Wills in Thailand, and which country's law applies
Not sure where to start? Start here
Written by Greg Berryman. Sources last checked 15 August 2026.
Your will decides who gets your things. Thailand honours a valid will, wherever in the world it was made, and there is no rule here reserving a fixed share for family that overrides it. If you have left your possessions to someone, they get them.
What no will can do is make anyone hand over what they are holding. A bank, the Land Office and the vehicle registry will not act on a will from any country until a Thai court appoints someone to deal with the estate.
The chart below runs through what you hold and what you have already signed.
Every box with an underlined heading opens the page that explains it. Whichever branch you take, which country's law reaches which asset is settled before the will is ever read.
Jump to
Which country's law decides who inherits your Thai assets?
Whether a will is valid is one question. Whose law decides who gets what is a different one.
Thailand answers it in the Act on Conflict of Laws B.E. 2481, and the answer splits your estate in two.
Land and buildings. Section 37: they pass under the law of the country they sit in. A condominium in Phuket is a Thai question, always, whatever any will says and whatever passport you hold.
Everything else. Section 38: bank accounts, vehicles, shares and the contents of your home pass under the law of your domicile when you die, whether you left a will or not.
What is domicile?
The country the law treats as your permanent home. Two countries can reach different answers about the same person.
Thailand keeps it simple. Section 37 of the Civil and Commercial Code says your domicile is where you mainly live. Section 41 says it changes when you move and mean the move to be permanent.
Your home country probably does not work that way. Under the rules British, Irish, Australian, Canadian, New Zealand and American courts use, the domicile you were born with sticks to you until you decide to make your home somewhere else for good. Living abroad for years does not shift it on its own.
So a foreigner whose whole life is in Thailand can be domiciled here as a Thai court sees it, and still domiciled at home as a court there sees it. Neither is wrong. They are using different tests on the same facts.
| What the asset is | Which law decides who gets it |
|---|---|
| Land or a condominium in Thailand | Thai law, because the property is here. Section 37, Act on Conflict of Laws |
| A Thai bank account, a vehicle, possessions | The law of your domicile when you die. Section 38 |
| Property you hold in your home country | That country's law for land there, and its own rules for the rest |
What else does that Act decide?
- Whether you were capable of making the will is decided by the law of your nationality at the time you made it. Section 39.
- Whether it was made properly is satisfied either by the form your own country requires or by the form required where you signed it. Section 40. A will made in your home country's form works here.
- What the will means, and whether a clause fails, is decided by the law of your domicile when you die. Section 41.
- Whether you cancelled it is decided by the law of your domicile at the time you cancelled it. Section 42.
One more decides cases. Section 8: if the foreign law that should apply is not proved to the court's satisfaction, the court applies Thai law instead. Proving Australian or British inheritance law to a Thai court takes an expert, translated, and somebody has to pay for it. Thai law is the default.
Whether a foreigner living here on a long-stay extension is domiciled in Thailand for the purposes of section 38 is an open question with a Thai lawyer.
Do you need a Thai will?
Not strictly. A valid foreign will can generally be enforced here, once it is translated, legalised and certified. Legalisation is an official stamp confirming a signature or seal is genuine, which is what makes an authority in another country accept the document. That route is slower and dearer than using a Thai will.
The clean arrangement is one will per country, each covering only the assets in that country, and each saying so. Without that limiting clause, two wills can cancel one another.
Does your home country will work in Thailand?
Two questions sit inside that one, with different answers.
Whether the home will still works here is answered above. It can be enforced, slowly, and the risk is that a later Thai will cancels it by accident.
Whether you can change it without flying back is not a Thai question at all. It is decided by the country that will one day read the will, and every one of them has a rule on it.
Can you make a valid home country will while living in Thailand?
In every country covered here, yes. None of them makes you be at home to write a will, and none of them needs a notary.
Most settle it through the Hague Convention of 5 October 1961 on the form of wills. Article 1 makes a will valid in form if it follows the law of any one of: where it was signed, a nationality you held then or at death, your domicile, where you habitually live, or, for land, where the land is. Article 2 applies the same test to a will that cancels an earlier one.
