Spanish to English
Spanish to English translation
For visitors driving here on a Spanish-language licence, and for migrants with an acta de nacimiento, a marriage certificate or other civil documents. We translate them into English and deliver digitally, with NAATI certification as an option.
En español: Conducir en Australia con carnet español · Traducción NAATI de licencia de conducir
What a Spanish document needs
Three things a careless translation gets wrong
Spanish-language documents come from Spain and nearly twenty countries in the Americas, and each has its own formats. Three features come up again and again.
Two surnames, in a fixed order
Most people carry a paternal surname and a maternal surname. The order matters when an Australian reader matches the document to your passport. Both surnames stay, in the order the document gives them.
Day before month
Dates are written day-month-year. Copied as digits into English, a day and a month can swap without anyone noticing. Every date is written with the month in words so it reads one way only.
Handwriting and marginal notes
Many civil registry documents are handwritten, and many carry notas marginales — annotations in the margin recording later changes. Those notes are part of the record and must be translated with it.
Driving here on a Spanish licence
Carry the licence, plus a translation or a permit
Spain issues EU-format licences with category pictograms. Latin American licences vary widely in layout, so a translation has to explain what your particular card says.
What VicRoads says
“If your licence is not in English, you’ll also need to carry either: an English translation of your licence, or an international driving permit in English.” The word also matters: the translation travels with your licence and does not replace it.
Source: VicRoads, driving with your overseas licence (checked 18 September 2026)
What the translation covers
Both sides of the card in full: name, date of birth, licence number, categories or classes, conditions and restrictions, issue and expiry dates, issuing authority, and every stamp or code. Categories shown as pictograms are named in words.
Rental desks have their own wording. See renting a car in Australia on an overseas licence, and driver licence translation with a NAATI-certified translator option.
What a careful job includes
The same care on every Spanish document
Licences, birth, marriage, divorce and death certificates, police certificates, passports and ID pages, academic records. Each gets the three checks below.
Names spelt as in your passport
Your name is written the way your passport writes it, so the translation and the passport agree. Both surnames are kept, in order, and never merged into one or dropped to fit an English form.
Dates that read one way
Day-month-year dates are written out with the month in words. Nothing is rounded, reordered or left for the reader to guess.
Stamps, seals and margins in full
Handwritten entries are read and translated. The wording on stamps, seals and marginal notes is translated in full, not summarised as a bracketed word. A seal with no words, or text that cannot be read, is marked in square brackets, for example [seal] or [illegible].
Queensland’s page says NAATI “has a list of approved translators” (Queensland Government, driving on an overseas licence, last updated 19 February 2024), and Europcar’s rental terms accept an English translation issued by NAATI (Europcar Australia, rental terms and conditions, clause 7.2, checked 19 September 2026). For driving or hiring a car, choose NAATI certification — with one exception: the Northern Territory says “you must apply for an international driving permit if: your overseas licence is not written in English”, and that a translation “must be done by an authorised translator in the NT” (NT.GOV.AU, driving in the NT for new residents and visitors, checked 18 September 2026), so we cannot help there. Compare the options on international driving permit or translation.
Pricing
The full price on screen before you order
Translation is $39.99 per page into English, delivered digitally. Add NAATI certification for $59.99 per page, prepared by a NAATI-certified translator and carrying their certification statement, NAATI stamp and credential number. Where the translator uses NAATI’s digital stamp, it carries a QR code you can scan to check the credential. For how it works, see NAATI translation, ordered online.
Translating civil documents as well? See birth certificate translation and marriage certificate translation. Documents in Portuguese? See Portuguese to English translation.
Driving on a licence in Spanish? Check your overseas licence in 1 second.