Legalisation of official documents (apostilles)

For a Norwegian document to be considered valid abroad, it must be issued with an apostille stamp. This apostille stamp does not confirm the accuracy of the contents of a document; however, it does confirm that the signature of the notary public is real. This is known as legalisation. The County Governor is responsible for legalising documents for use abroad – that is to say, documents to be used in countries that have ratified the Hague Convention.

An apostille is a confirmation of:

1. the authenticity of the signature
2. the capacity in which the person signing the document has acted, and
3. the identity of the seal or stamp which the document bears

We can only apostille original document(s) or “true copy” confirmed by Notarius publicus. Before we can apostille a document, you need to make sure that the document contains following:

• name and capacity in which the person signing the document has acted – either by printed text or handwritten block capitals.
• signature (with blue pen)
• stamp from the public authority that has signed the document.

We can not accept printouts from Digipost or Altinn.

You can choose whether you want to come to our office and deliver the document(s) by hand or if you want to send them to us by mail:

If you choose to send them to us, you need to send us following information together with the document(s):

• Which country you are going to use the document(s) in
• Return address
• Your telephone number