Marriage capacity certificate: getting married abroad as a Spanish national

It is the document by which the Spanish State declares that you are free and legally capable of marrying. It does not authorise the wedding. The wedding is authorised by the authority of the country where it is celebrated. What the certificate does is prove to that authority that, under Spanish law, there is no impediment.

Article 252 of the Reglamento del Registro Civil (the Spanish Civil Registry Regulations) says so: if the parties have stated their intention to marry abroad in the form laid down by the law of the place of celebration, and that law requires a marriage capacity certificate to be produced, then once the file has been concluded with a final favourable ruling the instructing officer will hand them that certificate.

It is issued on the multilingual form approved by the Orden de 26 de mayo de 1988 (a Spanish ministerial order) and provided for in Convention number 20 of the Comisión Internacional del Estado Civil (CIEC, the International Commission on Civil Status), done at Munich on 5 September 1980, published in the BOE (the Spanish Official State Gazette) of 16 May 1988 and in force for Spain since 1 June 1988. That multilingual format saves you the translation in the countries that accept it.

Whether the certificate is needed is decided by the law of the country of the wedding, not by the Spanish Registro Civil. That is why the first step is not booking an appointment: it is confirming the requirement and the exact name that country gives it. We check that for you when we open your file.

This is the mistake that ruins weddings that have already been paid for. There are 2 clocks, not 1, and they do not start on the same day.

The first is the certificate clock: 6 months from its date. Article 252 of the Reglamento del Registro Civil is categorical, the validity of the certificate is limited to 6 months from its date. Once that period has passed the document is of no use, even if nobody has told you.

The second is the file clock: 1 year. Under article 248 of the Reglamento del Registro Civil, once 1 year has passed since the publication of the edictos (public marriage notices), since their waiver or since the substitute steps, without the marriage having been celebrated, it cannot be celebrated without a new publication, waiver or substitute steps. Article 58 of the Ley 20/2011, del Registro Civil (the Spanish Civil Registry Act), repeats the same rule for the notices.

The file clock starts earlier, when the edictos are published or the step that replaces them is carried out. The certificate clock starts later, on the day it is handed to you. In practice the certificate clock governs, because it is shorter and because it is the document you present in the country of the wedding.

The practical consequence: fix the wedding date first and count backwards. The certificate cannot be issued more than 6 months before the ceremony.

Article 238 of the Reglamento del Registro Civil settles competence: competent to instruct the file prior to the celebration of the marriage is the judge in charge or the justice of the peace, or the officer in charge of the consular Registro Civil, for the address of either of the parties. It is enough for one of the two to be domiciled there.

Article 58 of the Ley 20/2011 keeps the same logic in the current model: the file is instructed by the letrado de la Administración de Justicia (the court clerk) or by the officer in charge of the Registro Civil for the address of one of the parties, and the acta (the formal record) is processed by the notario (Spanish public notary) for the address of either of them.

If your partner lives outside Spain, the file is not blocked. Article 246 of the Reglamento del Registro Civil allows the hearing of the party who is not domiciled in the instructing officer's district to be held before the Registro Civil of their own address, including the consular one. The Instrucción of the Dirección General de los Registros y del Notariado (DGRN, the former Spanish directorate for registries and notaries) of 9 January 1995 deals precisely with this situation.

Bear in mind that you have to prove your addresses for the last 2 years, not just the current one. Articles 240 and 243 of the Reglamento del Registro Civil require it, and that is where the certificados de empadronamiento (proof of registration on the padrón, the municipal register of residents) or the residence certificates from the Spanish Consulate come in if you lived abroad.

Under article 240 of the Reglamento del Registro Civil, the application that opens the file must state the identity details of the parties including their occupation, the first name and surnames of the previous spouse or spouses and the date the marriage was dissolved if there were any, the declaration that no impediment exists, the officer chosen for the celebration, and the towns where they have lived or been domiciled in the last 2 years.

To that you add the birth certificates of both parties and proof of the foreign party's capacity under their own national law. The foreign documents are the ones that create the work, and what they need depends on the country that issues them.

