How to Get a Copy of a Will¶
Whether a will exists, who is named in it, and what it says are usually the first three questions a family asks. The will tells you who the executors are, who inherits, and sometimes contains funeral instructions or directions about specific possessions. Without it, the estate falls back on intestacy rules, which rarely match what the deceased would have wanted.
This guide covers how to find a will, how to get a copy of it, and what your access rights are at each stage. It works through the position before probate (when the will is private) and after probate (when it becomes a public document), and covers Scotland and Northern Ireland separately.
If you can only do one thing today: If probate has been issued in England or Wales, search the gov.uk Find a Will service at gov.uk/search-will-probate. A new probate record appears about 14 days after the grant is issued. A copy of the will and the grant costs £16. [source: gov-uk/search-will-probate-2026-04-29.html]
Is the will public?¶
The single most useful thing to know early is that the answer changes at one specific moment.
Before probate is granted, the will is private. No-one has a legal right to see it except the executor named in the will and any solicitor who holds it. Beneficiaries — even people directly named to inherit — have no automatic right to a copy at this stage. Family members not named have no general right at all.
After probate is granted in England and Wales, the will is a public document. Anyone can apply for a copy through the Probate Registry, regardless of whether they are connected to the deceased or the estate.
The transition happens when the Grant of Probate is issued. From that moment, the will and the grant are filed at the registry and become searchable.
Scotland and Northern Ireland operate separately, with broadly similar but procedurally distinct routes; they have their own sections below.
After probate (England and Wales): Find a Will¶
The gov.uk Find a Will service is the main route. It covers grants made in England and Wales from 1858 onwards. [source: gov-uk/search-will-probate-2026-04-29.html]
Search by the deceased's name, ideally with the date of death and the last county of residence. The service returns the grants matching the search; for each match, the type of grant tells you whether a will is attached: [source: gov-uk/search-will-probate-2026-04-29.html]
- Probate or Grant and Will — there is a will.
- Admon with Will — administration with the will annexed; there is a will.
- Administration (Admon) — there is no will (intestacy).
If you find the right grant, you can order a copy of the probate record and any attached will online for £16. You receive a digital copy by email and a paper copy by post. The fee is the same whether ordered online or by post via Form PA1S. [source: gov-uk/search-will-probate-2026-04-29.html]
A new probate record takes around 14 days to appear in the online service after probate is issued. If a grant has been issued recently and isn't yet showing, it's worth checking again after a fortnight. [source: gov-uk/search-will-probate-2026-04-29.html]
For older records, the Find a Will service stores grants under the year the grant was issued, not the year of death. A will for someone who died in 1993 may sit in the 1996 records if probate took several years to apply for; widening the search by a year or two on either side is sometimes necessary. [source: gov-uk/search-will-probate-2026-04-29.html]
Before probate (England and Wales): three options¶
If probate has not yet been granted, the will is private but there are still ways to see or anticipate it.
Ask the executor¶
If you know who is named as executor, you can ask them directly. They are not legally obliged to share the document at this stage, but many are willing to do so, particularly with named beneficiaries.
If you are a named beneficiary and the executor refuses to confirm what you stand to inherit, a solicitor can write to the executor formally requesting sight of the document. This is uncommon — most executors share willingly with named beneficiaries — but the formal route exists where there is friction.
Contact the deceased's solicitor¶
If the will was drawn up by a solicitor, the firm usually retains either the original or a copy. Solicitors will confirm whether they hold a will, and they will release it to the named executor when probate is being applied for. They will not typically share it with other family members without the executor's authority or a court order.
If you don't know which firm the deceased used, the National Will Register (a private register run by Certainty PLC at certainty.co.uk) carries records of wills voluntarily registered by their authors or solicitors. A search costs a fee. The register is incomplete — registration is voluntary and many wills are never registered — but it is worth trying when no other lead exists.
Apply for a standing search¶
A standing search is the most useful tool when you know probate will eventually be applied for and want to be notified. You apply via Form PA1S and pay £3. The search remains active for 6 months and can be extended. When the Probate Registry grants probate during the active search period, a copy is sent to you automatically. [source: gov-uk/search-will-probate-2026-04-29.html]
The standing search is particularly useful where there is concern that the executor might not inform other family members when probate is granted, or where someone is checking that probate has not been applied for surreptitiously. The copy supplied by a standing search is not a sealed copy, but it contains the same content as the will lodged with the grant.
