Apostille Services by Location
There is no apostille counter in your city — there isn't one in any city, for anyone. What does change from one place to the next is the part nobody writes about: where you get fingerprinted, which federal court issues your records, which consulates are nearby, and how long the trip to Washington actually takes. That's what these pages are for, whether you are in a US metro or abroad.
Two authorities, neither of them local
An apostille authenticates the signature on a document, which means the only authority that can issue one is the authority holding that signer's specimen signature. For a document signed by a state or county official, that is the issuing state's authenticating office — one office per state, usually in the capital. For a document signed by a federal agency or a federal court, it is the U.S. Department of State in Washington, DC, and there is exactly one of those for the whole country.
Neither of them has a branch near you. So "apostille near me" resolves, in every US metro, to a shipping question — and to the one step that genuinely is local, which is fingerprinting for an FBI Identity History Summary.
United States — metro guides
| Metro | Region | State page | Federal court district |
|---|---|---|---|
| Miami, FL | South Florida | Florida | U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida — Miami Division, at the Wilkie D. Ferguson Jr. U.S. Courthouse downtown |
| Houston, TX | Greater Houston | Texas | U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas — Houston Division, at the Bob Casey U.S. Courthouse |
| Dallas–Fort Worth, TX | North Texas | Texas | U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas — Dallas Division and Fort Worth Division, two separate divisions inside the same metro |
| Atlanta, GA | Metro Atlanta | Georgia | U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia — Atlanta Division, at the Richard B. Russell Federal Building |
| Boston, MA | Greater Boston | Massachusetts | U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts — Boston, at the John Joseph Moakley U.S. Courthouse on the waterfront |
| Seattle, WA | the Puget Sound region | Washington | U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington — Seattle, at the United States Courthouse on Stewart Street |
| Los Angeles, CA | the Los Angeles basin | California | U.S. District Court for the Central District of California — Los Angeles, at the First Street U.S. Courthouse downtown |
| San Diego, CA | San Diego County | California | U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California — San Diego, at the Edward J. Schwartz U.S. Courthouse on West Broadway |
| Washington, DC | the Washington metro | District of Columbia | U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia |
International
If you are living abroad, the one step that has to happen where you are is fingerprinting for an FBI Identity History Summary — and no US embassy or consulate anywhere will do it. We capture prints by appointment in each city below. The apostille itself is filed in Washington regardless of where you are, and the finished document is couriered back to you.
| City | Country | Region | Requirements page |
|---|---|---|---|
| Madrid | Spain | Madrid province | Spain visa requirements |
| Barcelona | Spain | Barcelona province | Spain visa requirements |
| Valencia | Spain | Valencia province | Spain visa requirements |
| Alicante | Spain | Alicante province | Spain visa requirements |
| Marbella | Spain | Málaga province | Spain visa requirements |
| Lisbon | Portugal | the Lisbon district | Portugal visa requirements |
| Bogotá | Colombia | Bogotá D.C. | Colombia visa requirements |
| Medellín | Colombia | Antioquia | Colombia visa requirements |
| Cali | Colombia | Valle del Cauca | Colombia visa requirements |
| Cartagena | Colombia | Bolívar | Colombia visa requirements |
| Pereira | Colombia | Risaralda | Colombia visa requirements |
| Santa Marta | Colombia | Magdalena | Colombia visa requirements |
Not listed yet? Nothing about the process changes — the same two authorities serve every address in the country. Start from your state on the apostille services by state index, or go straight to the FBI background check apostille page if your document is federal.
Common questions
Is there an apostille office near me?
Almost certainly not, and that is true for nearly everyone in the country. Apostilles are issued by exactly two kinds of authority: each state's own authenticating office, which is usually in the state capital and serves the entire state, and the U.S. Department of State in Washington, DC, which is the only office in the country that can authenticate a federal document. There is no county, city or local counter for either. What varies by location is logistics — how your document gets there and back — which is the part these pages cover.
Do you have an office in my city?
No. Federal Apostille™ is a national mail-in and courier service, and the only place we file in person is at the authenticating offices themselves. We say this plainly because the alternative is common in this industry: a mail-forwarding suite listed as a local office, with a map pin on it. Our documents move to the authority, not to a storefront near you.
Then why do these metro pages exist?
Because a federal apostille does have a genuinely local half, and it is worth writing down. Where you get fingerprinted for an FBI Identity History Summary, which federal court district issues your federal records, which consulates sit in your city, which countries your documents are actually headed to, and how long a courier leg to Washington really takes from where you are — all of that differs by metro and none of it fits on a national page.
Does my location change the price?
No. The government fee is the same regardless of where you live, and our flat notarized true-copy lane is priced per document nationally. The only cost that varies with distance is shipping, and you choose that.
I live outside the United States. Can I still do this?
Yes, and the international pages below are written for exactly that situation. The only step that has to happen where you are is fingerprinting for an FBI Identity History Summary, which we capture by appointment in each of the cities listed. Everything after it happens between the FBI and the U.S. Department of State in Washington, and the finished document is couriered back to you.
Can a US embassy or consulate abroad take my fingerprints or issue the apostille?
Neither. No American embassy or consulate anywhere in the world provides fingerprinting for FBI Identity History Summary purposes, and none can apostille a US federal document — that authority belongs solely to the U.S. Department of State in Washington, DC. This is the single most common and most expensive misunderstanding among applicants living abroad, and it is why the international pages below exist.