The expiration date is on page 2 of your passport, in the format DD MMM YYYY. There's no way to look it up online — you have to read the book. Do it once, log it, and let a reminder handle the rest.
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Open your passport to the photo page — that's page 2, the one with your picture. On the right side of the page, you'll see four labeled date fields stacked vertically:
Date of Expiration is the bottom of the four. For adult passports issued since 2008, it's exactly 10 years after the Date of Issue. For child passports (under age 16), it's 5 years.
U.S. passports use day-month-year, with the month written as a three-letter abbreviation in all caps. A passport showing 15 JUN 2027 expires on June 15, 2027.
That format exists deliberately to eliminate the U.S. (MM/DD/YYYY) versus European (DD/MM/YYYY) ambiguity. With "JUN" spelled out, there's no risk of reading 06/07 as either June 7th or July 6th. The cost of misreading the date can be a missed flight, so the passport doesn't take chances.
Common abbreviations to watch for: JAN, FEB, MAR, APR, MAY, JUN, JUL, AUG, SEP, OCT, NOV, DEC. The MRZ at the bottom of the same page encodes the date numerically in YYMMDD format, but the human-readable version is what you'll record.
The State Department doesn't offer a public lookup of passport expiration by passport number. That's a privacy decision — letting anyone with your passport number query the expiration would expose travel-document data to fraud.
What you can check at travel.state.gov is the status of an application or renewal that's currently in process — whether it's been received, is being printed, or has shipped. Once issued and in your hands, the expiration date is yours to track on the physical document. The QR code on the back of newer U.S. passports just links to the State Department site; it doesn't open your specific record.
Bottom line: open the book, read page 2, write down the date.
Reading your passport every time you book a trip is unsustainable. So is hoping you'll remember the date a decade after you got it. The fix is to do this read-and-record exercise once, and have a reminder handle the next decade.
Page 2 of the passport. Bottom field on the right. Format: DD MMM YYYY.
That's your reminder date — early enough to renew at the routine rate, before the six-month rule applies.
A passport expiration reminder sends an email when you need to act. Follow-ups until you confirm you've renewed.
On the photo page (page 2 of the passport book). The right-hand column lists Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Issue, and Date of Expiration, in that order. The expiration date is the bottom one of the four. It is also encoded in the machine-readable zone at the bottom of the same page.
Day-month-year, with the month written as a three-letter abbreviation. For example, 15 JUN 2027 means June 15, 2027. The all-caps three-letter month is intentional — it prevents the U.S./European MM/DD vs DD/MM confusion that has caused travelers to misread their own expiration dates.
No. The State Department does not offer a public online lookup of passport expiration by passport number — that would be a privacy and security risk. You can check the status of a passport application or renewal at travel.state.gov, but only while it's in process. The expiration date itself is only available by reading the physical passport.
The Machine Readable Zone — two lines of letters and numbers near the bottom of the photo page. The second line encodes your date of birth, expiration date, and a check digit in YYMMDD format. Scanners at airports and border crossings read it. You can read it too: the expiration date follows the date of birth.
New U.S. passports issued in recent years have a QR code sticker on the back cover. Scanning it with a phone camera links you to travel.state.gov, not your specific passport data. It's a convenience for getting to renewal information, not a lookup tool.
For travel purposes, not at all. Once the printed date passes, the passport is invalid for international travel. Most countries require six months of remaining validity beyond that. The expiration date is a hard cutoff, not a soft one.
Free. No account. We email you 9 months before the date you just read, so the next time you think about your passport is when you actually need to renew.
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