Marry Abroad in Denmark

Rules such as age restrictions (i.e. not being under a certain age) and not being directly related to the person you wish to marry, along with others, will be in place in most countries. Check these rules out before you proceed.

You will be asked to provide various official papers and documents such as your passports, Visas, proof of termination of a previous marriage (where applicable) etc when making your marriage application. 

Exactly which documents are required will of course vary from country to country. 

A lot of places will ask for your birth certificate and / or a Marital Status Certificate (aka CNI). These can sometimes be tricky or lengthy documents to obtain, depending on where you’re from. 

Some of your documents may also require additional legalisation for use in foreign countries. 

You should thoroughly investigate exactly which documents will be required from you both before you make any wedding application as making an application without first obtaining everything that is required could cause lengthy delays to the application process.

Submitting an application for a wedding abroad will inevitably cost money. Somebody in an office will be processing your application, checking your documents and potentially requesting further information / additional documents from you. This requires not only time, but money, and the cost for this service will also vary from office to office in country to country. 

You should note that if you are choosing to hire a venue and wedding vendors such as a photographer or catering for your wedding, that these fees will be separate and additional to any processing fee you will pay for your marriage application. So be certain of exactly what costs you will need to pay for every aspect of the wedding prior to starting. This ensures you can properly budget and there are no unexpected or nasty surprises. 

There will likely be different rules or procedures involved with a Civil Ceremony compared to a Religious Ceremony. You will need to ascertain what kind of wedding you will be having before making your application.

Make sure you are fully aware of any extra procedures in place or officials you need to liaise with prior to or during the application process for a religious ceremony. Please also familiarise yourself with any rules that must be adhered to for a religious service compared to a civil ceremony. For example, in some countries, if you choose to have a civil ceremony, you must not have any religious content to your wedding, such as hymns or religious readings. 

Please note, you may be required to state the preferred location / venue for your wedding before making your application.

There will be a specific department or ‘office’ where all marriage applications should be submitted for each country for civil ceremonies. 

To give you some examples…

• UK – applications are made to the ‘General Register Office’ (GRO)
• Germany – apply to the Registrar’s Office local to where you wish to get married (Standesmant). 
• Denmark – has one main government department called ‘The Agency of Family Law’ (AFL). 
• Canada – you must have a marriage licence before you can get married. These are applied for from the provincial municipal office OR the ‘Department of Vital Statistics’ local to where you are wanting to get married 
• Turkey – applicants should apply directly to the municipality where they wish to get married
• The USA – applications* should be made to the local county clerk / clerk of the courthouse where a licence will be issued prior to the marriage ceremony being able to take place.
  
  *rules / timings may vary from state to state
  

Please note, these may be different and / or involve additional processes if you are wanting to have a religious wedding.

Some countries have very specific rules about foreigners travelling from abroad who want to marry there. These rules might vary depending on your circumstances or even the circumstances of that country. 

For example in Spain, if neither of you are a Spanish citizen, one of you must first be a legal resident of Spain before you are able to get married there. 

This would obviously cause a problem for a lot of couples hoping to get married abroad as simply as possible and in fact mean for the majority, Spain would not be an option. 

Gibraltar however, is known for being one of the easier countries to get married. This is because, while Gibraltar is physically part of Spain, it is actually a British ‘overseas territory’ and so follows British requirements with regards to getting married there.