I applied at a consulate yesterday for a renewal. They said it would take 2-3 weeks for me to get the new passport. I'll update the actual timeline once I receive the new one.

One of the US embassies to which I've been by in recent days in Europe took 11-12 business days for the applicant's passport to get back for pick-up. And that was about 2-5 business days more than what I was seeing there in say January or at this time last year.

See my words above.

Where/how are you planning to apply? I generally try to minimize use of a non-State facility as the application acceptance agent if I can help it -- and I would avoid it more so in this era when the USPS is messed up more than usual.

If I were in your situation, I would not pay the expedite fee at this point even if they said it would get the passport back 3-10 days earlier than is possibly the case already.

Updated: Friend called again on Monday and they said she could pay the $60 expedited fee and if they could get it expedited, then they'd charge the card, otherwise, they wouldn't. Yesterday they got notification he'll have his passport on Friday. So about 8-9 weeks (not sure if she got charged the expediting fee or not).

was expecting to use the local post office but may take your advice and do it at the DC Passport Agency.

I'm not sure it's a viable option.

A friend of mine got his from a US mission abroad, received it back last week, had put it in 8 days before.

Depending on if and where the child is outside of the US, the turnaround is quite often less than 15 business days nowadays when using State's facilities outside of the US. This is about 4-7 business days worse than what I've frequently seen (in prior years) at embassies in cities with pretty convenient flight schedules to the US.

State's facilities inside the US aren't necessarily as readily available for such quick turns since there's the issue of whether or not the applicant is even qualified for in-person services with State's own people as application acceptance agents at such facilities.

Speaking of passport acceptance by say the USPS's passport application acceptance staff or other contracted acceptance agents, make sure to double check that you've done the proverbially dotting of the i's and crossing of the t's for the DS-11 application nowadays before they say you're good to go. You don't want the application to be hung up because an acceptance agent got something wrong, since then you may be stuck with finding out via a letter or email that they need a fix from your side before they can issue the passport. Those kind of mistakes will drag things out.

Renewal by mail -- extra large book and passport card

Mailed from Berkeley, Cal.: July 30 [applications from California go to Texas processing center]
Check cashed: Aug. 10
"In process" status when I logged in to check: late Aug.
Email that my application is "in process": Sep. 26 [I had requested email alert on the website]
Email that my application was approved: Sep. 28
Received in the mail: Oct. 1

Nothing unusual about my application or my travels in the last decade.

Mine expires next August.

Since I'm not using it for travel, it might be nice to get it done now.

I think the State Dept. site says you can apply for renewal 9 months before?

Now seems like a really good time to renew (if you're eligible). They've worked through the backlog and it's unlikely we'll see any surge in applications in the next couple of months. But down the road, as the end of the pandemic nears, there might be a big surge in applications.

If that is said anywhere, it's not been universal in application.

Over many years, including earlier this year, I've seen US passports sent in with renewal applications where the passports had years and years left on them before the expiration date. And the applicants were issued new passports. One such application where the renewal was issued for an applicant whose submitted passport wasn't expiring for several years literally had it done this year because the bearer didn't like the printed date of issue on the passport as it was a reminder of a bad day. And I have a lot of other examples of renewal passports being issued for people whose submitted passports weren't expiring for years and years and yet had other reasons -- from the trivial to the very material -- to renew years in advance of the printed expiration date.

That's their suggested time for renewal, but I don't see any prohibition on renewing it earlier. In fact, those who run out of pages for visas must renew their passports now that they've stopped issuing extra pages, and that could be years before expiration.

Can I get extra visa pages for my passport?

No, you cannot. Applicants who need additional pages in their valid passports must obtain a new passport by mail. Applicants within the United States may choose a 28-page or 52-page book.

So would they renew it for the 10 years from when you renew early or 10 years from when it would have expired?

Say it expires in June next year and I renew now. Would it be 10 years from say November or December or 10 years from June?

Ten years from the date of issue.

Yes, the downside of renewing early is you lose any time that remained on your old passport. No credit on the new one for that.