Child custody in Germany

Joint custody is the normal rule: the child is born to married parents, and both share custody.

The mother has sole custody by default. The father can get joint custody by signing a custody declaration (certified by the Youth Welfare Office or a notary), by marrying the mother, by making an oral declaration at a court hearing, or by asking the Family Court, which grants it if it serves the child's best interests. That is presumed unless the other parent gives reasons against it.

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 separation, whether or not the parents were married. Sole custody needs a Family Court order on one parent's request. The court grants it if the other parent agrees, unless the child is 14 or older and objects, or if it is in the child's best interest. Divorce alone does not change custody.

The official fact sheet gives no general right to be heard. The only age it mentions is 14, where a child's objection can block a change from joint to sole custody.

The official fact sheet does not cover moving. Under the 1996 Hague Convention, custody under the law of the child's habitual residence generally continues if that residence changes.

Germany 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.

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

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