How Long Does Probate Take? A Realistic Timeline

GOV.UK states you will usually get probate within 12 weeks of submitting your application. That is the court stage. It is not how long the whole job takes. Valuing the estate before you apply commonly takes weeks to months, and gathering in and distributing the estate afterwards takes months more. For a straightforward estate, six to twelve months from death to final distribution is a normal, non-alarming total.

Most of the frustration people feel about probate comes from measuring the whole process against the 12-week figure, which was only ever about one stage of it. Here is the honest version.

This guide covers England and Wales. Scotland and Northern Ireland have different processes and timescales.

Those are the typical times, in full. How long this estate takes depends on which route it needs, because an estate that requires full Inheritance Tax details adds months before the application can even be submitted — the four routes, and what each involves.

The whole timeline, stage by stage

Stage	Typical duration	What controls it
Register the death	Within 5 days of being told you can	Statutory
Find the will, notify organisations	1 to 3 weeks	How organised the paperwork is
Value the estate	4 weeks to several months	How many assets, and whether there is property
Inheritance Tax, if a full account is needed	Add 4 to 20+ weeks	HMRC processing, waiting for the code
Court issues the grant	Usually within 12 weeks	HMCTS
Gather in the assets	4 to 12 weeks	How many organisations, and copies to hand
Pay debts, then distribute	2 to 8 weeks, often held to 6 months	Creditor risk and claim windows

Add those up and a simple estate lands around six months. One with a property, or with a full Inheritance Tax account, lands closer to twelve. Estates with foreign assets, trusts, or a dispute run longer.

The 12 weeks, precisely

Two official statements:

• GOV.UK: "You'll usually get probate within 12 weeks of submitting your application. It can take longer if you need to provide additional information."
• HMCTS, in its PA1P postal guidance: "It can take up to 12 weeks to process your application if there's no delay in receiving your documents", and it asks you not to contact them until 12 weeks have passed.

Both sentences contain the same escape clause and it is the important part: if there is no delay in receiving your documents, and longer if you need to provide additional information. The 12 weeks describes a clean application.

Where the time actually goes

Valuing the estate: usually the longest stage

GOV.UK says plainly that valuing an estate "can take several months, but it can take longer if it's a big or complicated estate".

The reason is that you are waiting on other organisations, in sequence:

• Banks take one to four weeks to confirm a date-of-death balance.
• Pension providers are frequently slower, particularly where trustees must exercise discretion.
• Share registrars vary enormously.
• A property valuation takes days to arrange, weeks if you want a formal RICS valuation.
• Tracing an account nobody knew about can add a month by itself.

You cannot compress this much, but you can parallelise it. Write to every organisation in the same week rather than one at a time. That single choice often saves a month.

Inheritance Tax: the big variable

If the estate is excepted, there is no separate step: you certify the values on the probate application and apply. This is most estates.

If it is not excepted, the sequence is serial and it is long:

1. Complete IHT400 and its schedules.
2. Submit it and start paying the tax. It is due by the end of the sixth month after the death.
3. Wait for HMRC to send a letter with a unique code.
4. Only then apply for probate.

Every one of those steps is a queue, and step 4 cannot start until step 3 finishes. Our guide to excepted estates explains which route applies.

The court stage

Once submitted, the registry checks entitlement, the will, and consistency across the documents. If everything matches, the grant issues and your sealed copies arrive with it.

If something does not match, they write to you. That letter is routine and does not mean your application has failed, but it does mean the clock effectively restarts from your reply.

After the grant

The grant is the beginning of the second half. You send sealed copies to each organisation, wait for funds to be released, deal with any property sale, settle the debts, and then distribute.

This is where having ordered enough copies pays off. With one copy, you go round the organisations in series. With eight, you go in parallel.