Thailand is not a party, and it does not matter. The duty falls on the country being asked to accept the will, not on the country where you signed it. The three below that sit outside the Convention get to much the same place through their own statutes.
| Country | The rule on a will signed abroad |
|---|---|
| United Kingdom | Wills Act 1963, section 1. Properly made if it followed the law of the place of signing, or of the person's domicile, habitual residence or nationality at signing or at death |
| Ireland | Succession Act 1965, section 102, in Part VIII, which gives effect to the 1961 Convention. Same list of tests |
| Australia | State and territory law. In New South Wales, Succession Act 2006, section 48: place of signing, domicile, habitual residence or nationality at signing or at death |
| Canada | Provincial law. In Ontario, Succession Law Reform Act, section 37(1): place of making, domicile, habitual residence or nationality at the time of making |
| New Zealand | Wills Act 2007. Formalities in section 11, and section 14 lets the High Court save a document that misses them. New Zealand turns on domicile and has no nationality test |
| United States | State law. Uniform Probate Code section 2-506 in the states that adopted it: the law of the place of signing, or of the person's domicile, place of abode or nationality. Other states apply their own rule |
Read those against a person sitting in Phuket. A will signed here that meets the home country's requirements is valid there.
What do those requirements come to in practice?
The same thing in all six. In writing, signed by you, in front of two witnesses who are both there at the same time, who then sign it themselves.
The trap is who you ask to witness it. The obvious person is whoever is in the room, and for most readers here that is the partner being left everything. They sign, the will is still valid, and they lose the lot. The same applies to anyone married to a person you have left something to. Use two people who take nothing under the will.
Two adults in Thailand can do this. They do not have to be Thai, or your nationality, or lawyers. No notary, no embassy.
The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office says British embassies and consulates will witness a signature only in exceptional circumstances, and that for that kind of work it is cheaper and easier to use a local notary or lawyer. For a will you need neither.
What about cancelling the old one?
A later will made properly cancels the earlier one as far as it says so, and the rules above treat a cancelling will like any other. Ontario spells it out at section 37(2)(b), and Article 2 of the Convention adds that a cancellation also counts if it follows any law under which the old will was valid.
The exception is a will made in front of a notary and entered in a national register. That country's own rules may require another act before a notary to cancel it, and being valid in form does not answer that. If you made one, ask the notary who holds it what cancelling it takes. This is common in Europe and is not a feature of the six countries above.
Is an international will an easier route?
Not from Thailand. The 1973 Washington Convention created an extra form, the international will, valid in form wherever it is made. Australia and several Canadian provinces use it. It needs an authorised person, a lawyer or notary appointed under the law of a country that has adopted it, to certify the will. Thailand has not adopted it, so there is nobody here who can sign that certificate.
What makes a Thai will valid?
The form nearly every foreigner uses is the ordinary written will under section 1656 of the Civil and Commercial Code. In writing, dated on the day it is made, and signed by you in front of at least two witnesses who are both there at the same time, who then sign to confirm your signature. Changes only count if they are made the same way.
Nothing has to be notarised or registered. Witnesses and executors can be Thai or foreign. There is no nationality, sex, visa or house-book requirement to make a will covering Thai assets, and a beneficiary does not have to be related to you.
Under section 1653, a witness must not be someone you left something to, or married to someone you left something to, and must not be under age.
Do you have to register a Thai will at the district office?
No. Registering is an option, not a requirement.
The public document will under section 1658 is made in front of a district officer with witnesses, and it is harder to challenge afterwards because there is an official record. That is the reason to consider it.
Sources disagree about what the district office asks of a foreigner, in particular whether the declaration has to be in Thai and whether you need to live in the district. That question is with a Thai lawyer.
Can a will decide who collects your body in Thailand?
For two nationalities, yes, and it is the reason to make one even if you own almost nothing.
A will can decide who your embassy deals with when you die, which decides who can collect your body.
Canada. The Embassy of Canada in Bangkok has told this site that where an unmarried partner is identified as the deceased's next of kin in the will, the partner becomes next of kin, and the authorisation letter follows. See when a Canadian dies in Thailand.
United States. American Citizens Services has confirmed that the Embassy acts on a will or a signed statement, that the signed statement means one written by the established next of kin, and that a statement prepared in advance by the person who died carries weight only if it is a valid last will and testament. See when an American dies in Thailand.
Two governments, asked separately, pointed at the same document. Neither the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand nor Ireland has said the same, and none of them has been asked in those terms, so do not assume it carries across. What each government does with the release letter is on the embassy letter that releases the body.
None of this changes who inherits. Naming your partner as next of kin decides who deals with your body and your paperwork. Who receives the assets is decided by the rest of the will, and by the law that reaches each asset.
What should you check in a will you already have?
- Is it dated?
- Were there two witnesses, in the room together, and did both sign?
- Did your partner, or anyone you left something to, sign as a witness? They lose it.
- Does it say which country's assets it covers?
- Is there a back-up beneficiary if the first one dies before you?
