Guides · 2026-09-09
Most civil registries issue more than one version of the same record, and the difference is not cosmetic. One version carries the later history of the person; the other does not. Applications are refused over this, and the translation is entirely innocent — the wrong document was ordered before anyone translated anything.
| Country | Abridged | Full |
|---|---|---|
| Poland | odpis skrócony | odpis zupełny |
| Italy | certificato / estratto per riassunto | copia integrale |
| Spain | extracto | certificación literal |
| Brazil | breve relato | inteiro teor |
| Japan | 戸籍抄本 (koseki shōhon, one person) | 戸籍謄本 (koseki tōhon, whole register) |
| Germany | Geburtsurkunde | beglaubigter Registerausdruck |
| Romania | certificat | extras de uz oficial |
Civil registries do not usually issue a new birth record when your life changes. They write the change into the margin of the original entry. Marriages, divorces, adoptions, legitimations, recognitions of paternity, court-ordered name changes and corrections of clerical errors are all recorded as annotations against the birth record.
The abridged version prints the facts of the birth. The full version prints the birth and every annotation added since.
So if you are proving that a previous marriage lawfully ended, or that a name was legally changed, or that paternity was recognised, and you send the abridged version, the document is silent on precisely the point at issue. It is not wrong; it is answering a different question.
Look for a section for notes or annotations. In an Italian copia integrale it is headed annotazioni; in Polish records wzmianki dodatkowe; in Brazilian ones averbações; in Spanish notas marginales; in German Vermerke.
Two things to check:
A Japanese koseki has its own version of this problem: the shōhon is an extract for one person, the tōhon is the whole family register. If your application asks for the family register, an extract will not do.
Read your checklist for the exact wording. "Full birth certificate", "long-form birth certificate", "complete record" and "literal copy" all mean the full version. If it says that and you hold the short one, go back to the registry first — most now issue them online, and it is cheaper than translating twice.
If your checklist does not specify, the full version is the safer choice. It contains everything the abridged one does, plus the annotations.
We translate what you send, and we label it as what it is — Summary extract of the register entry and Full literal copy of the register entry are different headings in the finished PDF, so the officer reading it knows which record is in front of them rather than assuming. Marginal annotations are always translated; a translation that renders the main body and drops the margin can leave a reader believing a marriage or divorce never happened.
If you upload something and are not sure which version it is, the translated result will tell you — the labels and the annotation section make it obvious. If it turns out to be the wrong version for your filing, you will at least know before the officer does.