Annulment & Declaration of Nullity in the Philippines

There is no divorce — there are two remedies

The Philippines has no general divorce law. For most Filipinos, a marriage is ended in court through one of two distinct petitions, and they are not interchangeable. A declaration of absolute nullity is for a marriage that was void from the very start. An annulment is for a marriage that was valid until a court sets it aside for a defect that existed when you married. Getting this distinction right is the first decision in the case, because it determines the ground you must prove and whether your right to sue can expire.

Two related remedies are often confused with these and are covered separately: legal separation, which divides property and living arrangements without dissolving the marriage bond, and recognition of a foreign divorce, which is available where one spouse is a foreign national.

Which remedy applies to you

The label on the petition follows the ground. If your marriage was void from the beginning, you file for declaration of nullity — and because a void marriage never existed in law, the action does not prescribe. The common grounds under the Family Code are the absence of a valid marriage license, a party below the marrying age, a bigamous or incestuous marriage, and psychological incapacity under Article 36.

If your marriage was valid when celebrated but defective for a reason listed in Article 45 — lack of parental consent for a spouse aged 18 to 21, unsound mind, fraud, force, intimidation or undue influence, incurable physical incapacity to consummate, or a serious and apparently incurable sexually transmissible disease — you file for annulment, and most of these grounds prescribe within periods fixed by law. A marriage that merely became unhappy is neither; the ground must have existed at the moment you married. Our commentary on annulment vs. declaration of nullity walks through the line in detail.

Psychological incapacity under Article 36, after Tan-Andal

The single most common — and most misunderstood — ground is psychological incapacity. In Tan-Andal v. Andal (2021) the Supreme Court reframed it: it is a legal concept, not a medical diagnosis, so expert psychiatric testimony is no longer required. That change is widely read as making annulment "easy." It did not. The incapacity must still be grave, must have existed at the time of the marriage (juridical antecedence), and must be proven by clear and convincing evidence — ordinarily the detailed testimony of people who observed the spouse over years. What changed is the kind of proof allowed, not the height of the bar. Read the full analysis in Psychological Incapacity Under Article 36 and the case study in Tan-Andal v. Andal.

What actually happens, in order

• Case build-up — facts, documents, and, for an Article 36 case, the psychological evaluation;
• Filing with the Family Court that has proper venue and payment of docket fees;
• Service of summons on the respondent — the single largest source of delay when the spouse is abroad or cannot be located, which then requires service by publication;
• Investigation by the public prosecutor for collusion, which the law requires in every case;
• Pre-trial, then trial — presentation of the petitioner and corroborating witnesses, and the expert where one is offered;
• Decision, then finality, then registration with the local civil registrar and the PSA.

The last step is the one people forget: the decision has no effect on your civil status records until it is annotated with the civil registrar and the PSA. Until then, for every legal purpose, you are still married.

Where you file

Venue turns on residence, not on where you were married. The petition is filed with the Family Court of the city or province where you or your spouse has resided for at least six months before filing. We handle filings across Metro Manila — see how it works from your city:

Quezon City · Makati · Pasig · Manila · Taguig / BGC · all locations

We also serve Metro Manila — Caloocan · Parañaque · Las Piñas · Muntinlupa · Marikina · Mandaluyong · Pasay · Valenzuela · San Juan — and the provinces bordering Metro Manila: Antipolo (Rizal); Bacoor, Imus and Dasmariñas (Cavite); and San Pedro and Calamba (Laguna).

Timeline and cost, honestly

Anyone quoting a fixed number of months is guessing. The realistic range for an uncontested petition is commonly one to three years from filing to a registered annotation, and the variables are specific: whether the respondent can be served personally or needs publication, how congested the branch docket is, whether the prosecutor finds an issue, and whether the State appeals the decision.

Cost is driven by the same variables plus the psychological evaluation, publication, and docket fees. We do not quote a single all-in figure before seeing the facts, because that is how clients end up with a bill that grows. Consultations are paid, and our fee structure is discussed openly at that first meeting.

Estimate your cost first

Our annulment cost calculator breaks the total into its actual components — attorney's fees, docket fees, psychological evaluation, and publication — so you can see what drives it before you speak to anyone. For a narrative breakdown, see How Much Does Annulment Cost in the Philippines? 2026 Price Guide.

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