Child custody in Austria

Both parents have custody when the child is born in marriage, or when the parents marry afterwards.

The mother has custody. The father gets it if both parents, after being informed of the legal effects, declare in person before the registrar that both are responsible. Alternatively they can agree before the court, or the court can give custody to both. Parents who live apart must also agree which parent is the main carer.

The unmarried father, in one line: The mother has it; the father needs a step: a joint declaration, registration, agreement, or living with the mother at the birth.

Joint custody continues after divorce, and the same rules apply to separating unmarried partners. Parents who keep joint custody must agree which parent the child lives with, and the court approves that if it is in the child's interest. Parents can also agree that only one keeps custody. Without agreement, the court decides.

The child's personality, needs and wishes are part of the best-interest assessment. The official fact sheet gives no fixed age.

The official fact sheet does not cover moving. Where both parents have parental responsibility, a move abroad with the child generally needs both parents' agreement or a court's permission.

Austria is a party to the 1980 Hague Child Abduction Convention, which lets a parent ask for a child wrongly taken to another country to be returned. It works only with countries that have accepted its accession, so check the other country on the treaty status table.

Within the EU, Regulation (EU) 2019/1111 (called Brussels IIb) decides which country's courts handle parental responsibility: in principle the courts of the country where the child habitually lives, and it speeds up the return of a child wrongly taken to another member state. Denmark does not take part in it.

Austria belongs to the Civil law family. Family law grows out of the legal tradition, so it helps to know how the system works.

Read the Austria legal-system profile in the Legal Families Atlas →
Who owns what in a marriage in Austria? →
Divorce rate and trend in Austria →

• European e-Justice Portal: parental responsibility, child custody and contact rights in Austria