Green Card Renewal: How to Renew with Form I-90, What It Costs, and What Counts as Proof Meanwhile

A green card expires. Your permanent residence does not. That one sentence removes most of the panic around green card renewal, but it does not remove the paperwork, because an expired card still stops you boarding a flight home, starting a new job, or renewing a driver’s license. Here is how the renewal works, what it costs, and what protects you while USCIS is working on it.

When to renew a green card

USCIS tells permanent residents to file for a replacement when the card has expired or will expire within the next six months. Ten-year cards are the normal case. If you file much earlier than six months out, USCIS can reject the application, so the window matters at both ends.

The same form, Form I-90, Application to Replace Permanent Resident Card, also covers a card that is lost, stolen, damaged, carries wrong information, or shows an old name after a legal name change, and a card issued before your 14th birthday once you turn 14.

If you are outside the United States when the card is within six months of expiry, and you will be back within a year of leaving and before it expires, USCIS says to file as soon as you return rather than from abroad.

Who must not use Form I-90

This is the mistake that costs people months. If your green card is valid for two years, you are a conditional resident, usually through a marriage under two years old at approval. Your card does not get renewed. The conditions get removed, with Form I-751, filed in the 90 days before the card expires. Filing an I-90 instead is rejected, and the I-751 deadline does not wait. Our guide to a green card through marriage explains where the two-year card comes from.

The other case is citizenship. If you filed Form N-400 on or after 12 December 2022, the receipt notice itself extends your green card by 24 months, so most people in that position never need an I-90 at all. If you are close to eligible, compare the two in our guide to permanent resident vs citizen before paying for a card you may not need. Not sure which of the three forms is yours? That is exactly what a free green card consultation settles in ten minutes.

What green card renewal costs

These are the USCIS fees as of September 2026, from Form G-1055 Edition 09/09/26.

Filing online saves $50 and gives you the receipt notice at once, which matters more than the money, because the receipt notice is what protects you next. A fee waiver on Form I-912 is possible for people who qualify on income. If citizenship is the next step instead, our guide to the cost of US citizenship covers the N-400 fee and its reductions. The government fee is the only cost of doing it yourself; if you ask us to prepare it, our fee is separate and quoted after the free consultation.

How to renew, step by step

1. Read your card. A ten-year card means I-90. A two-year card means I-751. A pending N-400 filed since 12 December 2022 means neither.
2. Check the date. File once you are inside the six-month window before expiry, or immediately if the card is already expired, lost or damaged.
3. File Form I-90 online through a free USCIS account. Upload a copy of the front and back of your current card, or a government photo ID if the card is gone. Use the current form edition from uscis.gov on the day you file.
4. Pay the fee from the table above, or attach a fee waiver request if you qualify.
5. Save the receipt notice, Form I-797C, the day it arrives. Print it and keep it with your old card. It is your proof of status for the next 36 months.
6. Attend biometrics if USCIS schedules an appointment. USCIS often reuses fingerprints already on file, so you may not be called.
7. Update your address with USCIS if you move while the case is open, or the card goes to the wrong house and you are back at step three.

The wait for the new card varies and published figures change every month, so check your own case on the official tool. Our USCIS processing time checker pulls the current figure for Form I-90 in one step. The USCIS document checklist lists what to attach for each I-90 reason. If you are still at the application stage, our guide to how much a green card costs lists every fee before this one.

What proves your status while you wait

Here green card renewal is far kinder than a work permit renewal, which lost its safety net in 2025. USCIS states that the Form I-90 receipt notice, together with your expired card, is evidence of lawful permanent resident status for 36 months from the expiration date printed on the card. Employers can accept the pair for Form I-9, and it is what you show at the airport on the way back in.

Two cautions. The receipt only works with the card, so if the card is lost you need an ADIT stamp in your passport from a USCIS field office, which you request after filing. And an expired card with no I-90 on file is just an expired card: the 36 months start from the receipt, not from the expiry.

What an expired card never does is end your residence. You remain a permanent resident until a judge or USCIS says otherwise. The card is proof, not the status itself, a distinction our guide to the difference between a green card and a visa goes into.

Mistakes that turn a simple renewal into a long one

• Filing I-90 on a two-year card. Rejected, and the real I-751 window may close while you wait for the rejection.
• Filing too early. More than six months before expiry, USCIS can send it back.
• Letting the card expire with nothing on file and then trying to travel. Book the filing before you book the flight.
• Losing the receipt notice. Without it, the 36-month extension is not on paper.
• Paying $465 on paper for a card that would cost $0. Check the error and age rows before paying.
• Renewing when you could naturalize. If you have been a resident five years (three, married to a citizen), an N-400 extends the card 24 months by itself and ends the renewal cycle for good.

The verdict

Green card renewal is the least dramatic filing in immigration, if you send the right form inside the right window. For most families we file this for, the whole job is an online I-90, a $415 fee and a receipt notice kept safe with the old card.

The two questions worth stopping on are whether your card is a two-year one, and whether you are already eligible for citizenship. Either answer changes the form. If neither applies, file in the six-month window and keep the receipt. Our green card through marriage guide covers what happens if you are still at the conditional stage.