Formally, a national visa type D is not a Schengen visa. However, Mexico's immigration rules state that entry into Mexico is possible with a “visa from one of the Schengen countries.” Therefore, a national visa D is quite suitable for entry into Mexico, as the experience of many travelers proves.
If you have a national visa of an EU state type LTV (not D), such a visa does not give the right to enter Mexico using it.
Here are the basic rules for using EU national D visas to enter Mexico.
1. The state of issue of the visa is not important. The basis for issuing a visa (study or work) beyond this is not significant.
2. The visa must be multi, in other words, allow multiple entries into the EU. Usually, national visas — long-term visas, unlike a regular Schengen visa, because most often they are multi.
3. The visa may not be used for travel to the EU («not printed») before arriving in Mexico.
4. The duration of the visa does not matter. You must enter Mexico before your visa expires. However, the closer your entry is to your visa expiration date, the more doubt the migration service may have about whether to allow you in.
5. Even if you enter Mexico on the last day of validity of your national visa, you will be able to stay in the country for as long as the migration officer allows upon entry, and not until the end of your visa. Sometimes his decision still depends on the validity period of the visa.
6. National D visa allows entry into Mexico by any means of transport, by land, water or air, in contrast to the electronic permit, which allows entry into Mexico only by plane.
7. National D visa may be used for entry into Mexico by citizensall countriespeace. However, it does not provide any benefits over the Mexico visa, foreign visas, or e-Permit. Your success in entering Mexico depends more on your citizenship than your visa. Citizens of a number of countries, primarily the republics of Transcaucasia and Central Asia, may be denied entry into Mexico with any visa. Therefore, obtaining a Mexico visa is preferable for them.
8. If you are a citizen of Ukraine or Russia, use an electronic permit to enter Mexico. He usually has fewer questions.
Some caveats. The first entry into the EU on a national D visa should be in the country that issued it, or in another country if you can prove that you are going to the country that issued the visa. This means that airlines may be ambivalent about the D visa when boarding a flight to Mexico transiting through Europe. In particular, you have a Polish work visa type D, and you are en route to Istanbul — Munich — Cancun. In other words, you will enter the EU in Germany, not Poland, and will not travel to Poland, but to Mexico. Or, if you are denied entry into Mexico, the airline will be forced to return you to Germany. But your D visa does not give you the right to enter Germany for the first time. We have encountered European airlines banning independent transit through one EU country using a new national visa issued in another EU country.
On the other hand, the national visa D gives the right to stay in other EU countries for a period of 90 days in every 180 days, then after entering the EU it acts as a regular Schengen visa. Re-entry into the EU with such a visa is already possible through any country in the Schengen area.
In addition, we would like to remind you about other visas that allow you to enter Mexico without having to purchase a Mexico visa. These are visas from the USA, Canada, Great Britain, Japan and the regular Schengen multi-visa.