Apostille Services is a private document-services company and is not affiliated with any Secretary of State, the U.S. Department of State or any government agency. You can request an apostille or certificate of authentication directly from the issuing office, for its fee only.
Upload a scan of your birth certificate, diploma, FBI check, power of attorney or company papers. A person checks it against the certifying office's rules, prepares the request and the translation, and on Premier hand-carries it to the office and returns it by tracked courier.
Apostille Services is a private document-services company and is not affiliated with any government agency. Apostilles and certificates of authentication are issued only by a state Secretary of State or the U.S. Department of State, which set their own fees and processing times. You can request one from them directly.
Which one you need depends on where the document is going and what language the receiving office works in. Not sure? Start any order and we route it.
For documents used in the 120+ countries of the Hague Apostille Convention: birth and marriage certificates, diplomas, FBI checks, powers of attorney, corporate papers.
Complete, word-for-word translation with a signed certificate of accuracy, in 20+ languages. Accepted by consulates, civil registries, universities and USCIS.
For countries outside the Hague Convention (China, the UAE, Egypt, Vietnam, Thailand and others): a certificate of authentication, then legalization at the country's embassy or consulate.
What the document is, who issued or notarized it, and where it is going. Two minutes, no account needed.
A person checks the scan against the certifying office's current rules (certified copy, notarization, signature) and prepares the request form, cover letter and fee payment.
Smart: print, sign and mail the package with the instructions we give you. Premier: send us the original with our prepaid label and our team hand-carries it.
Processing time is the office's own. We track the request in your dashboard and the document returns to your address, by tracked courier on Premier.
No payment until you have seen the price and the office's fee.
Our fee covers the work we do. The certifying office's fee is listed on its own and billed at cost; a translation has none.
Any U.S. public document, and any private document once it is notarized. Which office certifies it depends on who signed it, not on where you live.
Parties to the Hague Convention of 5 October 1961 accept a U.S. apostille with no embassy step.
Countries outside the Convention require a certificate of authentication from the state or the U.S. Department of State, then legalization at their embassy or consulate. Common destinations:
The reasons an office returns a document unstamped (plain photocopy, missing notary acknowledgment, wrong state) are caught before anything leaves your hands.
Documents issued in any of the 50 states and D.C., plus federal documents for the U.S. Department of State.
Our fee covers the checking, preparation, translation and handling. The certifying office's fee is listed separately and billed at cost.
Prepaid, tracked labels both ways on Premier. Scans are encrypted at rest and deleted on request.
A certificate attached to a public document that confirms the signature, seal or stamp on it is genuine, so that the document is accepted in another country that is party to the Hague Apostille Convention. It certifies the signature, not the content. In the U.S. it is issued by the Secretary of State of the state that issued or notarized the document, or by the U.S. Department of State for federal documents.
If the destination country is a party to the Hague Apostille Convention, an apostille. If it is not (the UAE, Egypt, Vietnam and Thailand are common examples), the document needs a certificate of authentication and then legalization at that country's embassy or consulate. Tell us the destination and we work out the route.
Yes. Every Secretary of State and the U.S. Department of State accept requests directly and charge only their own fee. Our fee is for checking that the document is eligible, preparing the request correctly, translating where needed, and, on Premier, hand-carrying it and returning it by tracked courier.
Processing time belongs to the certifying office and varies by state and season, from a few business days to several weeks; the U.S. Department of State publishes its own current times. We give you the office's current figure when you order and track the request in your dashboard. We do not have a way to make an office work faster.
State Secretaries of State charge $1 to $25 per apostille; the U.S. Department of State charges $20 per document. Embassy legalization fees vary by country. These are listed separately from our fee and billed at cost once the route is confirmed.
Certified copies of vital records and court documents do not: the clerk's signature is what gets certified. Private documents (powers of attorney, affidavits, diploma copies, corporate resolutions) must first be notarized, and the notary's commission must be on file with that state. We check this before anything is mailed and tell you exactly what is needed.
No. A certified translation carries the translator's signed statement that it is complete and accurate; USCIS and most offices need only that. A notarized translation adds a notary's acknowledgment of the translator's signature, which some consulates and foreign registries ask for. Our Premier translation tier includes the notarization.
Documents issued outside the U.S. (they are apostilled in the issuing country), and documents whose signatures the office cannot verify, such as a photocopy of a birth certificate rather than a certified copy. If your document is one of these we say so before you pay, and our fee is refunded if we cannot prepare the request.
Two minutes to start, no payment until you have seen our fee and the office's fee side by side.
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