Poland began applying rules on August 23 allowing same-sex couples married abroad to enter their marriage certificates in Poland’s civil registry, extending official recognition beyond cases won through the courts.

The change is Poland’s first system-wide recognition of such marriages and gives couples a Polish document confirming their civil status. It ends the need for separate court orders, although it does not legalise same-sex marriage in Poland or automatically settle every associated right.

Eleven couples had already received new Polish marriage certificates by late morning on August 24, the first working day since the changes took effect, deputy Prime Minister and Digital Affairs Minister Krzysztof Gawkowski said.

“The right to have a joint marriage certificate has become a fact,” Gawkowski told a news conference in the Polish parliament on August 24. He described the change as an affirmation of “equality and dignity” and warned that offices refusing to implement it would violate the law.

The rules follow a regulation adopted by the government in May, which introduced revised certificate templates covering female-female and male-male couples. Applications may be submitted at any civil registry office.

The government acted after the EU Court of Justice ruled in November 2025 that Poland must recognise a same-sex marriage legally contracted in another EU member state. Refusal violated EU citizens’ freedom of movement and right to private and family life, the court said, while stressing that Poland was not required to introduce same-sex marriage domestically.

Poland’s Supreme Administrative Court applied the judgment in March and ordered officials to register the German marriage certificate of two Polish men. Warsaw completed the first such transcription in May.

The Constitutional Tribunal ruled in July that parts of the regulation were unconstitutional. The government rejected the decision, arguing that the tribunal’s composition was legally defective due to judiciary reforms of the previous radical right government that EU courts said violated the bloc’s treaties.