What actually causes delay

In rough order of how often they bite:

1. Name inconsistencies. The will says "Margaret Jane Smith", the death certificate says "Margaret J Smith", the deeds say "Peggy Smith". Declare alternative names on the form rather than leaving the registry to ask.
2. Marks on the will. Staple holes, paperclip marks, sticky notes, anything suggesting something was attached and removed. Expect a letter asking what it was.
3. Photocopies instead of originals. HMCTS does not accept a photocopy of the will or the death certificate.
4. Paper rather than online. HMCTS says outright that paper takes longer.
5. Waiting on the HMRC code where a full account was needed.
6. Slow third parties during valuation, which is invisible to the court but very visible to you.
7. A caveat. If someone enters a caveat to stop the grant, the timeline stops being predictable and you need advice.

What you can and cannot control

You can:

• Apply online.
• Write to every organisation in the same week rather than sequentially.
• Order plenty of sealed copies at £2 each rather than £16 later.
• Check names across the will, death certificate and title deeds before you apply, and declare any differences.
• Send original documents, tracked.
• Handle the will carefully: no staples, no paperclips, no folding it into a different shape.

You cannot:

• Speed up HMCTS.
• Speed up HMRC.
• Make a pension scheme's trustees decide faster.
• Shorten the six-month window for a claim against the estate.

Chasing the registry before 12 weeks is specifically discouraged and does not help.

When to chase, and how

Before 12 weeks: do not. HMCTS asks you not to.

After 12 weeks: contact the probate helpline on 0300 303 0648, Monday to Friday, 9am to 1pm, closed weekends and bank holidays, or contactprobate@justice.gov.uk. Have the deceased's full name, date of death, and your application reference ready.

If you are not comfortable online, We Are Group provides HMCTS-funded support on 03300 160 051, Monday to Friday 9am to 5pm, or text FORM to 60777 for a call back.

Which of these deadlines actually bite depends on the route the estate takes, and that is decided by its figures rather than by choice. Working out which of the four situations applies is what tells you whether the tax deadlines are yours to worry about at all.

Deadlines that do exist

There is no deadline for applying for probate itself. But there are real deadlines around it:

Deadline	What
5 days	Register the death after being told you can
28 days	Use Tell Us Once after getting your reference number
End of the sixth month after death	Pay Inheritance Tax, or interest accrues
12 months	Submit the IHT400 where the estate owes tax

The six-month tax deadline is the one that sets the pace. If tax is due, work backwards from it: you need the valuation finished well before then.

The six-month wait before distributing

Many executors deliberately wait at least six months from the date of the grant before distributing.

The reason is the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975, which allows certain people to bring a claim against an estate, generally within six months of the grant. Distributing before that window closes leaves you exposed if a claim arrives and the money has gone.

Advertising for creditors in The Gazette and a local newspaper is the other half of the same protection. It gives creditors a defined period to come forward and protects you personally if one appears afterwards.

Both are optional, and both are cheap relative to the risk. Beneficiaries may press you to distribute sooner; explaining why you are waiting is usually enough.

An interim distribution, if the pressure is real

Waiting six months is prudent, but it is not always kind. A widow with no income of her own, or a beneficiary facing a genuine hardship, may need money before then.

The usual middle path is an interim distribution: release part of the estate now and hold back a reserve against claims, unknown debts and final tax. To do that sensibly you want to have advertised for creditors, be confident about the debts, and keep back enough to cover a realistic worst case.

The reserve is a judgement, and it is your personal exposure if you get it wrong. On any estate where a 1975 Act claim is even conceivable, take advice before making an interim payment rather than after.

Two timelines for the same estate

The same estate can take very different amounts of time depending on decisions made in the first fortnight. Consider an estate with a house, three bank accounts, a pension and a small share holding.

The slow version. The executor writes to the bank, waits three weeks for a reply, then writes to the next one. The property valuation is arranged after the bank letters come back. The pension is chased last because it seemed complicated. A paper application goes in with one sealed copy ordered. After the grant, each organisation is contacted in turn, each holding the single copy for a fortnight.

Elapsed: comfortably over a year, with no single stage having gone wrong.

