term. Report your expected income for the whole half-year when you apply, and tell CSN if it changes.

Ahmed has held a permanent residence permit since March 2025 and starts a three-year programme on 31 August 2026. He applies for 20 weeks of full-time studiemedel in the second half of 2026, which pays 20 × 3 398 kr, that is 67 960 kr. His fribelopp for that half-year is 114 676 kr, and his summer job plus his weekend hours come to about 95 000 kr, so nothing is reduced.

His classmate Mei is here on a study permit granted in July 2026. She gets no studiemedel, she showed 10 656 kr a month in funds to get the permit, and she may work 15 hours a week during the semester.

Working while you study on a permit

The 15-hour limit is the change that matters most this year. It applies during semesters to first- and second-cycle students whose permit was granted on or after 11 June 2026, and it is a condition of the permit, not a tax rule.

You may work without that limit in June, July and August, and also when the work is part of your education, such as an internship, or involves student representation, administration, research or artistic research at your own higher education institution.

There is one more exemption worth knowing: if you have completed a programme corresponding to at least two semesters and hold the diploma, you may work without the limit for the rest of your permit, as long as you are not applying for a new permit for studies below doctoral level.

Working more than the rules allow can lead to the permit being revoked or an extension being refused. The same applies to study results below 37.5 credits in the first year or 45 credits a year after that.

If you received your permit before 11 June 2026, none of the three new requirements applies to you until you extend it. From the extension onwards, all of them do.

What we do not know yet

How strictly the 15 hours will be checked in practice is not yet visible. Migrationsverket writes that too much work can lead to revocation, but the agency has not published how it will measure an average week or how it will treat an occasional busy one.

CSN's amounts and the fribelopp are set for 2026 and are revised for each new year, usually in the autumn. Read the figures on csn.se the day you apply, and if you are near the fribelopp line, apply for fewer weeks rather than hoping the reduction misses you.