Texas Birth Certificate Apostille
Texas is unusually flexible about which office issued the birth certificate you want to apostille — a city, county or state certified copy is all acceptable — and unusually strict about when it was issued. A certified copy issued more than five years ago will not be apostilled, so the copy sitting in a family file almost never qualifies no matter how official it looks. Texas Vital Statistics also cannot forward a record to the Secretary of State on your behalf; the document has to be obtained first and submitted separately.
Which Texas birth certificate copies qualify for an apostille
| Issuing office | Apostille | What decides it |
|---|---|---|
| DSHS Vital Statistics (Austin) | Accepted | State-issued and the cleanest option, provided it was issued within the last five years. |
| County clerk certified copy | Accepted | Texas accepts county-issued certified copies directly, with no additional certification step. |
| City or local registrar certified copy | Accepted | Also accepted directly. Texas is one of the few states that takes a municipal copy without a pre-step. |
| Certified copy more than five years old | Not accepted | The five-year limit applies regardless of which office issued it or how good the condition is. Order a fresh copy. |
Before the request is filed
- Find the issue date on the copy, not the date of birth. If it is more than five years old, order a replacement before doing anything else — this is the step that sends most Texas requests back.
- Order the replacement yourself or through us. DSHS cannot send the record to the Secretary of State directly, so there is no way to skip the handoff.
- Complete Form 2102 and name the destination country on it, even though the Texas apostille itself is universal.
What Texas sends back
- Any certified copy issued more than five years ago.
- A request that assumes DSHS will forward the record to the Secretary of State.
- A record request from someone outside the qualified-applicant rules — Texas birth records stay restricted for 75 years and only qualified applicants can obtain a certified copy at all.
Where it is filed
| Authority | Texas Secretary of State |
|---|---|
| Filed in | Austin |
| State fee | $15 per apostille. |
| Turnaround | about 24–48 hours once we file in person for most state documents |
Texas issues one universal apostille that is valid for every Hague country, so a single document does not have to be re-filed if the destination changes after it is issued.
Texas birth certificate apostille FAQ
Why does Texas reject a certified copy that is more than five years old?+
The Secretary of State authenticates the signature of the official who signed the copy, and Texas keeps signature exemplars on file only for a limited period. Once the copy is older than five years the office can no longer verify the signature against its records, so it declines the request regardless of the document's condition.
Does the apostille name the country it is for?+
Form 2102 asks for the destination, but the apostille Texas issues is universal — it is valid in every Hague Convention country without being re-issued. The country is collected for the state's own records and, in non-Hague cases, to route the request to a certification instead.
Can my county clerk copy really go straight to the Secretary of State?+
Yes. Unlike California and New York, Texas does not require a county-level certification step before the state acts. A city, county or state certified copy is accepted as it is, which is why the age of the copy is the only real gate here.
I was born in Texas but live abroad. Can I order the fresh copy from overseas?+
You can, but only if you are a qualified applicant under the 75-year restriction — generally the registrant, an immediate family member or a legal representative — and the identity documents have to satisfy DSHS from a distance. In practice this is the part of a Texas request that takes longest, so start it before anything else.
Keep reading
Other states
Federal Apostille™ is a private, independent courier and document-processing service. We are not affiliated with any state vital records office, the U.S. Department of State, or any government agency.