Who inherits without a will in Germany?

The spouse takes one quarter alongside the descendants. Under the default regime of accrued gains, a further quarter is added for the equalisation of gains, which makes one half.

The spouse takes half alongside the parents, siblings, nieces and nephews, or grandparents (three quarters under the accrued-gains regime). If there are none of those relatives, the spouse takes everything.

Descendants inherit first; no more distant relative inherits if there is a descendant. Next come the parents and their descendants, then the grandparents and their line, then the great-grandparents. If no relative can be found, the state inherits.

Registered partners have the same inheritance rights as spouses. Other forms of living together carry no legal right to inherit.

Close relatives (descendants, the spouse and the parents) can claim a compulsory portion of half their legal share, paid in money. The courts can postpone payment where an immediate sale of the family home would be unfair.

In this EU country the Succession Regulation applies to people who die after 16 August 2015: the whole estate is generally governed by the law of the country where the person had their habitual residence at death, unless they chose the law of their nationality in a will. A foreigner living here, or a citizen living abroad, can therefore be governed by a different law than the one described on this page.

Germany belongs to the Civil law family. Succession 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? →

• European e-Justice Portal: succession in Germany