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The documents required to get married in Denmark are fairly straightforward and simple to obtain, for most people. BUT, and it’s a large but…
All marriage applications must be made via the Danish Agency of Family Law (AFL for short). The AFL aims to respond to all applications within 5 business days, however, if there is even the smallest thing wrong, or missing with your application, this can cause long delays – sometimes up to as much as 6 months during the busy seasons.
To add to this, the documents required to get married in Denmark vary greatly depending on where you come from, where you legally reside, your civil status, and whether or not you have children.
This guide will help you work out exactly what documents you and your partner might need for you to get married in Denmark.
Get your free and personalised Required Documents list from us here.
Read on for more in depth information about each of these documents, helpful insights and what will be expected from you when providing these documents.
As a general rule, all couples will need to supply the following documents for both partners in order to get married in Denmark.
A passport is the only ‘official’ document that is required for everyone, or if you are from an EU/Schengen country (except Ireland) – an EU ID card.
As part of the document requirements to get married in Denmark, your passports must:
*If your passport has less than four months of time remaining before it expires, then the length of the Certificate of Marital Status (Prøvelsesattest), i.e. the period you will be given to marry in Denmark, will be limited in time based on this.
The Declaration of Truth is a legal document that you and your partner need to sign.
By signing the Declaration of Truth means you are making a legally binding statement that all the information you supply within your marriage application is true and correct, and that your supporting documents are real.
It is a criminal offence to lie or use fake documents, which might result in a monetary fine or even prison time.
Depending on your personal situation, some couples will need to provide additional documents to get married in Denmark. These requirements can vary – again though this depends on each of your specific circumstances..
Below is a list of the additional documents that you may need to provide in order to get married in Denmark, and guidance on each.
What type of visa do you need to get married in Denmark? Well, there are a few answers to this, and some visitors don’t need a visa at all!
For a full and in depth look at visas and the rules and requirements for getting married in Denmark, take a closer look at our article dedicated entirely to visas!
For a summary on what is required, see below (click on each for further information)
As long as the visa is valid on the date of your wedding, you have not exceeded the duration of your permitted stay, and it does not explicitly exclude travel to Denmark, then you can get married in Denmark on a Schengen C Visa.
As long as the visa is valid on the date of your wedding, you meet the 90/180 rule when travelling around the Schengen (where applicable) and it does not explicitly exclude travelling to Denmark, then you can get married using a D visa.
If one or both partners are from outside the EU/Schengen Area and you reside in an EU/Schengen country then you will be required to provide your residence permit.
This might be a residence permit for Denmark itself, or for a different Schengen country from which residents are also allowed to enter Denmark.
For instance, if you have a residence permit from another Schengen country, this could serve as one of your required documents to get married in Denmark, even though the residence permit isn’t for Denmark itself. This is because most residence permits issued within the Schengen area allow free movement around the Schengen.
If either you or your partner have ever been married before, that previous marriage must be legally ended before you can get married in Denmark.
This means you’ll need to supply either a final divorce decree (or divorce certificate) or a death certificate to prove that the prior marriage has legally ended and that you’re free to marry again.
Getting this right is really important, and being unable to provide a final divorce decree, (or divorce certificate), or death certificate can stop you from getting married entirely!
What often makes this particular area complex is that every country (and in the US, every state) issues a different version of a final divorce decree and there are different processes for having a ‘final’ decree issued.
So, what is important to remember, wherever in the world your final divorce decree is issued, is that usually the divorce is only considered final (from the point of view of the AFL) when stated and signed as such by a judge.
We’ve handled and resolved a wide range of issues with death and divorce certificates from all over the world, and we can help you to get things right the first time.
If you and your partner legally reside at the same address then you will be asked to provide evidence of this as part of your marriage application to the Danish authorities.
We can advise you on the types of documents that are accepted.
A birth certificate is a formal document that verifies and documents the birth of a child.
If you and your partner have children together (that is where both of your names are stated on their birth certificate), you will need to supply the birth certificate for your child or children as one of the required documents to get married in Denmark.
If the birth certificate does not list the father, then additional information to prove the fatherhood, such as paternity recognition, a DNA test etc. can be accepted.
If you, your partner, or both are in the military and stationed in a Schengen country, you will need to either provide permission from your Commanding Officer or your Military Orders before you can get married in Denmark!
If you are a civilian, working for the military in a Schengen country, then in this instance you will need to provide your SOFA stamp.
These are required to show legal stay within the Schengen, without the need for a visa or residence permit.
The Danish Agency of Family Law is actively looking for couples who are entering into what is called a Pro-Forma marriage – this is a marriage that takes place solely for the purpose of gaining rights to live in the EU via marriage.
In order to determine whether couples are engaged in a genuine relationship, they want to see ‘proof’ of your relationship. As such it’s likely, depending on your circumstances, you will need to provide evidence of your relationship, spanning the length of your time together as a couple.
If this information is insufficient then you will certainly be asked to provide more information or may even be asked in for an interview!
We can use our vast experience to help make sure your relationship document is perfect!
The Danish Agency of Family Law needs to be able to read your documents before being able to approve your application for marriage,
As a result you might need to have certain documents professionally translated before being able to submit them (in combination) as part of your application.
