Child custody in Poland

Both parents have parental responsibility over the child.

The official fact sheet does not say how the father's position is established; Polish law gives parental authority to both parents once the father's paternity is established, whether or not they are married.

The unmarried father, in one line: Both parents have it, married or not, once the father's paternity is established.

The divorce judgment must decide parental responsibility. The official page gives no default. If the parents do not agree, the court can order joint exercise, or give exercise to one parent and limit the other to specific rights and duties. For parents who live apart, the court decides the child's place of residence.

The official fact sheet does not say when the child is heard.

The official fact sheet states no specific rule. Travel abroad is one of the matters a guardianship court can decide when the parents disagree.

Poland 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.

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

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