- Does anyone know where the original is?
Who should you name as executor in Thailand?
Somebody who can realistically do the job.
The court still has to appoint them, and once appointed they carry duties with dates attached: fifteen days to begin an inventory of the estate, one month to finish it in front of two witnesses who have an interest in it, and one year to complete the administration and account for it. Sections 1719 to 1733. They cannot pay themselves without the will or a majority of the heirs allowing it, and they cannot buy from or sell to the estate.
Naming a relative abroad who has never dealt with a Thai court, and cannot easily travel, puts all of that on somebody unequipped for it. What the job involves is on what an estate administrator has to do in Thailand.
What does a Thai will not cover?
It will not avoid the court. You cannot walk into a bank or a land office with a will alone. A court has to appoint someone first, under section 1713 of the Civil and Commercial Code. What that takes and how long it runs is on the court order that unfreezes a Thai bank account.
It will not get round the property rules. What a foreigner may not own, a foreigner may not inherit. A foreigner married to a Thai national inherits the land as a statutory heir, but will not be allowed to register ownership of it, and has to sell.
Thai law firms disagree about which provision produces that. Section 93 of the Land Code says the Minister shall permit the inheritance of land by a foreign lawful heir, within the area limits set by section 87. Other firms read section 93 as belonging to the treaty provisions that begin at section 86, and no treaty has been in force since 1970, which would put the land under section 94 instead. Both roads end in a sale. They differ on how long you get, and that question is with a Thai lawyer.
A usufruct sidesteps all of that, because it is not inheritance. Where you live on land held in a Thai spouse or partner's name, a usufruct registered on the title lets you stay there after they die and binds whoever inherits, without your ever being an heir to it. See usufruct in Thailand, and what happens when you die.
Condominiums are easier but still conditional. The heir has to qualify under section 19 of the Condominium Act, and the building's foreign ownership quota has to have room. If either fails, the unit has to be sold.
It will not make a joint account pass to the survivor. Thai law does not recognise that on most joint accounts.
And a trust will not do the job instead. Section 1686 of the Civil and Commercial Code says a trust, created by will or by any act taking effect during your lifetime or after your death, has no effect whatever. The one exception is a narrow capital markets scheme under the Trust for Transactions in the Capital Market Act B.E. 2550, which is not an estate planning tool. A trust set up in your own country still governs the assets you hold there. It reaches nothing you hold here.
It will not touch the other half of a marriage's property. If the person was married, the property built up during the marriage is split first under sections 1474 to 1476 of the Civil and Commercial Code, and only their half becomes the estate. Spouse means a registered spouse of either sex, marriage equality having taken effect on 23 January 2025.
It will not guarantee anybody a minimum share. Unlike much of Europe, Thailand reserves nothing for family. That cuts both ways. Nobody can claim a share against your wishes, and your wishes only reach as far as the will you actually made.
It will do nothing while you are alive. A will only works on death. The lease, the bank, the visa and medical decisions are untouched by it. See if you lose capacity rather than die.
Who inherits in Thailand if you do not make a will?
Your own relatives.
Section 1629 sets six classes of heir in a fixed order: children and grandchildren, parents, full brothers and sisters, half brothers and sisters, grandparents, then uncles and aunts. A spouse sits outside those classes and takes a share alongside whichever one qualifies, under section 1635.
The bit people miss is that a spouse does not simply take everything. If there are children, or parents, or siblings, they share. And with no will and no marriage, an unmarried partner takes nothing at all. See who can legally act and what happens to your partner.
What deadlines does a foreign heir face in Thailand?
Three, and all of them run short against a process that takes months to reach the Land Office.
| What a foreign heir has to do | By when |
|---|---|
| Tell the authorities in writing about an inherited condominium unit | 60 days |
| Sell a condominium unit they do not qualify to own | One year |
| Sell inherited land | Between 180 days and one year, fixed by the Director-General |
They run from when the heir acquires the property rather than from the date of death. For an estate that takes months to reach the Land Office that is a real difference, and worth asking a lawyer which date applies to you. The one-year figure for a condominium is set by the Condominium Act. The period for land is not fixed in the same way: section 94 of the Land Code leaves it to the Director-General, within a floor of 180 days and a ceiling of one year, so a reader planning on twelve months may get six. If the deadline passes, the Director-General of the Land Department can sell the property on the heir's behalf.
If you hold land or a condominium here, this is the point to instruct a lawyer rather than read a website.
What is in the guide?
The guide contains an asset and document inventory, the next of kin authorisation letter in the wording the embassies ask for, and separate modules for British, American, Australian, Canadian, New Zealand and Irish citizens, because the six governments define next of kin differently.
