A single registry of foreigners opened on 1 September — but the deadline that matters is 1 January 2027

From 1 September the State Services Development Agency runs a centralised record of foreign nationals' legal status in Georgia — residents, remote workers, employees and company owners — drawing together information that previously sat in separate government systems. Writing at the end of July, Eurofast noted that the operational procedures were still being published, which is worth keeping in mind whenever someone tells you with confidence exactly how the thing works.

Since 1 March 2026 most foreign workers and entrepreneurs have needed formal work authorisation. Staff already on the books when that rule arrived have until 1 January 2027 to be brought into line. If you run a guesthouse with a foreign manager, a building crew, or a small agency with hires from abroad, that is the date to plan against — not the registry launch, which mostly changes how the state sees records it already held.

One softening came in this year: short professional activity of up to four months in a calendar year can sit outside the standard authorisation route if it is pre-registered through the electronic system. It is drafted to cover self-employed people, independent contractors and professionals doing paid work — the visiting surveyor, the photographer booked for a season, the consultant on a defined job. It is not a way to staff a business.

Go through your payroll and note which people are foreign nationals and which document each one actually holds. Then check the agency's own published procedure before you file anything, because the rules were still being issued over the summer and a summary written in July may already be behind. Where a work permit decision could touch someone's residence permit, that is the point to pay a lawyer rather than guess.