Polish to English translation

Short copy or full copy

A registry office issues an odpis skrócony, which shows a record as it stands today, or an odpis zupełny, which repeats the original entry and every later change, such as a change of name. We translate the one you hold. If an Australian office needs the history, it needs the full copy.

Source: gov.pl, odpis aktu stanu cywilnego (checked 19 September 2026)

The multilingual copy, and Australia

Poland also issues a multilingual short copy. Gov.pl says it needs no translation or legalisation in a listed group of countries, from Germany and Italy to Turkey. Australia is not on that list, so ask the office reading it whether it will do, and see documents already in English.

-ski and -ska

Polish surnames ending in -ski, -cki or -dzki take -ska, -cka or -dzka for a woman, so a father and a daughter can carry two forms of one name. The translation keeps each person’s own form, with ł, ś, ż and the other letters exactly as your passport prints them. A double surname joined by a hyphen after marriage stays joined too. Czech and Hungarian surnames also have a woman’s form: see Czech to English translation and Hungarian translation services.

The whole prawo jazdy

Front and back: your details in the card’s numbered fields, then the category table on the reverse, where each category, its start and end dates and any restriction code are set out in English words, not left as numbers.

Numbers copied exactly

The 11-digit PESEL, the licence number and the record reference are copied digit for digit, so they can be matched against your passport and your other papers. Dates are written with the month in letters, so 03.04 cannot be read the wrong way round.

Records in any of the three forms

Birth, marriage and death copies, divorce judgments, the certificate from the National Criminal Register, diplomas and transcripts. Registry seals, clerks’ signatures and later entries all come across; a word the photo does not show clearly is marked [illegible].