Pennsylvania Name Change Laws: Fingerprinting, Dual Publication, and the Offense Bar

Pennsylvania's name-change process is more demanding than most states'. Every adult petition requires pre-filing fingerprinting and a Pennsylvania State Police criminal-history check, notice published in two newspapers, and a detailed statutory list of convictions that permanently bar the change. There is no single statewide fee; each court of common pleas sets its own, and a full filing can run several hundred dollars once background-search and publication costs are added.

The good news for anyone who only needs a name restored after a divorce or a spouse's death: Pennsylvania has a dramatically simpler path for that specific situation, no petition, no publication, just a written notice filed with the prothonotary.

Information last verified on 2026-09-02. This article has not yet been reviewed by a licensed lawyer.

How to Change Your Name as an Adult in Pennsylvania

An adult petition is filed in the court of common pleas in the county where the petitioner resides, under 54 Pa.C.S. § 701(a.1)(1). Pennsylvania law makes it unlawful to assume a different name outside a court proceeding, so the petition is the mandatory route to a legal name change.

The petition must state the petitioner's intention to change names, the reason, their current residence, and every residence they have had over the preceding five years. A hearing must be held no less than one month and no more than three months after filing. Section 702(b) requires the court to forward a duplicate of the petition and a set of the petitioner's fingerprints to the Pennsylvania State Police for a criminal-history check; the State Police either note the change on record or destroy the fingerprints within 60 days.

There is no single statewide filing fee; fees are set locally by each court of common pleas. Philadelphia's current official fee, per its January 2026 court guide, is $349.23. On top of that, Philadelphia charges a separate $20.00 Family Court judgment-search fee and a $58.52 Office of Judicial Records judgment-search fee, plus newspaper publication costs and $41.58 for each additional certified copy of the decree, with the total commonly exceeding $900. Publication costs are generally described as non-waivable even where a fee waiver applies to the base filing fee.

Changing a Minor's Name in Pennsylvania

Chapter 7 has no dedicated statute for a minor's own name-change petition. Section 703(a) addresses the automatic effect on a minor child when a parent's own surname changes: the child takes the parent's new surname too, unless the court orders otherwise. Section 703(b) then supplies the route back out. A minor child whose surname was changed that way is entitled, on attaining majority, to the benefits of Section 702, so a child swept into a parent's surname change can petition to change it again as an adult.

One notice requirement matters more than any other in a contested minor name change. Section 701(a.1)(3)(ii)(B) directs the court to order that notice of the filing and of the hearing date be given to any nonpetitioning parent of a child whose name may be affected by the proceedings. That is a separate obligation from newspaper publication, and it is what gives the other parent the opportunity to appear and raise a lawful objection at the hearing.

Procedurally, at least in Philadelphia, a minor's own name-change petition (age 17 and under) is routed to the Clerk of Family Court rather than the civil Prothonotary's office adults use. No express best-interest statutory standard was found for a minor's own petition; the general fingerprinting and publication process would presumably still apply.

Publication in Two Newspapers

Pennsylvania requires notice of the petition and hearing to be published in two newspapers of general circulation in the county of residence, or a contiguous county. Philadelphia's local practice requires one publication specifically in The Legal Intelligencer plus a second general-circulation paper. Section 701(a.1)(3)(ii) also requires that the same notice be given to any nonpetitioning parent of a child whose name may be affected by the proceedings.

That requirement is not absolute, and the exception does considerably more than switch off the newspapers. If the court finds that the notice required by Section 701(a.1)(3)(ii) would jeopardize the safety of the person seeking the change or their child or ward, the notice shall be waived by order of the court. Because the waiver runs to everything that subparagraph requires, it reaches the notice to a nonpetitioning parent as well as the two publications.

The waiver also carries a confidentiality guarantee, and that is the part most petitioners are actually after. On granting a request to waive notice, the court shall seal the file, and in cases filed under that paragraph there is to be no public access to any court record of the name change petition, proceeding, or order, whether or not the petition is granted. Sealed records may be opened only by order of the court in which the petition was granted, on a showing of good cause, or at the applicant's own request. That sealing provision, rather than the publication waiver standing alone, is the reason survivors of domestic violence and transgender petitioners ask the court to proceed under this subsection.

