Child custody in Estonia

Custody rights are exercised jointly by parents who are married. Joint holders also represent the child jointly and must act unanimously in the child's overall interest.

The mother is the woman who gave birth. Custody is joint if, when the parents submit the acknowledgement of paternity, they did not say they wished to give custody to only one of them.

The unmarried father, in one line: Both parents have it, married or not, once the father's paternity is established.

The official fact sheet does not state a default. Any change to custody, including ending joint custody, is possible only through the courts, and the child's best interests come first. Family mediation through the Social Insurance Board can produce a parenthood agreement that is enforceable once approved.

The child's views are taken into account according to age and maturity. The official fact sheet gives no fixed age.

The official fact sheet does not cover moving. It says the law of the child's country of residence governs the relationship between child and parents.

Estonia is a party to the 1980 Hague Child Abduction Convention, which lets a parent ask for a child wrongly taken to another country to be returned. It works only with countries that have accepted its accession, so check the other country on the treaty status table.

Within the EU, Regulation (EU) 2019/1111 (called Brussels IIb) decides which country's courts handle parental responsibility: in principle the courts of the country where the child habitually lives, and it speeds up the return of a child wrongly taken to another member state. Denmark does not take part in it.

Estonia belongs to the Civil law family. Family law grows out of the legal tradition, so it helps to know how the system works.

Read the Estonia legal-system profile in the Legal Families Atlas →
Who owns what in a marriage in Estonia? →
Divorce rate and trend in Estonia →

• European e-Justice Portal: parental responsibility, child custody and contact rights in Estonia