Apostille and Certified Translation for the UK

An apostille is a standardised certificate attached to a public document — a birth certificate, court decision or notarial deed — confirming that the signature, seal or stamp on it is genuine. It is issued under the 1961 Hague Convention by the authorities of the country where the document was issued.

An apostille does not translate anything and says nothing about the content of the document. It only authenticates the document itself, which is why an apostilled document in another language still needs a certified English translation for use in the UK.

Not every UK application needs an apostille. UKVI generally accepts foreign documents with a certified translation alone. Apostilles are most often requested by register offices for foreign divorce or civil status documents, by courts in cross-border cases, and by banks or solicitors handling foreign powers of attorney and notarial deeds.

The safest approach: check what the receiving institution asks for. If they say 'legalised' or 'apostilled', arrange the apostille in the country that issued the document first.

The order matters. Get the apostille attached to the original document first, then have the whole thing translated — including the apostille page itself. UK institutions expect the translation to cover every element of the document, and the apostille is part of it.

If you translate first and apostille later, the apostille page will be left untranslated and the institution may return your documents.

Send us the document with its apostille attached and we translate everything as one certified package: the document, all stamps and seals, and the apostille certificate. You receive a single signed and stamped PDF, ready to submit.