LGBT rights in Romania

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people in Romania may face legal challenges and discrimination not experienced by non-LGBT residents. Attitudes in Romania are generally conservative, with regard to the rights of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender citizens. Nevertheless, the country has made significant changes in LGBT rights legislation since 2000. In the past two decades, it fully decriminalised homosexuality, introduced and enforced wide-ranging anti-discrimination laws, equalised the age of consent and introduced laws against homophobic hate crimes. Furthermore, LGBT communities have become more visible in recent years, as a result of events such as Bucharest's annual pride parade and Cluj-Napoca's Gay Film Nights festival.

In 2006, Romania was named by Human Rights Watch as one of five countries in the world that had made "exemplary progress in combating rights abuses based on sexual orientation or gender identity." However, in June 2020, it placed a blanket ban on the study of gender identity in education. The ban was struck down in December 2020 by Romania’s Constitutional Court. In April 2022, a bill passed in the Senate of Romania banning "gay propaganda" in schools. Also in April 2022, the senate passed a bill banning the discussion of homosexuality and gender identity in public spaces. It was approved by the Romanian Human Rights Commission but requires approval by the Chamber of Deputies, Romania's lower house of Parliament. The bill sparked a march by over 15,000 people in Romania's capital Bucharest in July 2022, calling for equal rights for gender and sexual minorities. In 2022, the advocacy group ILGA-Europe ranked Romania 26 out of 27 European Union (EU) countries for LGBT rights protection, behind all EU countries except Poland.