How divorce works (England & Wales)

A woman thinking, looking up, considering how divorce works

Getting divorced is three things happening at once, and almost all the confusion comes from treating them as one. We’re hear to explain exactly how divorce works and hold your hand as you work through it.

There's the divorce itself, which is a form, a fee and two waiting periods. There's the money, which is a separate legal process with its own application. And there are the arrangements for any children, which sit outside both. The first one is straightforward. The other two are where the time and the cost actually go.

This page is the whole shape of it, in the order it happens. Each stage links to a fuller explanation.

Need help? Our divorce support page lists numbers to call and organisations you can reach out to.

Before you start: can you apply?

Four things have to be true.

  • You've been married for over a year. A hard limit with no exceptions - you cannot apply before your first anniversary whatever the circumstances.

  • The marriage has broken down permanently. You decide this. Nobody tests it, and you don't have to prove or explain it.

  • Your marriage is legally recognised in the UK, including same-sex marriage.

  • The UK is your permanent home, or you or your spouse live in England or Wales.

If all four apply, you can start. There is nothing else to qualify for - no grounds for divorce to establish, no reason to give, and no need for your husband, wife or spouse to agree.

The five stages

1. The application

You apply online or on form D8, and pay £628. You can apply on your own as a sole applicant, or together as a joint application.

The clock that matters starts when the court issues your application, not when you submit it.

2. Serving it on your spouse

If you've applied on your own, the court sends the application to your husband or wife. They have 14 days to return an acknowledgement of service.

They can't stop the divorce by refusing to respond, but they can slow it down, and there are established routes around a spouse who won't engage.

3. The 20-week wait

A statutory pause of 20 weeks minimum between the application being issued and the point you can move forward. It exists to give people time to reflect, and it cannot be shortened, waived or negotiated away, not even if you both want it gone.

It is, however, the single best window you'll get for sorting out the money. More on that below.

4. The conditional order

Once the 20 weeks have passed, you apply for a conditional order - called a decree nisi before 2022. You confirm the content of your application is true, a judge checks the paperwork, and the order is pronounced.

You are not divorced at this point. This is the court saying it's satisfied you're entitled to be.

5. The final order

You must wait at least 43 days - 6 weeks and 1 day - after the conditional order before applying for the final order. When it's granted, the marriage is over.

Two things nobody mentions. You should apply within 12 months of the conditional order, or you'll have to explain the delay to the court. And if you want a legally binding financial arrangement, you must apply for that before you apply for the final order.

Discover more about how long divorce takes here.

The divorce and the money are two different things

This is the single most expensive misunderstanding in the process, so it's worth being blunt about.

Your divorce does not divide your money. The final order ends the marriage. It does not touch the house, the pensions, the savings or the debts, and it does not stop your ex making a financial claim against you later. Not in five years, and not in twenty.

To close that off you need a financial order — an agreement approved by the court so that it's legally binding. If you agree between yourselves, that's a consent order, and it costs £62 to lodge. If you can't agree, it's a contested application at £321 plus legal costs, and that's where divorces become expensive.

The £628 buys you a divorce. Discover more about how much a divorce costs and what goes into that pricing here.

And children are a third thing

Arrangements for children sit outside the divorce entirely. You don't need a court order to agree who lives where and who sees whom - most people never get one, and the courts would rather you didn't need to.

If you can't agree, mediation comes before court in almost every case. A court application for a child arrangements order costs £270 and is genuinely a last resort.

Children's arrangements don't delay the divorce. They do frequently delay the financial agreement, however.

What you'll need

Have these to hand before you start rather than halfway through:

  • Your marriage certificate — the original or a certified copy. Not a photograph of it.

  • Both full names, spelled as they appear on the certificate.

  • Your spouse's current address, and their email if you have it. Service problems are the most avoidable delay in the whole process.

  • Evidence of any name change since the marriage, if either of you has changed one.

  • A debit or credit card for the £628, or a Help with Fees reference if you're applying for a reduction.

Sole or joint?

A joint application is the two of you applying together. It's smoother - no service to go wrong, nobody waiting on the other to return a form - and it sets a tone that tends to survive into the financial conversation. It's the better option where it's available to you.

A sole application is one of you applying. It's the right choice if your spouse won't cooperate, if you don't want to depend on them doing anything on time, or if there's any reason the joint route wouldn't be safe or straightforward.

You can't convert a joint application into a sole one partway through without starting elements again, so it's worth being honest with yourself at the outset about which one you're actually in.

Do you need a solicitor?

For the divorce itself, usually not. The online service is genuinely usable and most straightforward divorces don't need anyone.

For the money, usually yes - at least once. Even where you agree completely, having a consent order drafted properly costs a few hundred pounds and closes off claims permanently. It's the cheapest insurance available in this process and the most common thing people regret skipping.

The exceptions where you want advice early rather than late: a business, a pension worth arguing about, property abroad, a significant imbalance in what each of you knows about the finances, or any concern that your spouse isn't being straight about what they have.

The dos and don'ts of divorce

  • Do apply jointly if you can. Fewer things go wrong.

  • Do use the 20 weeks. It's dead time otherwise, and it's a free run at the slowest part of the process. Start the financial conversation, get valuations, gather paperwork.

  • Do get a financial order, even if you agree about everything, and even if there's very little to divide. Especially then — people skip it precisely when it's cheapest.

  • Do keep the paperwork. The final order is the document you'll be asked for when you remarry, remortgage or change your passport, and it's the one everybody loses.

  • Don't apply for the final order before the financial order is sorted. You can lose rights that only exist while you're married, and you may need to explain a long delay to the court if you leave it more than 12 months.

  • Don't expect the process to acknowledge what happened. It won't. There's no box for it, nobody will read your account of the marriage, and the law is deliberately uninterested in whose fault it was. That's better for you than it feels, but it does mean the acknowledgement has to come from somewhere else.

  • Don't make decisions about the house in the first month. It's the biggest financial decision most people make, and the first month is when you have the least information and the worst judgement.

If you're in Scotland or Northern Ireland

Different legal systems. Scotland has its own procedure, retains a fault-based route alongside separation-based ones, and can be quicker for straightforward cases. Northern Ireland did not adopt the 2022 reform and still works on the older grounds-based model.

Everything on this page applies to England and Wales.

Where to go next

Last reviewed: September 2026. This page explains the process in England and Wales - it isn't legal advice about your situation. For decisions that turn on your circumstances, speak to someone qualified who knows your case.

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