Apostille or Embassy Legalisation: What Hungary Requires

Last reviewed: 26 September 2026. Country requirements change. This page is re-checked periodically, and nothing on it replaces confirming the position with the Hungarian office that will receive your document.

Hungary is a Convention country, so a document going straight to a Hungarian authority would normally carry a DFAT apostille. But a great deal of Australian paperwork for Hungary never goes straight there. It goes through the Hungarian Embassy in Canberra and its consular offices — birth registration, citizenship, name changes — and the embassy publishes its own rules. Under them, an Australian notary's signature needs the embassy's certification, and only notaries whose specimen seal and signature the embassy holds will do.

Check the current position before acting on this or any other page. Hungary has been a party to the Apostille Convention since 1973. Confirm its status, and any objections, against the HCCH status table on the day you start.

Two routes, depending on where the document goes

Through the embassy. If your application is lodged with the Hungarian consulate in Australia, follow the embassy's instructions. Its consular information page says:

• application forms must be witnessed by Hungarian consular officials or honorary consuls
• attestations by a Justice of the Peace are not accepted
• attestations by Australian notaries are accepted, together with Hungarian consular certification
• Hungarian forms have no English translation and are completed in Hungarian

Directly to a Hungarian authority. For a document you send to a Hungarian court, land registry, bank or lawyer yourself, the Convention route is an Australian notary (for a private document) followed by a DFAT apostille. The HCCH status table records Hungary's accession in 1972, with the Convention in force from 18 January 1973. Ask the receiving body which it wants before you start, because the two routes produce different certificates.

The embassy's rules for notaries

The embassy's legalisation page is unusually specific:

• Signatures and copies can be certified by an Australian notary.
• The notary's seal and signature must then be legalised by the consulate — what the embassy calls diplomatic legalisation — for a further fee.
• The consulate accepts legalisations only from notaries whose specimen seal and signature it holds. It publishes a list of those notaries.

So before booking a notary for a Hungarian consular procedure, check that the notary is on the embassy's list. A notary who is not on it may be perfectly qualified and still not be accepted for this purpose.

The embassy also offers the service itself. A consul or honorary consul can certify your signature (you sign in front of them, or acknowledge a signature as yours) and certify copies of original documents. Honorary consuls can certify signatures only on documents written in English, or in English and Hungarian. Anyone signing for a company must go to one of the consular offices, not an honorary consul, and bring a certificate of incorporation issued within the previous 30 days.

Translation: English is often enough, and OFFI matters

The embassy's birth registration page says an Australian birth certificate needs no translation, because certificates issued in English, German or French are accepted as they are. For a document in another language, it accepts either:

• a translation by OFFI, the Hungarian Office for Translation and Attestation, which needs no further legalisation, or
• a translation by a NAATI translator, which the Hungarian consulate must then legalise.

The legalisation page draws a further line. The consulate legalises NAATI translations between English and Hungarian only where the translation will be used in Hungary as part of a consular procedure. For an official translation to be used in Hungary outside a consular procedure, it directs people to OFFI. Honorary consuls cannot legalise translations at all.

Registering an Australian birth or marriage

Births of Hungarian citizens must be registered in Hungary, and this can be done through the consulate. The embassy's birth page asks for:

• the original full birth certificate, showing the parents' details
• the parents' Hungarian marriage certificate or, if they were not married, an acknowledgement of paternity
• the parents' identity documents and proof of Hungarian citizenship

The parents' marriage must already be registered in Hungary, or be registered at the same time. Both parents must attend in person.

Notice what the page does not ask for: an apostille on the Australian certificate, or a translation of it. For registration through the consulate, the original registry certificate goes in as it is. Use the full certificate from the state or territory registry, not an extract or a commemorative certificate.

Simplified naturalisation

Many Australians of Hungarian descent apply for Hungarian citizenship through simplified naturalisation. The embassy says applicants must be able to show a Hungarian-citizen ancestor, or likely Hungarian origin, or a long marriage to a Hungarian citizen; must know Hungarian, which the receiving authority checks; and must have a clean criminal record. All official communication and forms are in Hungarian only.

Ask the consulate which supporting documents it wants, and in what form, before ordering certificates or booking a notary. For documents lodged through the consulate, its rules above apply.

Frequently asked questions

Can a Justice of the Peace witness my Hungarian forms? No. The embassy says JP attestations are not accepted.

Will any Australian notary do? Not for a consular procedure. The consulate accepts only notaries whose specimen seal and signature it holds, and then legalises the notary's signature itself.

Does my Australian birth certificate need translating into Hungarian? Not for registration through the consulate. The embassy accepts certificates in English, German or French without translation.

How long does it take? It depends on the procedure and the Hungarian authorities. Do not plan to a figure quoted on a blog, including this one.