Law no. 46/2023 of 17 August was recently passed, which changed the maximum age of the adoptee and the minimum age of the adopter in the portuguese adoption system.

According to the rule that was in force, the adoptee had to be under 15 years old at the time of the adoption application (or under 18 in cases where they had been entrusted to the adopters or one of them since they were no older than 15, or when they were the child of the adopter's spouse).

From now on, under the terms of the approved law, the maximum age will always be 18, except in cases of emancipation: the adoptee must be under 18 and not emancipated at the time of the adoption application.

According to the explanatory memorandum of one of the bills that gave rise to it (508/XV/1st), the criterion for extending the possibility of adoption comes from the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which, like Portuguese law, considers any human being under the age of 18 to be a child, unless, under the terms of the law applicable to them, they reach the age of majority earlier. According to the argument of another of the bills (484/XV/1.ª), the previous rule placed children between the ages of 16 and 18 in a limbo, where they were no longer "adoptable" but not yet of legal age, condemning them to institutionalisation.

On the other hand, the minimum age of the adopter was also changed. According to the current rule, if the adopters were a couple (joint adoption), the minimum age for both should be 25. In cases of single adoption, the minimum age was 30, except in cases where the adopted child was the child of the adopter's spouse, in which case it was enough for the adopter to be over 25.

Under the terms of the law now passed, the general rule is now 25 in all cases: anyone over 25 can adopt.