Sweden's paid grandparent leave when your family lives abroad
For new parents in Sweden, family help can mean planning across borders.
Sweden lets grandparents take paid leave to help with a new baby. Here is how it works when the person you want beside you lives in another country.
The person receiving the days must be insured in Sweden. Most people who live or work here are covered. A relative coming from abroad needs their own entitlement assessed; the parent's right to Swedish benefits does not settle it.
Living abroad does not automatically rule someone out. Försäkringskassan says people working in Sweden while living elsewhere in the EU, EEA, Switzerland or Britain can receive most Swedish benefits. Where a person lives and works matters, and the agency checks their insurance status when they apply.
Each parent with joint custody can transfer up to 45 days to someone other than the child's other parent. A sole custodian can transfer 90. An eligible friend can receive days too, and payment reflects the recipient's income and the type of day transferred.
The arrangement has been used less often by foreign-born parents, according to Försäkringskassan's January 2026 evaluation. The agency suggested that fewer relatives nearby could help explain the difference. Foreign-born parents also tend to use more days during the child's first year, leaving fewer to transfer.
Among those receiving transferred days, almost 44 per cent were maternal grandmothers and 19 per cent were paternal grandmothers. Grandmothers accounted for nearly two-thirds of recipients.
DailySweden
DailySweden's desk of editors, reporters, researchers and investigative journalists. We bring readers factual, truthful and objective reporting on the issues that matter to them.