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To mail documents for an apostille, send the original document to the authentication office of the state or country that issued it, with the office's request form, the fee, and a prepaid return envelope. The office verifies the notary or official who signed the document, attaches the apostille certificate, and mails it back to you.
An apostille is a certificate that proves a document is genuine, so that a foreign country will accept it without further checks. It comes from the Hague Apostille Convention, a treaty that more than 120 countries have joined. The apostille does not say the contents of your document are true, only that the signature, seal, and authority of the person who signed it are real. A birth certificate, a diploma, a power of attorney, or a business document can all carry one.
Countries outside the treaty need a longer chain instead, usually called authentication and legalization, which runs through the foreign ministry and then the destination country's embassy. If your destination country is not a treaty member, an apostille alone will not be accepted, so confirm the destination before you mail anything.
In the United States, apostilles for state-issued documents come from the Secretary of State of the state where the document was issued or notarized, not the state where you live now. A document notarized in Texas goes to the Texas Secretary of State, even if you now live in Ohio. Federal documents, like FBI background checks, go to the US Department of State's authentication office instead. Sending a document to the wrong state's office is the most common delay in this process, and the office will return it unprocessed.
In Canada, authentication is handled federally by Global Affairs Canada, and by some provincial authorities for documents issued in that province. Check the destination country's requirements too: some countries want the apostille on the original document, while others accept it on a certified copy.
| Document type | Where to mail it |
|---|---|
| US state document or notarized paper | Secretary of State of the issuing state |
| US federal document | US Department of State authentication office |
| Canadian document | Global Affairs Canada or the issuing province's authority |
| Document for a non-treaty country | Authentication plus embassy legalization, not an apostille alone |
Keep a full copy of everything before you seal the envelope, including the request form. If the package goes missing, that copy is what lets you rebuild the request without starting from scratch.
Processing time varies widely by office and by season, from a few business days to several weeks. Mailed requests are slower than walk-in requests, and offices that receive a surge of student or immigration documents in summer and autumn run longer. Use a tracked service for both directions, and keep the tracking numbers with your copy of the request. Some offices offer an online status check by a reference number printed on your receipt, which is worth asking about when you mail the package.
If the office finds a problem, like a notary whose commission is not on file, it returns the document with a letter explaining the gap. Fix that gap and resend: a rejection is a paperwork problem, not a refusal of the document itself.
The apostille is a separate page attached to your document, or a stamp and certificate on the document itself, depending on the office. Do not detach it. A document and its apostille are a single unit, and separating them breaks the chain that the receiving country checks. Make copies of the finished pair for your records, then send the original pair on to the foreign office, employer, or school that asked for it, again by a tracked service.
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