The fast version. In week two, one letter goes to every organisation at once, asking for the date-of-death balance and whether a grant is required. The valuation is commissioned the same week. The application goes in online with eight copies ordered. After the grant, every organisation is contacted in the same week.

Elapsed: six to seven months, doing exactly the same work.

The difference is not effort or expertise. It is that the second executor ran the waiting in parallel instead of in series. Almost all of probate's elapsed time is other people's response times, and those can overlap.

What to do while you wait

The 12 weeks after submitting are genuinely empty for you, and empty time in a bereavement is not restful. Useful things that can be done in it:

• Build the estate accounts as they stand: every asset, every debt, every payment you have made personally and will reclaim.
• Draft the letters you will send to each organisation when the grant arrives, ready to go out the same day.
• Sort the property, if it is empty: check on it, keep the insurer informed, keep the heating ticking in winter.
• Collect beneficiaries' details, including full names, addresses and bank details, which always takes longer than expected.
• Deal with the income tax position to the date of death, which is separate from Inheritance Tax and easy to forget.

None of this speeds up the court. All of it shortens the second half.

Frequently asked questions

How long does probate take in the UK?

GOV.UK states you will usually get probate within 12 weeks of submitting your application, and longer if you need to provide additional information. That covers the court stage only. Including valuing the estate beforehand and administering it afterwards, six to twelve months is common.

How long after applying does the grant arrive?

Usually within 12 weeks of submitting the application. HMCTS asks postal applicants not to contact them until 12 weeks have passed, because chasing earlier does not speed anything up and adds to the queue.

Is online probate faster than applying by post?

Yes. HMCTS states it takes longer to process paper applications than online applications and advises applying online if you can. The online service also prevents some of the omissions that cause paper applications to be sent back.

Why is my probate application taking so long?

The most common causes are a query about the will, inconsistent names between documents, missing original documents, or an Inheritance Tax account still being processed. The registry writes to you if it needs something, and the clock effectively restarts from your reply.

How long does it take to value an estate?

GOV.UK says valuing an estate can take several months, and longer for a big or complicated estate such as one involving trusts or tax to pay. In practice this stage, not the court stage, is usually the longest part of the whole process.

Can I speed up probate?

You cannot speed up the court, but you can avoid delaying it. Apply online, send original documents, make sure names match across the will and death certificate, and order enough sealed copies so you can contact organisations in parallel afterwards.

How long should I wait before distributing the estate?

Many executors wait at least six months from the grant before distributing, because that is the window in which a claim under the Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975 can normally be brought. Debts and taxes must be settled before anyone inherits.

Is there a deadline for applying for probate?

There is no fixed deadline for applying for probate itself. But if Inheritance Tax is due it must be paid by the end of the sixth month after the death or interest accrues, and an IHT400 must be submitted within twelve months, so tax deadlines effectively set the pace.

The waiting is mostly out of your hands. The part that is not is sending a complete, correct application first time, because the commonest cause of a long wait is a query letter about something that could have been right at the start. Here is what this estate needs, and what help getting it right will cost.

Sources

Checked 17 September 2026:

• GOV.UK, Applying for probate: Apply for probate — the 12-week figure, online versus paper, helpline and support contacts
• HMCTS, How to apply for probate by post if there is a will — up to 12 weeks, do not contact before then, helpline hours
• GOV.UK, How to value an estate for Inheritance Tax — valuing can take several months, deadlines
• GOV.UK, Pay your Inheritance Tax bill — the six-month payment deadline
• GOV.UK, What to do after someone dies — registering within 5 days
• GOV.UK, Tell Us Once — the 28-day window
• GOV.UK, Applying for probate: Fees — sealed copy costs

Ranges given for stages other than the official figures are general observations, not official statistics.

Related guides

• How to apply for probate without a solicitor
• What is an excepted estate?
• What to do when someone dies: the first two weeks
• How much does probate cost in the UK?
• Who can apply for probate if there is no will?