When you cannot find a will¶
If a thorough search produces nothing, there are several possibilities to work through.
The deceased may not have left a will. If they died intestate, no will exists and the estate is distributed under the intestacy rules. The relevant grant in the Find a Will service is Administration (Admon) and contains no will. [source: gov-uk/search-will-probate-2026-04-29.html]
Probate may not have been granted yet. It can take several months from the date of death for an executor to apply, and applications themselves can take 4 to 16 weeks to be processed by the Probate Registry. A standing search via Form PA1S covers this case. [source: gov-uk/search-will-probate-2026-04-29.html]
The estate may have been small enough not to need probate. Estates below the various banks' probate thresholds can sometimes be settled without a formal grant, in which case no public record is created. The do I need probate guide covers when this applies.
The will may exist but be lost or destroyed. Wills kept at home can be lost, accidentally destroyed, or held by a family member who is unwilling to produce them. Where a will is known to exist but cannot be found, the executor can apply to admit a copy or reconstructed will to probate; this requires a separate court application and evidence of the will's contents.
A solicitor may hold it without anyone realising. The Law Society's Find a Solicitor service (solicitors.lawsociety.org.uk) can be used to contact local firms and ask whether they hold a will for the deceased. This is slow and patchy but sometimes the only route when family records are thin.
Scotland: Confirmation, not probate¶
Scotland uses a different system. The equivalent of probate is Confirmation, granted by the Sheriff Court rather than HMCTS. Once Confirmation is issued, the Sheriff Court holds a copy of the will (where one exists), and a copy can be requested for a fee directly from the Sheriff Court that issued the Confirmation, or from HM Commissary Office in Edinburgh.
If the will was registered in the Register of Deeds (part of the Books of Council and Session, administered by Registers of Scotland), it can be searched at ros.gov.uk. Registration is voluntary, so most wills are not held there; it is only worth checking if you have a reason to think the will was lodged for safekeeping or recording.
For wills predating the searchable records on Registers of Scotland, requests go via National Records of Scotland.
If Confirmation has not yet been granted in Scotland and the executor is unwilling to share the will, the routes are similar to those in England and Wales: ask the executor's solicitor, ask any solicitor the deceased used, or contact the National Will Register to check for a registered will.
Northern Ireland¶
Northern Ireland's probate process is administered by the Probate and Matrimonial Office, part of the Northern Ireland Courts and Tribunals Service (NICTS). Once a grant is issued, the will and grant become public documents.
NICTS provides an online search at the NI Direct probate search service. Grants issued from 1986 onwards are searchable. The fee structure is different from England and Wales and changes from time to time; check the NICTS website for the current search fee.
Once you have located a grant, copies of the grant, the will, or both can be requested through the NICTS copy documents service, with separate fees for certified and uncertified copies. The current fees are listed on the NICTS website at the point of ordering.
What you receive¶
Whether ordered through the gov.uk Find a Will service or by post via Form PA1S, the standard package is the Grant of Probate (or Letters of Administration with Will Annexed) plus the will itself, supplied as a single document. The will appears as it was admitted to probate; any earlier drafts or codicils that were superseded are not included.
You receive a copy of the legal record, not an original. Originals are retained by the registry.
For most family administrative purposes — confirming who the executor is, confirming named beneficiaries, checking specific bequests — the standard probate copy is sufficient. Some overseas institutions or specialist applications occasionally require a sealed certified copy; that is a separate request to the registry, with its own fee.
What this guide doesn't cover¶
This guide is about finding and obtaining a copy of an existing will. It doesn't cover challenging a will (a separate area of contentious probate), what to do if you suspect a will has been forged or substituted, or how to remove a will from probate that has already been admitted.
It also doesn't cover what happens when no will exists at all — that's the intestacy rules guide. And it doesn't cover writing a will, which is a separate topic outside this wiki's current scope.
If you're struggling, you don't have to do this alone. Samaritans (116 123, 24/7) | Cruse Bereavement Care (0808 808 1677) | Mind (0300 123 3393)
Next: How to apply for probate
Last verified: 29 April 2026 against gov.uk/search-will-probate.