Legal Translation by Language

Six routes currently carry a dedicated page: Arabic, English, Russian, Urdu, French and Persian. Each page goes deep on its own script, calendar, document types and legalisation origin. If your language is not among them, the constants on this page still apply, and you can send the document through the request page for a specific answer.

For mainland courts, notaries and registries, yes — the official portal states court documents must be in Arabic or be translated by a legal translator approved by the Ministry of Justice. The DIFC and ADGM work in English instead, and a few processes accept English alongside Arabic, such as school-certificate equalisation. The destination decides, so confirm it before commissioning.

It depends on the receiving authority, and the honest answer is that the rules are not uniform. The foreign ministry's attestation service speaks of a legally certified translation accompanying foreign documents, while the courts look for a translator on the UAE roll. The Iranian route is the notable exception where translation at origin is the norm. When the answer matters, ask the specific authority — we do exactly that before advising.

Because what the Iranian ministries legalise is the seal of an official translator licensed by the Iranian judiciary. The translation therefore has to exist first, inside Iran, before the Ministry of Justice and then the Ministry of Foreign Affairs can stamp it and the UAE Embassy in Tehran can legalise the set. A Persian translation made anywhere else has no seal those ministries recognise.

Sometimes not — and a serious provider tells you so. Computerised Pakistani certificates carry Urdu and English; some civil-status records arrive with translations attached. Whether that satisfies your authority depends on what it requires: an English half may clear one counter and not another, and an Arabic requirement may still stand. We check before quoting rather than translating by default.

Only if their registration covers both. A UAE legal translator's licence is scoped to named languages, and the Ministry of Justice treats adding a language as its own application. In a mixed file it is normal for different registered translators to sign different documents, while one project owner keeps terminology and name spellings consistent across all of them.

By declaring one master spelling — the passport — before the first page is translated, then building a name table for the whole file: every person and company, in every script involved. Each translated document is checked against that table, so the certificate, the Emirates ID and the visa record reconcile instead of fighting each other at the counter.

They are converted individually and, where it helps the reader, shown in both calendars. Lunar Hijri dates on Gulf documents and Solar Hijri dates on Iranian ones follow different systems entirely; confusing them, or converting with a fixed offset, produces a document that contradicts the person's own passport. Dates get the same verification discipline as names.

Mostly, but not entirely — and pretending otherwise helps nobody. Abu Dhabi's judiciary, for example, issued a circular in 2023 exempting purely numerical English bank statements and invoices from mandatory Arabic translation in its courts, with the court keeping discretion where English text affects understanding. That relief is emirate-specific; do not assume it travels to Dubai or elsewhere.

The constants of this page still hold: the destination sets the target language, the UAE's non-membership of the Apostille Convention sets the consular chain, and the pair-specific registration rule sets who may sign. Send the document through the request page and we will map its specific route — including telling you plainly if part of it sits outside our scope.

Arabic and English form the core pair, and MANJAZ also works between Arabic and the other languages listed on its language pages, including Persian. Legal translation in the UAE is licensed per language pair, so availability for a given combination depends on a licensed translator being assigned. Send the document and we will confirm the pair; where no direct route exists, translation via English may be possible.

Often, yes, but availability depends on whether a translator licensed for that specific pair can be assigned at the time, which the team confirms case by case. Where no direct pair exists, an authority may accept translation through English as an intermediate step, though you should verify this with them first. Send the document and its destination and we will state plainly what is possible.