Legal procedures to get married in Portugal

These are the options which are available to celebrate a marvellous wedding in Portugal, depending if it is a legal or symbolic ceremony. We review all of the necessary documents, procedures and processes.

During the most part, the organisation of a wedding is very exciting and romantic, there is only one part that can be more frustrating, and that is the search and obtaining of the procedure documents necessary to celebrate your wedding in the country of your choice. In Perfect Venue we want to help you make this process easy and comfortable so it does not tarnish the preparations for your big day.

In other posts we spoke about the legal procedures to celebrate a multicultural wedding or how to celebrate a legal wedding in Spain, but now we are focusing on the legal procedures to get married in Portugal, a perfect country to celebrate a dream destination wedding thanks to its marvellous towns, variety of beaches, places for weddings and good weather.

Bussaco Palace Hotel
Bussaco Palace in Portugal, one of the most beautiful wedding locations in the country.

Regarding the legal procedures, unlike other countries, Portugal offers more possibilities to design your dream wedding because of two important reasons:

  • You can have a legal wedding in the place you have decided without it necessarily having to be the embassy or church.
  • The celebrant goes to the place to celebrate your legal wedding.
Wedding in Lisbon, a proper place to get married and fall in love again
Palacio Marques

Of course it is necessary to present various requisites:

  • Passport or valid identification
  • Birth certificate (with an official apostilla stamp), which will be valid for 6 months
  • Certificate of no impediment (with an official apostilla stamp)
  • Certificate for matrimonial capability
  • If this not your first wedding, the divorce certificate or a death certificate (with an official apostilla stamp)
  • Request the marriage license, a process which must be presented in any Civil Registry Office in Portugal. The process can begin a maximum 6 months before the date of the wedding. The price starts at around €100
Vida Mar Madeira - Perfect Venue
VidaMar, Madeira

In addition, all of the presented documents have to be translated into Portuguese, for which you will need a specialised translator. It is necessary to take into account that the required documents can change according to the area of Portugal where you are going to get married, your nationality and if your partner is Portuguese, so we recommend informing the Minister of Foreign Affairs or embassy in your country.

Palácio Monserrate
Palácio Monserrate

Now we have seen everything necessary to get married in Portugal, you have to choose if it is worth spending the time on these documents, or on the contrary opting to celebrate a beautiful symbolic ceremony designed by and for you. The advantages of this type of celebration are:

  • You don’t have to be waiting for any procedure or document that never seems to arrive
  • You don’t spend time or money on finding out about the necessary documentation
  • You can organise and design the ceremony as you want from start to finish: texts, readings, symbolic rituals, etc.
  • The time and money that you don’t give to the paperwork you can spend on other aspects such as the decoration or the banquet.

And now you know which options you have to celebrate your marvellous wedding in Portugal, what would you choose? If you want to know more about the best and most exclusive locations for weddings in Portugal, you can visit our directorate or write to us at info@perfectvenue.eu

7 comments

  1. Buenas tardes Katherine,
    perdona por la tardanza. Para casarse en Portugal, no hace falta residir ahí. Es mejor contactar a una de las wedding planners que os ayude en todo el proceso burocrático y también en organización de boda sin estrés.

  2. Sandra

    Hola buena tardes, soy Colombia y mi pareja portugués queremos casarnos civilmente en Portugal, hicimos pareja de hecho hace 10 meses aquí en España, Barcelona…que requisitos necesitamos? por favor….muchas gracias

  3. Rafaela Alfaro

    Hola soy de El Salvador, Centroamérica, me quiero casar con mi novio portugués, cuáles son los requsitos para casarnos en portugal

  4. SandraP

    Hola mi nombre es Sandra mi novio es portugués, nos queremos casar, pero no puedo entrar a Portugal por la pandemia, sino hay viajes esenciales, no hay viajes turísticos, con ustedes podemos hacer un matrimonio por poder, para que nos podamos reunir por agrupación familiar?

  5. Hola soy venezolana y mi novio vive en jersey londres pero el es portugues y nos queremos casar en portugal para después viajar a Londres. Q requisitos debo tener.

  6. Mariana

    Hola.Soy rumana y mi novio español.Q
    Queremos casarnos en Portugal.
    Que requisitos hacen falta? Cuanto tiempo dura?Es reconocido el matrimonio en España?
    Gracias!

  7. Nicolas Bulla

    Hola chicos que tal, tengo una consulta, llegue a casarme con una nacionalidad la cual nunca renove y si efectue el divorcio, pero mi pareja actual y yo deseamos avanzar, yo tengo otra nacionalidad, que tan necesario en este caso seria el asunto de presentar un acta de divorcio?

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