Designing a digital passport application for first-time passport applicants

About State

The U.S. Department of State (State) leads America’s foreign policy through diplomacy, advocacy, and assistance by advancing the interests of the American people, their safety and economic prosperity. The Department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs (CA) serves more than 30 million customers each year in the United States and every country in the world. As part of the CA’s Passports team, a U.S. Digital Corps Design Fellow was instrumental in the research and design of the first-ever fully digital, first-time passport application.

The challenge

Applying for a passport for the first time has historically meant navigating a paper-based process:

• Printing forms
• Filling them out by hand
• Gathering and mailing physical documents like birth certificates for review

The process is slow and prone to error; a single mistake like a missing signature or illegible writing can result in delays that impact both passport applicants and the State Department team that must manually review, correct, and process each submission.

While passport renewals have already moved towards a digital approach for eligible applicants, first-time applications present a distinct set of challenges. To increase security and prevent fraud, first-time applicants must have their identity verified in person and submit original supporting documents. Designing a digital experience for this group meant solving for a more complex identity verification workflow than renewals require while ensuring the process remains secure and accessible.

In 2025, CA leadership identified building a fully digital first-time passport application as a key strategic objective that would require collaboration across designers, technologists, policy analysts, and operations staff.

The approach

Alongside a cross-functional State team, a U.S. Digital Corps Design Fellow took a research-driven, human-centered approach to an online passport application experience. She:

• Conducted user research to understand where the first-time applicants struggled the most in the experience, identifying pain points like confusing language on the form, uncertainty about document requirements, and manual entry errors
• Translated findings into actionable design solutions
• Introduced and reinforced agile methodologies within the division, helping the whole organization (with praise and support from CA leadership and internal State partners) move towards iterative, user-tested, human-centered design (HCD) development rather than traditional linear planning approaches

The Fellow defined how the digital application should:

• Validate information in real time
• Guide applicants through identity verification
• Reduce the likelihood of the types of errors that previously caused processing delays

The impact

A fully digital first-time passport application would directly improve the citizen experience for millions of Americans. In 2025 alone, more than 26 million Americans applied for a U.S. passport.

Such a digital process would give applicants a more user-friendly way to submit accurate information from the start, correct mistakes before submission, and avoid the risk of mailing original identity documents. This would allow for faster processing and enable the State Department’s Passports team to focus on more complex casework instead of conducting manual reviews and error correction.

The Fellow’s work proactively embedded customer needs into the design of the passport system. Partners across the Passports organization praised this work that saved time and resources for both the Bureau of Consular Affairs and the American public it serves.