If the document comes from a European Union State, it needs neither an apostille nor legalisation. Regulation (EU) 2016/1191, applicable since 16 February 2019, expressly covers public documents on marriage, including capacity to marry and marital status, and its multilingual standard form also avoids the translation.

If it comes from a country party to the Hague Convention of 5 October 1961, it carries an apostille. If it is in neither of the 2 groups, there is legalisation through diplomatic channels. In the notarial route, the Instrucción of the Dirección General de Seguridad Jurídica y Fe Pública (DGSJFP, the Spanish directorate for legal certainty and public attestation) of 3 June 2021 also requires the documents to have been issued within the 6 months before the date they are filed.

We take care of the apostille, the legalisation and the translation. You upload the documents you already have and we tell you exactly which ones are missing and in what condition.

Article 246 of the Reglamento del Registro Civil provides that the instructing officer, assisted by the clerk, will hear both parties privately and separately in order to satisfy themselves that there is no impediment of an existing marriage bond or any other legal obstacle to the celebration.

It is not a formality. The Instrucción of the Dirección General de los Registros y del Notariado of 31 January 2006 on marriages of convenience, published in the BOE of 17 February 2006, turns that hearing into the main instrument for detecting sham marriages. You will be asked how you met, about living together, about family and about your shared plans, and the 2 versions will be compared.

Before the hearing there is publicity. Article 243 of the Reglamento del Registro Civil orders edictos to be published for 15 days in the towns where you have lived in the last 2 years, provided they have fewer than 25,000 inhabitants. If the towns are above that figure, article 244 replaces the edictos with the hearing of at least one relative, friend or close acquaintance of either party, chosen by the instructing officer, who must state that they are satisfied that the planned marriage does not fall under any legal prohibition.

Article 245 adds that during the proceedings the evidence proposed, or ordered by the instructing officer of their own motion, on marital status, capacity or address is taken, and that if the instructing officer detects deficiencies or mental anomalies they will obtain an opinion from the Registro Civil doctor.

We prepare both interviews before the appointment, with the real questionnaire and the typical inconsistencies that bring a file down.

The file before the Registro Civil and the issuing of the certificate carry no tasa (official fee). Neither the application nor the handing over of the certificate triggers a state tasa.

What can cost money are the foreign documents: the apostille or the legalisation is paid in the country that issues the document, at the rate that country applies, and the translation is paid to the authorised translator. The amount depends on the country, on the number of documents and on the language, which is why we itemise it for you before you pay anything.

If you choose the notarial route, the notaría (notary's office) applies its own scale of fees. That scale is paid directly to the notaría and is not included in our fee. You do not have to look for a notaría or sort out the rota: the coordination, the appointment and the sending of the acta are handled by us.

Our fee and the full breakdown of what you pay are on the service page, visible before payment. It is the only figure we update, which is why it lives there and not in this guide.

Article 61 of the Código Civil (the Spanish Civil Code) sets the rule: the marriage produces civil effects from its celebration, full recognition of those effects requires its registration in the Registro Civil, and an unregistered marriage will not prejudice rights acquired in good faith by third parties. Translated: you are married from the day of the ceremony, but without registration you will not be able to rely on it fully against third parties.

Registration is applied for at the Spanish Consular Office for the district where the wedding was celebrated. If both spouses already live in Spain, it can be applied for at the Registro Civil of their place of residence. Either spouse can apply, whatever their nationality.

The supporting title is the certificate issued by the authority of the country of celebration, provided for in article 256 of the Reglamento del Registro Civil, legalised or apostilled and translated where appropriate, together with the birth certificates and the identity documents.

If you married abroad without having processed the preliminary file when it was required, article 65 of the Código Civil requires it to be checked beforehand whether the legal requirements for validity are met, by processing the corresponding acta or file. That is the long road, and it is avoided by doing things in order.

Once the registration has been made, a full marriage certificate (certificación literal) is issued. Do not expect a Libro de Familia (the Spanish family book): the Registros Civiles stopped issuing it on 30 April 2021, and those issued before that date keep their effects.