Sources
- Act on Conflict of Laws B.E. 2481 (1938), published in the Government Gazette Vol. 55, page 1021, 20 March B.E. 2481. Section 8 on unproved foreign law, section 37 on succession to immovable property, section 38 on succession to movable property and domicile, section 39 on capacity, section 40 on form, section 41 on effects and interpretation, and section 42 on revocation. Cited from the unofficial English translation prepared by the Office of the Council of State.
- Thai Civil and Commercial Code, section 37 defining the domicile of a natural person as the place of his principal residence, and section 41 on how domicile changes.
- Thai Civil and Commercial Code, Book VI, Succession. Section 1653 on who may not witness a will, section 1656 on the form of an ordinary written will, section 1658 on the public document will made before a district officer, section 1686 under which a trust created by will or by any act taking effect during life or after death has no effect whatever, section 1629 on statutory heirs, section 1635 on the surviving spouse's share, section 1713 on appointment of an estate administrator, sections 1719 to 1733 on the administrator's duties and the periods for the inventory and the account, and sections 1474 to 1476 on marital property.
- Trust for Transactions in the Capital Market Act B.E. 2550 (2007), the only Thai legislation permitting a trust, and confined to capital market transactions.
- Thai Civil and Commercial Code, sections 1417 to 1428 on usufruct, for the cross-reference above. The provisions are set out on usufruct in Thailand.
- Consular Section, Embassy of Canada to Thailand, in correspondence with this site, 12 August 2026, for the position that an unmarried partner identified as next of kin in the will becomes next of kin. Not published in any Global Affairs Canada guidance.
- American Citizens Services, US Embassy Bangkok, in correspondence with this site, 10 August 2026, for the position that a statement prepared in advance carries weight only if it is a valid last will and testament.
- Condominium Act B.E. 2522 (1979), section 19, on which foreign heirs may hold a unit and the 49 per cent foreign-ownership quota, and sections 19/5 to 19/7 on notification within 60 days, disposal within one year, and the Director-General's power of sale.
- Land Code B.E. 2497 (1954), section 86 on the acquisition of land by foreigners under a treaty, section 87 on the area limits permitted under section 86, section 93 on the inheritance of land by a foreign lawful heir, and section 94 on the disposal of land acquired without permission within a period of not less than 180 days and not more than one year fixed by the Director-General. Whether section 93 reaches a foreigner inheriting from a Thai spouse, or is confined to the treaty provisions beginning at section 86, is disputed between Thai law firms and is not settled on this page.
- All Thai legislation above is cited from published English translations. No official English text of Thai legislation exists. Only the Thai text as published in the Royal Gazette has legal force. Thai legal review of these sections is under way, including what a district office requires of a foreigner making a public document will, whether a foreign resident on a long-stay extension is domiciled here for the purposes of section 38, and which provision of the Land Code governs a foreigner inheriting land from a Thai spouse. Section numbers are given so the provisions can be checked directly. See about this site.
- Convention of 5 October 1961 on the Conflicts of Laws Relating to the Form of Testamentary Dispositions, Hague Conference on Private International Law, Articles 1 and 2, and the status table recording 42 contracting parties, including the United Kingdom, Ireland and Australia, and not including Canada, New Zealand, the United States or Thailand.
- Wills Act 1963, section 1, United Kingdom, on the general rule as to formal validity.
- Succession Act 1965, section 102, Ireland, in Part VIII, which gives effect to the 1961 Convention.
- Succession Act 2006 (NSW), section 48 on the validity of a will executed in a foreign place, and Part 2.4A on international wills. Other Australian states and territories legislate separately.
- Succession Law Reform Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. S.26, Ontario, sections 36 to 38 on choice of law, section 37(2)(b) on revoking wills, and section 42 giving the international wills convention force in Ontario. Other Canadian provinces legislate separately.
- Wills Act 2007, New Zealand, section 11 on formalities, section 14 on validation by the High Court, and section 22 on dispositions of movable property.
- Uniform Probate Code, section 2-506, choice of law as to execution, as enacted in the states that have adopted the Code. Succession is state law in the United States and other states apply their own rule.
- Convention Providing a Uniform Law on the Form of an International Will, Washington, 26 October 1973, Annex Articles 1 to 5 and Article 10, on the certificate of an authorised person.
- Documents for British people abroad, Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, last updated 31 July 2025, on the limits of consular notarial services and the witnessing of signatures.
- What to do after a British person dies in Thailand, Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, on the use of a Thai death certificate for probate purposes.