Normally, you can become a citizen of a country if you have been living there for a few years. If one or more of your ancestors were local citizens, however, this residency requirement may be waived, and you may gain residency much sooner.
Even then, however, you must consider the processing time of your application. Authorities must review the data you submit, and the time frame available to them varies. The below table lists the processing time in each EU country where you can become a citizen by descent if you base your application on grandparents or ancestors even further down the lane. (In other EU countries citizenship by ancestry is limited, see a map here. At the same time, not all of them allow dual citizenship; learn more about that here.)
Country | Processing time |
Luxembourg | 4-8 months |
Latvia | 4-12 months |
Bulgaria | 9 months |
Hungary | ca. 1 year |
Lithuania | ca. 1 year |
Poland | 1-3 years or longer |
Slovakia | 2 years (you can get permanent residency in the meantime) |
Italy | 2-3 years |
As you can see, the 1-year processing time in Hungary is not especially long compared to the procedure in other EU member states.