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UK birth certificates are those countries within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Norhern Ireland, namely England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. If the event has been recorded in these countries, or the event occurred with a Brtitish national, then a certificate should be available.
Full certified birth certificates can also be known as unabridged certificates. Details provided include full name at birth, date of birth, place of birth and details of the parents. The abridged certificate, which is usually issued at birth, is also known as a short (or half) birth certificate and does not have the parents' details, and so do not help a genealogist for research purposes.
All births, marriages and deaths (in England and Wales) have been required by law to be registered. This law came into effect on July 1st, 1837. Following the "Births and Deaths Act 1874", to report a birth became a duty of those present at the event, with late or non-registration penalised and fined.
From 1969 onwards, the register records the child's surname and notes the gender as male or female, and the certificates are portrait format. Before 1969, the child's surname was not registered, and the gender was noted as boy or girl, and the format is landscape.
For UK citizens, a birth certificate is not always accepted as proof of identity. It is illegal to impersonate someone else by using birth certificates and is defined as identity fraud.
Certificates are often obtained for family history research, for naturalisation processes, genealogy, and passport applications.
Certificates are issued from the BMD (BM&D) indexes held at the register offices. The indexes hold the entries which occurred during the civil registration of a birth. The entry (transcript) of the birth will be used to create the certified copy of the certificate.
Obtaining a certificate is straightforward. To obtain, please use the links below.
Order a Birth Certificate
Order a Marriage Certificate
Order a Death Certificate
