Three systems, all valid
| Civil marriage | Under the Marriage Act, monogamous, before a marriage officer. |
|---|---|
| Customary marriage | Under the Recognition of Customary Marriages Act: valid once lobola has been negotiated and the customary ceremony performed, and it may be polygynous. It must be registered with Home Affairs within a set period. |
| Civil union | Open to same-sex and opposite-sex couples alike; South Africa was the fifth country in the world to recognise same-sex marriage. |
See civil marriage in South Africa.
Register the customary marriage
A customary marriage is legally valid the moment the requirements are met — but if it is not registered, proving it later is difficult and transcribing it abroad is close to impossible. Registration is a short administrative act with long consequences; do it immediately after the ceremony rather than eventually.
The property regime, decided before the wedding
A civil marriage is in community of property by default — assets and debts merge entirely. Choosing otherwise requires an antenuptial contract signed before a notary before the marriage; afterwards it takes a court order. The accrual system is the usual alternative. This is the decision with the greatest financial consequence in the whole process and it is routinely made by default rather than deliberately.
Documents for the foreign partner
- Passport with entry stamp and proof of lawful status
- A letter of no impediment from the embassy
- Where previously married, the divorce decree or death certificate
- Both parties must be interviewed separately by the Department of Home Affairs where one is foreign — an anti-fraud measure applied as standard
The spousal visa
A spousal or relative visa is applied for, and this is where the difficulty actually lies: Home Affairs processing times are the principal constraint on any plan, and they have run to many months or longer. Build the calendar around the department's timelines, not around the wedding date.
The sequence of steps and why the order matters
The order is the same in every country; only what each step involves varies.
| Step 1: capacity paper | Your own country issues it (certificate of no impediment, of marital capacity or similar, depending on the name). Request it well before the wedding; everything else waits on it. |
|---|---|
| Step 2: publication | A notice or banns period, whose length your national law sets. |
| Step 3: the interview | Usual when one partner is a foreigner. Routine rather than suspicious, and unproblematic for a genuine couple. |
| Step 4: the ceremony | Held before the local civil authority; only this act produces legal effect. |
| Step 5: legalising the paper | The local certificate is apostilled or legalised by a consulate, according to the conventions in force, then translated. |
| Step 6: recording at home | Transcription, registration or entry in the civil registers; the label differs, the purpose does not. |
| Step 7: the spouse visa | A distinct application that presupposes step 6. Waiting times accumulate. |
Traditional or religious rites are not a civil marriage
A gathering of three hundred guests may unite two families, yet with no civil certificate nothing can be recognised in your home country and no spouse visa follows. Hold both ceremonies, in the order that suits you, but never skip the civil one.