More on Arkansas

The rest of what we have written about Arkansas. Every figure is quoted from Arkansas’s own statute or its courts’ own published schedule, and carries the date we last checked it.

Changing your name back in Arkansas

Whether you can get your former name back in the divorce itself — and what it costs in Arkansas if you miss that moment.

A name going back to what it was An identity card with a photo and a name line, and an arrow curving back over the card to show the name being restored.
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The federal half is the same everywhere

Social Security, the passport, and the order to do them in are identical in all fifty states and are on the main name-change page. This page is the part that is Arkansas-specific.

Restore it in the divorceYesArk. Code Ann. Sec. 9-12-318 (Restoration of name)
After the decree is finalYes separate statutory name-change petition
Newspaper publicationNot required No newspaper publication requirement appears in Sec. 9-2-101 as amended by Act 331 of…
Background checkNo No fingerprinting and no criminal-history check is imposed on the petitioner. The state’s…
Separate petition fee$165.00Confirmed from an official schedule.
CourtCircuit Court of the county where… File in the circuit court of the county where you live. No minimum length of residence…
What do you need?
Restoring your name in the divorceIf the decree is already finalThe separate name-change petitionWhat catches people out in…Sources for this pageEvery state
6 sections on this page. Pick one, or show everything.
The short version5 points · tap one to jump to it
  1. Restoring your name in the divorce — Arkansas restores a former name through the divorce itself, under Ark. Code Ann. Sec. 9-12-318 (Restoration of name).
  2. If the decree is already final — Expect the standard civil filing fee (about $165) rather than a free amendment.
  3. The separate name-change petition — This is the route if the divorce route is closed to you, or if you want a name that is not a former one.
  4. What catches people out in Arkansas — Arkansas has a genuine safety exemption, and it is a sealing provision rather than a publication waiver.
  5. Every state
In this subject 6

Restoring your name in the divorce

Arkansas restores a former name through the divorce itself, under Ark. Code Ann. Sec. 9-12-318 (Restoration of name).

The Arkansas Judiciary’s own Domestic Relations Benchbook (2022) lists, among the required contents of a divorce decree, ‘Restoration of the wife’s previous name (Ark. Code Ann. Sec. 9-12-318).’ The operative statutory sentence we could not read on a primary source – see blocked sources – so it is not quoted here.

If the decree is already final

No primary Arkansas source found says whether a decree can be reopened to add a name restoration, so the reliably available route after the decree is final is the ordinary adult name-change petition in the circuit court of the county of residence under Sec. 9-2-101 (with Sec. 9-2-102 governing use of the new name). Expect the standard civil filing fee (about $165) rather than a free amendment.

Authority: Ark. Code Ann. Sec. 9-2-101 (Name change – Procedure)

The separate name-change petition

This is the route if the divorce route is closed to you, or if you want a name that is not a former one.

  • Statute: Ark. Code Ann. Sec. 9-2-101 (procedure); Sec. 9-2-102 (use of new name)
  • Court: Circuit Court of the county where the petitioner resides
  • Filing fee: $165.00
  • Residency: File in the circuit court of the county where you live. No minimum length of residence was found in any primary source.
  • Publication: No newspaper publication requirement appears in Sec. 9-2-101 as amended by Act 331 of 2023, nor in the Arkansas self-help materials reviewed. Sec. 9-2-101(b) requires only ‘a verified petition in writing embodying the reasons for the application.’ Arkansas’s post-2023 notice scheme runs to agencies, not to the public: the clerk delivers the unredacted order to the Arkansas Crime Information Center, Arkansas Driver Control, and (on request) the Division of Vital Records.
  • Background check: No fingerprinting and no criminal-history check is imposed on the petitioner. The state’s criminal-justice interest is served on the back end: Act 331 of 2023 requires the clerk to send the unredacted order to the Arkansas Crime Information Center and Arkansas Driver Control so records can be matched.

Official forms

What catches people out in Arkansas

Act 331 of 2023 rewrote the mechanics: the name-change order now must contain the petitioner’s prior name, date of birth, an identifier such as SSN or driver’s license number, and the new name – and ‘the clerk shall ensure that all of the identifying information within the case, other than the petitioner’s new name and prior name, is properly redacted.’ Expect to put sensitive identifiers on the petition.
The order is automatically transmitted to the Arkansas Crime Information Center and Arkansas Driver Control. A name change here is not quiet.
The Arkansas judiciary’s benchbook frames name restoration as a required part of the divorce decree, so a decree that omits it is arguably incomplete – worth raising with the judge before entry rather than after.
The $165 is the general civil filing fee under Ark. Code Ann. Sec. 21-6-403(b)(1); there is no separate cheaper name-change category, and county add-ons can push the real total higher.
Whether you get a hearing is county practice, not statute – some judges take it on the papers, others set a formal hearing.
Worth knowing

Arkansas has a genuine safety exemption, and it is a sealing provision rather than a publication waiver. As amended by Act 331 of 2023, Sec. 9-2-101 provides: ‘The court shall order the court file sealed upon clear and convincing evidence presented by the petitioner that the petitioner would otherwise be endangered.’ Note the burden – clear and convincing evidence – which is a high standard for a survivor to meet with documents.

Because Arkansas requires no newspaper publication at all, the publication-exemption question is moot; the real exposure is the public court file, which the sealing provision above addresses.

The section heading of Sec. 9-12-318 is ‘Restoration of name’ and it is framed in the judiciary’s benchbook in gendered terms (‘the wife’s previous name’). We could not verify whether the current statutory text is gender-neutral.

We cannot say whether the request must be made before the divorce is final, who can ask, whether the court has discretion, or whether a hearing is required, because we could not reach an official source carrying the operative text of Sec. 9-12-318. Arkansas’s official code is not published in readable form on the Legislature’s own site; the Bureau of Legislative Research Title 9 PDF returned only fragments.

Sources for this page

Sources we could not reach when this page was built, listed so you know what was not checked rather than assuming it was: https://www.arkleg.state.ar.us/Home/FTPDocument?path=%2FBLR+Publications%2FArkansas+Code%2FTitle+9.pdf – the Title 9 code PDF returned only a fragment (Sec. 9-2-101(b)); Sec. 9-12-318 was not retrievable from it; Arkansas has no free official online code viewer comparable to other states; law.justia.com and codes.findlaw.com carry Sec. 9-12-318 but are commercial aggregators and were not used

Found an error? Tell us — it goes on the corrections page with the date and how long it was live.

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Sources last checked30 August 2026
Page published30 August 2026
What this means. This is when the sources on this page were last read against their originals — statutes, court rules, official schedules — taken from the date this page was built from its sources. It is not the date the page was last edited. Adding a link or fixing a typo does not move it; re-reading the statute does. Law changes without notice, so treat anything time-sensitive as needing a fresh check. Where we get something wrong we publish it at thecusp.app/corrections with the date, what changed, and how long the error was live.