Romanian Translation Services

Prism Language Solutions translates Romanian documents into English and English documents into Romanian for immigration filings, US courts, credential evaluations and companies working in Romania and Moldova. Certified files carry a signed Certificate of Translation Accuracy prepared to meet USCIS requirements. A single civil status certificate is normally ready the next working day.

Last reviewed September 11, 2026 by Sarah J, Prism Language Solutions

Romanian documents arrive from two countries, and the difference matters before a single word is translated. Romania issues a standard national civil status certificate with the CNP, the personal numeric code, printed on it. Moldova issues its own certificates through the Agenția Servicii Publice, and an older Moldovan file may hold a Soviet-era certificate printed in Russian and in Moldovan written in Cyrillic. All of it is translatable. None of it is interchangeable, and a translation that quietly calls a Moldovan record a Romanian one has told the reviewing officer something untrue.

The recurring headache is the spelling of the name, and it has two separate causes. One is technical: Romanian uses s and t with a comma below, and for years software printed them with a cedilla instead, while American systems stripped the marks off altogether. The other is historical: in 1993 the Romanian Academy restored a-circumflex inside words where communist-era spelling had used i-circumflex, so a document written in 1975 and a document written in 1995 can spell the same word two ways, entirely correctly. Between the two, one family routinely turns up with three spellings of a surname across a birth certificate, a diploma and a green card.

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Certified Romanian and Moldovan Civil Status Certificate Translation

The certificate itself is the easy part. What gets missed is everything around it: the CNP digit for digit, the series and number, the issuing local civil status office, and any annotation added later recording a marriage, a divorce or a change of name. On a Moldovan bilingual form, both language columns are translated, not just the one the translator finds easier. On a Cyrillic Soviet certificate, the whole thing is rendered, including the handwritten registrar entries.

For immigration work the rule is the boring one: complete means complete. What the signed certificate says is described under certified translation, and the document set for each form under USCIS translation.

Birth, marriage and death certificates from Romania or Moldova
Divorce judgments and court decisions
Cazier judiciar police record certificates
Passports, identity cards and driver’s licenses
Notarial deeds and powers of attorney for property in Romania

Romanian Diacritics and Name Spelling in Certified Translation

This is where a Romanian file usually goes wrong, and it is not the translator’s language skill that decides it. A surname printed with a comma-below letter on a 1988 certificate may appear with a cedilla on a 1998 diploma, unaccented on a US work permit, and with a different vowel again on a pre-1993 document. All four are the same person. A reviewer with four spellings in front of them does not know that.

We print the name exactly as each document gives it, including the diacritics, and add a translator’s note listing the variants and explaining which is a typographic difference and which follows the 1993 orthography change. We do not standardize across the file. If two documents genuinely disagree about a person, that is a fact your attorney needs rather than something to be smoothed away at the translation stage.

Translation into Romanian for Citizenship by Descent

A steady share of our Romanian work goes the other way, for people reclaiming Romanian citizenship through a parent or grandparent. Many applicants were born in Moldova or Ukraine, in territory that was Romanian before 1940, so the supporting records are in Russian, Ukrainian or Cyrillic Moldovan and have to be brought into Romanian rather than English.

Here is the limit, and it is worth knowing before you pay anyone. The National Authority for Citizenship works in Romanian, and Romanian practice is that a foreign document is translated by a traducător autorizat authorized by the Ministry of Justice and the translation is then notarized in Romania. A US agency cannot supply that certification. What we can do is prepare the Romanian text accurately for your Romanian attorney to have certified, and translate the Ukrainian, Russian or Moldovan originals in the same pass. Note also that Romanian authorities want the foreign document apostilled before it is translated, so the apostille is captured in the translation.

Romanian Apostille and Notarized Translation

Romania joined the Apostille Convention in 2001 and splits the work three ways by document type. Administrative documents, civil status certificates among them, are apostilled by the office of the prefect for the county. Court documents go to the tribunal. Notarial acts go to the regional Chamber of Public Notaries. Sending a notarial deed to a prefect’s office is the usual wasted morning.

For a US filing you rarely need any of this: USCIS asks for the document and a complete certified English translation, not an apostille. It becomes necessary when a Romanian document has to be recognized by a foreign registry or court, or when a US document is going to Romania. See apostille translation and notarized translation.

Romanian Diploma and Foaia Matricola Translation

Credential evaluators want two documents and will chase you for the second: the diploma and the foaia matricolă, the transcript of records that lists every course, its credits and its mark. Romanian marks run on a ten-point scale, which an American reader can misread as a ten percent result, so the scale is printed against the marks and the degree title is left as awarded rather than converted into the nearest US-sounding equivalent. Deciding equivalence belongs to the evaluator.

Files moving the other way, towards recognition of a foreign degree in Romania, go through the Ministry of Education recognition centre and want the same literal treatment. See diploma translation and academic transcript translation.

Romanian Translation Cost and Turnaround

Guide pricing puts a certified page at about $24.95 and running text at roughly $0.11 per source word, Romanian sitting in the mid range because the translator pool is deep. One certificate goes out inside 24 hours. Longer jobs are court judgments, which are reasoned at length, and handwritten parish or registry books from before the war, which need a transcription pass and are quoted from the scan. See pricing.

Ready to start? Send the document or the booking details through the quote form, call +1 (833) 282 8883, or email info@prismlinguistics.com. You get a fixed written price within 60 minutes during business hours.

Questions we get asked

My Romanian surname is spelled three different ways across my documents. What will the translation say?

Each document will read exactly as it is printed, diacritics included, and the translation carries a note listing the variants. Most of the differences come from comma-below letters being printed as cedillas or stripped by US systems, or from the 1993 spelling change. We flag them rather than picking one spelling and applying it to the whole file.

Can you translate a Moldovan certificate printed in Russian or Cyrillic?

Yes. Moldovan files often hold Soviet-era certificates in Russian, or Moldovan written in Cyrillic, alongside newer forms from the Agentia Servicii Publice. We translate the whole document, both columns of a bilingual form, the handwritten entries and the stamps, and we identify the issuing country and authority as printed.

Will your Romanian translation be accepted for a citizenship application in Romania?

Not as the certifying party. Romanian authorities expect a translation by a translator authorized by the Ministry of Justice, notarized in Romania. We prepare accurate Romanian text for your Romanian attorney to have certified, and we say so at the quote stage rather than after you have paid.

Which office issues the apostille on a Romanian document?

It depends on the document. Administrative documents such as civil status certificates are apostilled by the county prefect's office, court documents by the tribunal, and notarial acts by the regional Chamber of Public Notaries. Romania has been an Apostille Convention party since 2001.