Step-by-Step Relocation Guide

Before you touch the portal, assemble the file on paper

Everything from here on is graded on completeness. The portal, the preliminary review and the appointment all exist to check one thing: is this file complete, correct, and in order. Get that right before you start.

You do not need to be enrolled yet

A common assumption that costs people weeks: the visa file needs your admission letter, not proof that you have already matriculated. Enrolment usually happens once you are in Germany, on the visa this application produces. If your university happens to allow postal enrolment before you travel, having that certificate can strengthen the file — but it is a bonus, not a requirement. Do not hold the visa application back waiting for it.

The order matters

The Karachi consulate's own checklist asks for the file assembled in a specific order, and the same discipline is worth applying everywhere even where a mission processes it through the portal instead of on paper:

1. Application form ("Application for a national visa")
2. Biometric picture
3. Declaration pursuant to Section 54 (2) Nr. 8
4. Applicant's Declaration pursuant to Section 55 (2) 1
5. Copies of pages 1 and 2 of your current passport
6. Copies of any previous visas you have held
7. Information sheet for intending students
8. Admission letter(s)
9. Confirmation letter for the blocked account
10. Curriculum Vitae
11. Motivation letter
12. Copies of the O-level exam degree and grade sheet
13. Copies of the A-level exam degree and grade sheet (if applicable)
14. Copies of the grade sheet and/or degree(s) of any previous university studies (if applicable)
15. Copy of IELTS (or similar) and/or Goethe language certificates
16. Copies of any previous visa refusal letters, from any embassy or consulate (if applicable)
17. If the course charges a fee: proof of sufficient means to pay it
18. Any further documentation you wish to provide

Two complete sets, always

Prepare the entire set twice. This is stated explicitly for Karachi's paper process and is good practice everywhere: one set is what you submit, the other is your own reference copy for the appointment and for anything the mission asks you to re-send. Keep photographs of every page as a third, digital backup.

Format details that get files sent back

• Biometric photo: not older than six months, and — where the process is still paper-based — glued, not stapled, into the top-right corner of the application form's first page.
• Copies, not originals, for everything except what you are explicitly told to bring in original — mainly your passport, which you keep with you and present only at the appointment itself.
• Attested, not plain, academic documents. Your degree and transcripts need the HEC (and, for Matric/Intermediate, IBCC) attestation stamps from earlier in this guide before they count here — an unattested copy is treated as incomplete.
• English documents where the original is not English, matching the translation rules already covered for uni-assist: a sworn or court-admissible translator, not a general translation agency.