Apostille Translation Services

Prism Language Solutions handles translation on both sides of the apostille. Foreign documents that arrive with an apostille under the 1961 Hague Convention are translated in full, apostille included, and certified for USCIS, courts, universities and employers in the United States. US documents heading abroad are translated and the translator’s certificate notarized in New York, so the translation can be apostilled by the state Secretary of State or, for federal documents, authenticated by the US Department of State. The apostille itself is issued by a government office, never by a translation company, and we say plainly which office and what it charges.

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

• Certified translations prepared to meet USCIS requirements
• Human linguists only, matched to the subject
• Fixed written quote within 60 minutes in business hours
• One office in New York, linguists in every state

What an Apostille Is Under the Hague Convention

The Convention of 5 October 1961 Abolishing the Requirement of Legalisation for Foreign Public Documents, usually called the Apostille Convention, replaced the old chain of consular legalization with a single certificate. Under Article 5 the apostille certifies the authenticity of the signature, the capacity in which the signer acted and, where relevant, the identity of the seal or stamp. Article 1 covers public documents: court documents, administrative documents such as civil registry certificates, and notarial acts. Article 4 lets the certificate be written in the issuing authority’s own language, but its title must appear in French, which is why every apostille in the world is headed Apostille (Convention de La Haye du 5 octobre 1961).

The Convention entered into force for the United States on October 15, 1981, and the HCCH lists 130 contracting parties. A document apostilled in one member state is accepted in every other without further legalization. Countries outside the Convention still require consular legalization through the receiving country’s embassy, and the translation requirements for that route come from the embassy concerned.

Translating an Apostilled Foreign Document for US Use

When a document arrives from abroad with an apostille attached, the whole thing is translated: the document, its seals and stamps, any reverse-side annotations, and the apostille certificate itself with its ten numbered fields, issuing authority and registration number. A translation that stops at the document and leaves the apostille untouched looks incomplete to a USCIS officer or a clerk, and drops the one part of the file that ties the document to the authority that issued it.

Two points that surprise people. USCIS does not require foreign civil documents to be apostilled; its rule, 8 CFR 103.2(b)(3), is about the translation, not about authentication, so an apostille on a birth certificate for an I-130 is harmless but unnecessary. State courts, universities and some employers, on the other hand, do sometimes ask for apostilled originals, and the translation is then certified in the normal way. The most common documents on this side are birth certificates, marriage certificates, diplomas and powers of attorney from Spanish-, Portuguese- and Italian-speaking countries.

Apostille for a Translated US Document Going Abroad

The outbound direction is where sequencing matters. A foreign registry, court, university or employer wants a US document, translated into its language, with an apostille its own law recognizes. There are two ways to build that: apostille the original US document and have it translated abroad by a translator the receiving country recognizes, or translate it here, notarize the translator’s certificate, and apostille the notarized translation as a notarial act. Many countries accept the second route, some insist on a sworn translator of their own, and we ask at the outset so nobody pays for both.

For the US route, the chain in New York runs: we translate and certify; the certificate is signed before a notary public; the county clerk of the county where the notary is qualified certifies the notary’s signature; the New York Department of State issues the apostille at $10 per document. The apostille authenticates the notary, so the notarization and the apostille must come from the same state. Details of the notarization step are on the notarized translation page; documents that usually travel this way include death certificates for inheritance abroad, divorce decrees for remarriage, and corporate records for a foreign subsidiary, translated into French, German, Chinese or any of the other languages we cover.

State Secretary of State vs US Department of State Apostille

The United States has no single apostille office. Which authority issues the certificate depends on who signed the underlying document, and sending it to the wrong one costs weeks.

A few states have designated an office other than the Secretary of State, and the HCCH keeps the current list of US competent authorities. We check the destination office for each job before the translation is notarized, because a document notarized for a New York apostille cannot be apostilled in New Jersey.

Apostille Translation Cost and Turnaround

The translation is priced as a certified translation: short certificates from around $24.95 per page, longer documents per source word, with notarization at about $15 to $25 per document and hard copies itemized; see pricing. The government fees are separate and are paid to the issuing office: $10 per document to the New York Department of State, $20 per document to the US Department of State, plus the county clerk’s certification fee where that step applies. We do not mark those up, and we tell you which ones apply before you commit.

Turnaround splits into our part and the government’s. Translation, certification and notarization of a short document take one business day. The county clerk and the state apostille can often be done within days in person in New York; the federal Office of Authentications takes weeks for mailed requests. The translation can be done as a rush, but no translation company can speed up a Secretary of State.

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