Restrictions: The Offense-Based Bar and the 2-Year Waiting Period

Pennsylvania's restriction list is unusually specific, and three of its entries are much narrower than they look. Section 702(c)(2) bars a court from ordering a name change for anyone convicted of murder, voluntary manslaughter, rape, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, statutory sexual assault, sexual assault, aggravated indecent assault, kidnapping, robbery of a motor vehicle, or criminal attempt, conspiracy, or solicitation to commit any of those offenses.

Robbery, aggravated assault, and arson appear on that list only in named subsections, not as whole offenses. The statute bars robbery as defined in 18 Pa.C.S. § 3701(a)(1)(i), aggravated assault as defined in 18 Pa.C.S. § 2702(a)(1) or (2), and arson as defined in 18 Pa.C.S. § 3301(a). A conviction under any other subsection of those three statutes is not on the bar list at all, so it is handled under the general felony provision described below rather than by an outright prohibition. Anyone reading a summary that lists plain robbery, aggravated assault, or arson should check the subsection of conviction before concluding the door is closed.

For the offenses that are listed, this is an outright bar with no waiting-period exception stated. Several of the barred offenses, including rape, involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, statutory sexual assault, sexual assault, and aggravated indecent assault, are themselves sex offenses, so registrants convicted of those crimes are swept into this bar directly rather than through a separate sex-offender-specific clause.

Section 702(c) is headed Convicted felons, and paragraph (c)(1) applies by its terms to a person convicted of a felony. For a felony conviction that is not on the barred list, the court may order the change if either of two conditions is met: at least two calendar years have elapsed from the date the person completed their sentence and the person is not subject to the probation or parole jurisdiction of any court, county probation agency, or the Pennsylvania Board of Probation and Parole, or the person has been pardoned. The two routes are alternatives, so a pardon satisfies the provision on its own no matter how recently the sentence ended.

Because subsection (c) reaches felony convictions, misdemeanor and summary convictions fall outside it and carry no waiting period of their own. A criminal record is not by itself a bar or a delay in Pennsylvania; the grade and the specific offense are what matter.

Separately, Section 705 makes it a summary offense to violate the provisions of Chapter 7 for the purpose of avoiding payment of taxes or other debts. The offense is assuming a different name outside the court process with that motive, not obtaining a lawful court decree. A properly petitioned, court-ordered change does not become a summary offense because debt was part of the reason for it. A debt-avoidance motive is instead the sort of thing a creditor can raise as a lawful objection at the hearing, where any person having lawful objection to the change may appear and be heard.

Name Restoration After Divorce or a Spouse's Death

Pennsylvania offers a much simpler path for two specific situations. Under Section 704, anyone who is a party to a divorce action can resume a prior surname, at any time before or after the divorce decree, by filing a written notice with the prothonotary of the county where the divorce action was filed or the decree entered. No court order or hearing is required.

Section 704.1 extends the same simple written-notice mechanism to a surviving spouse, who may resume a prior surname at any time by filing written notice with the prothonotary of their county of residence, along with a copy of the deceased spouse's death certificate. Anyone who only needs a name restored after a divorce or a spouse's death should use this path rather than the full petition process described above.

Name Changes After Marriage

Section 701 makes no reference to marriage as a basis for a name change; Chapter 7 is strictly a general judicial mechanism. A marriage-based name change in Pennsylvania is handled administratively: the Social Security Administration and PennDOT accept a marriage certificate as proof to update a name, without a court filing.

Related Pennsylvania Records

A Pennsylvania name change often comes up alongside other state records. See Pennsylvania marriage and divorce records for how to obtain the certified copies agencies require as proof, Pennsylvania court records for how a name-change proceeding fits into the state's public-records rules, and Pennsylvania divorce laws for how the written-notice restoration path fits into a divorce case.

Disclaimer

This article provides general information about Pennsylvania name-change law. It is not legal advice and does not create an attorney-client relationship. Fees, forms, and procedures change and vary by county; verify current details with your county's court of common pleas or a licensed Pennsylvania attorney before relying on anything here for a specific situation.

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Last updated: 2026-09-02. Fees and forms reflect their published status as of August 2026.