The Danish Government accepts documents written in the following languages:
As such, if your documents are in any other language than the above stated, you will need to get them professionally translated into one of these languages before they can be submitted.
Legalisation of documents – known in some countries as authentication – is the process of certifying and verifying that an important document is legal and genuine, so that it can be properly recognised and used for its intended purpose.
Some official documents required to get married in Denmark that were issued by another country may have to be legalised before they can be submitted in support of your marriage application.
One of the most common – and yet, easy to avoid – reasons for applications to get married in Denmark being delayed or rejected is because of missing legalisations.
Generally, it is death certificates, final divorce decrees and divorce certificates that need to be legalised. Do note that not all death or divorce decrees need to be legalised, with this requirement it depends on where the documents were originally issued.
Sometimes, the Danish authorities will request that other documents be legalised too, but this is less common.
This document (the 11b, for short) is only required if you OR your partner (but not both of you) are a permanent resident or legal citizen of Denmark, and the other partner is not an EU citizen either.
In this instance you need to read and sign, agreeing that you know the rules Denmark has in place surrounding family reunification. This is known as an 11b declaration.
A signed Power of Attorney document approves a 3rd party, usually a Danish Wedding Agency, to help you with your marriage application, and to speak and act on your behalf and with your permission.
We, at GMiD, can provide you with this form to sign.
We require this document to enable us to submit your marriage application, stay up to date with the status of your application, contact and handle interactions with the AFL on your behalf and ultimately to book your wedding date at the town hall.
As a general rule*, there is no requirement for your birth certificate to be provided as part of your application to get married in Denmark.
*Since the AFL was brought into being in 2019, we here at GMiD have been asked to provide an original birth certificate for 1 person. That’s 1 request in 5 years!
That request was in specific relation to a divorce document, where, as part of that country’s divorce process, the divorce was only considered final once the divorce was noted on the birth certificate. The country in question was Tunisia.
Single Status Certificates have been scrapped as a necessary requirement in order to get married in Denmark since 2019, for nearly all couples.
There are a few very rare occasions where they can sometimes ask for a Single Status Certificate. IF this is necessary, it will be in combination with your divorce papers to show that the divorce has become final*.
*This has only been requested in instances where the divorce papers do not explicitly state that the divorce is final and is not a requirement for 99.9% of couples.
Yes, getting married in Denmark with a tourist visa is absolutely possible.
You don’t need to be residing in Denmark to get married here. We know this is a requirement for many countries, but it’s not a requirement in Denmark.
You can get married in Denmark even though you’re not a Danish citizen or a resident.
It’s no problem if you have a visa, permit, or use your visa free days. As long as you legally enter the country, you can get married in Denmark.
You can read more about the visa types you can use to get married in Denmark on our website here.
If you and/or your partner have had a previous legal marriage:
If you and/or your partner were involved in a registered partnership:
It isn’t possible to convert or “upgrade” your existing civil union to a legal marriage in Denmark instead.
If you and/or your partner previously had a religious, but not legal, marriage:
Ensuring you have the correct the divorce papers or a death certificate is really important for getting married in Denmark without problems.
However, the three most common methods of splitting up with a former husband or wife are often taken to mean the same thing, when in law, they’re viewed very differently:
Divorce
A divorce is a legally recognised and completely final end to a legally binding marriage between two romantic partners.
Annulment
Annulments are uncommon; legally, an annulment means voiding a marriage or declaring it invalid, as if the marriage never really happened in the first place.
Annulments are also recognised in law, and may be issued in place of a divorce in exceptional circumstances, such as if one of the partners was already legally married to someone else, or misrepresented themselves in order to marry; for instance, to try to get citizenship benefits.
If you were married and received a legal annulment, then you are free to marry again.
Separation
A separation is not the same as a divorce or annulment, because during a separation, the two partners in the union are still legally married to each other, and so, are not free to marry again.
A separation may be part of the process of attaining a divorce, and may be permanent or temporary; but if you and your former partner are only separated but not divorced, or your marriage is not annulled, you are not free to marry again at this point.
A death certificate is a document that is produced by the authorities after a person’s death. It is to prove that the law recognises this person has died.
If you are legally married to the person at the time of their death, then the death certificate acts as proof that you are no longer legally married, and are free to remarry again, when the time is right.
Please Note: The death certificate must list the other partner as the then spouse or husband. Some death certificates do not list this information, in which case, on top of the death certificate, a copy of the marriage certificate of the previous marriage is also required.
If you do need to provide a death certificate or divorce certificate as part of the requirements to get married in Denmark, you may need to have the certificate legalised first.
We’ll talk about what this means in more detail later on.
However, if the divorce certificate or death certificate was issued in the USA, Canada, Australia, NZ, Turkey, or an EU member country, it is all ready to use as it is.
A Single Status Certificate or Marital Status Certificate is known by various different names depending on the country issuing it; in Denmark, it’s called a “Civilstandsattest” (Single Status Certificate); in the UK it is a Certificate of No Impediment, and in Germany, it is called a Ledigkeitsbescheinigung. This is 99.9% of the time NOT a required document to get married in Denmark.
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This is for those couples who are considering getting married in Denmark and are looking for some helpful information on how to get started and how the process works:
