The first U.S. passports arrive When passports were first issued in the U.S. in the late 1700s, they looked almost nothing like the official booklets we carry today, and they were only given to a select few citizens.

Yes, passports existed in the 1700s, but they were vastly different from the standardized booklets we use in 2026. In the 18th century, a passport was typically a single-page, handwritten document issued by a high-ranking official or monarch. They weren't universally required for all travel as they are today; instead, they served as a "letter of safe conduct" to verify the bearer's identity and request protection from foreign authorities. In the United States, for instance, the first passports were issued in the 1780s by American consuls in cities like Paris. These documents often included a physical description of the traveler since photography hadn't been invented yet. Most international travel in that era relied more on social status and letters of introduction than on a formal government document, and it wasn't until the late 19th and early 20th centuries that the modern, mandatory passport system became a global standard for border crossing.