The Five Steps of the No-Fault Divorce Process in the UK (2026 Guide)

Step One: The Prerequisite Conditions

Before you can begin, two conditions must be met. You must have been married for at least one year, and the courts of England and Wales must have jurisdiction to deal with your divorce, which usually depends on where you and your spouse are domiciled or habitually resident. Jurisdiction is rarely an issue for couples who live in England or Wales, but it matters a great deal in international cases, where more than one country may be able to deal with the divorce and the order in which proceedings are issued can affect the outcome.

Step Two: The Divorce Application

The single ground for divorce is that the marriage has broken down irretrievably. Under no-fault divorce you no longer have to prove this by relying on one of the old facts such as adultery or unreasonable behaviour. You simply confirm in the application that the marriage has broken down, and that statement is treated by the court as conclusive evidence. This removed the conflict that the old blame-based system often created at the very start of a divorce.

You can apply on your own (a sole application) or together with your spouse (a joint application). A joint application tends to be smoother where the decision to divorce is mutual. The application is made online or by post, and the court fee is £628, payable to HM Courts and Tribunals Service. If you are on a low income or certain benefits, you may be able to reduce or remove the fee through the Help with Fees scheme.

Step Three: Responding to the Application

Once the application is issued, the next step depends on whether it was made jointly or by one spouse.

On a joint application, both of you acknowledge the application to the court. On a sole application, your spouse must complete an acknowledgement of service within 14 days, confirming either that they accept the divorce or that they intend to dispute it. It is sensible to take legal advice before responding.

Disputing a no-fault divorce is now very limited. Because no blame is involved, a spouse cannot object simply because they do not want the divorce or want to delay it. They can only dispute on narrow legal grounds, such as that the court does not have jurisdiction, that the marriage was never valid, or that it has already legally ended. If a spouse indicates they wish to dispute but does not file the required answer, the applicant can proceed.

Step Four: The 20-Week Reflection Period and the Conditional Order

You must wait 20 weeks from the date the application was issued before you can apply for the conditional order. This reflection period is built into the process deliberately, to give couples time to be sure of their decision and, importantly, to begin discussing and resolving their finances.

The conditional order (formerly the decree nisi) is the court’s confirmation that it sees no reason why you cannot divorce. It is the halfway point. It also matters for finances: the court cannot approve a financial order until the conditional order has been made, so this stage is often where the financial settlement comes into focus.

Beatrice’s Experience

The 20 week ‘cooling off’ period in the divorce process is a period of time where you can make good progress with the financial negotiations and ideally this should be utilised. Rather than waiting to be able to apply for the Conditional Order, we would strongly suggest engaging in financial negotiations sooner rather than later to move matters forward. Within the 20-week holding period, it is possible for financial disclosure to be exchanged, any necessary expert evidence can be obtained and there may even be opportunity for out of court dispute resolution to take place. There are parties who resolve matters before the Conditional Order has even been pronounced.

Parties who wait 20 weeks (i.e. 5 months) to begin financial disclosure and negotiations lose valuable time in bringing about a resolution. In addition, in some cases the financial landscape has changed over the course of those 5 months which can be unhelpful in terms of ascertaining the financial landscape as at the parties’ separation. Most parties benefit from concluding matters as soon as possible for reasons related to financial certainty and additionally so that they are able to begin the next chapter of their lives as soon as possible.

Step Five: The Final Order

After the conditional order, you must wait a further six weeks and one day (43 days) before you can apply for the final order. The final order (formerly the decree absolute) legally ends the marriage; this is the point at which you move from being married to being divorced.

There is an important word of caution here. It is often unwise to apply for the final order before your financial settlement is agreed and approved by the court. Ending the marriage can affect valuable rights, including some pension and inheritance entitlements, so in many cases the final order is deliberately delayed until the financial order is in place. This is one of the most common and costly mistakes people make when they handle a divorce without advice.

Beatrice’s Experience

Whilst clients are often keen to obtain their Final Order a soon as they can for understandable reasons, we would advise awaiting the sealed financial order from the court. I have had clients who have had spouses who were sadly not in good health. If they were to pass away before the financial order, but the Final Order in the divorce had already been obtained, then the pension rights would be lost along with the automatic inheritance rights that you have as a spouse of the deceased. You essentially would be in “limbo” in terms of losing all spousal rights but not yet having your financial claims settled as a former spouse.

How Long Does a No-Fault Divorce Take?

The minimum time for a no-fault divorce is around 26 weeks: the 20-week reflection period before the conditional order, plus the six weeks and one day before the final order, together with the time taken to issue the application and for each stage to be processed. In practice it often takes longer, usually because the finances take time to resolve and the final order is sensibly held back until they are. There is no such thing as a quick divorce under the current law; the waiting periods are fixed and cannot be shortened.

Your Divorce and Your Finances Are Separate

It is worth being clear that the divorce itself, ending the legal status of the marriage, is a separate process from resolving your finances and any arrangements for children. The £628 application deals only with the divorce. A financial settlement should be recorded in a separate financial order approved by the court, which is what makes it binding and prevents future claims. Treating the divorce as finished once the final order arrives, without a financial order in place, leaves people exposed, sometimes years later.

Beatrice’s Experience

The Final Order in the divorce legally ends the marriage and means you are divorced. However this is separate from resolving the financial claims that the parties have against one another as a result of their marriage. Being divorced does not mean that those financial claims are resolved or that the parties are barred from pursuing those claims.

Not having a financial order leaves parties exposed in terms of future financial claims. This could have unfortunate consequences in certain circumstances where the financial position of one of both parties significantly changes. By way of example, if one party were to inherit significant wealth, this may lead to the other party arguing that this wealth should be invaded by them on account of their “needs”. Whilst this would be an argument highly dependent on all the circumstances in the case, clearly it is better to have had the financial claims settled before any such events take place.

Getting the Process Right

No-fault divorce has made ending a marriage less combative and more administrative, but the stages, the waiting periods and the relationship between the divorce and the finances still need to be navigated carefully. Understanding the five steps, and in particular keeping the divorce and the financial settlement properly aligned, is the difference between a clean process and an expensive mistake.

At Payne Hicks Beach, our family team guides clients through every stage of divorce, from the application to the financial settlement. If you would like to speak to one of our team in confidence, we are here to help.