Florida: legal help you can afford
There is no public defender for a divorce in Florida, or anywhere else — the right to a free lawyer is a criminal-case right, and a divorce is a civil case. What exists instead is on this page, with the link to each one. Start with the fee waiver and the question of whether your spouse can be made to pay your legal fees, because those two are the ones people never think to ask about.
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The five things to try, in this order
Ordered by how much they are worth relative to how hard they are, not alphabetically.
- Ask about the filing fee waiver. In Florida it is called Application for Determination of Civil Indigent Status. If approved, filing and summons fees are waived; other costs/fees are not waived. There is a $50 non-refundable application fee to the clerk (Fla. Stat. § 57.082).
- Ask whether your spouse can be ordered to pay your lawyer. Allows the court, after considering the financial resources of both parties, to order one party to pay a reasonable amount for the other’s attorney’s fees, suit money, and costs, so each party has similar ability to obtain competent counsel. (Fla. Stat. § 61.16)
- Check the statewide legal-aid portal. FloridaLawHelp.org lists the program that covers your county and what it takes.
- Use the court self-help service. Florida Courts Self-Help Information / Family Law Forms. Florida Supreme Court approved family law forms (dissolution of marriage, alimony, timesharing, child support, etc.) for self-represented litigants.
- Try the bar referral service. The Florida Bar Lawyer Referral Service – Modest Means Panel. Modest-means clients get a free initial 30-minute consultation; panel attorneys charge roughly half their regular rate.
Legal aid in Florida
Legal aid organizations are funded to serve people under an income threshold, and family cases are one of the areas they most often take. Being turned down by one is not the end of it — the threshold, the caseload and the priorities differ by program and by month.
| Organization | Who it covers | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Legal aid organizations listed via Florida Law Help (e.g. Bay Area Legal Services, Legal Services of Greater Miami, Community Legal Services of Mid-Florida, Florida Rural Legal Services, Legal Services of North Florida, Three Rivers Legal Services, Coast to Coast Legal Aid of South Florida) | statewide, organized by regional LSC-funded provider |
Limited scope representation. You hire a lawyer for one piece — one hearing, one document, a review of an agreement before you sign it — and do the rest yourself. It costs a fraction of full representation and it puts a lawyer in the two or three moments that actually change the outcome. How it works, and where it is permitted.
What we could not confirm for this state
Listed rather than filled in. Every one of these is something we went looking for and could not stand behind.
- a single statewide fee-waiver form number, which in many states does not exist because each court uses its own
- a law school family law clinic we could confirm is currently running
If you know one of these and we have it wrong or missing, tell us and we will check it and credit the correction.
Compiled 31 August 2026 from each organization’s own site, the state courts and the state bar. Legal aid funding and eligibility change, sometimes mid-year. Always check the link before relying on anything here. Corrections welcome.
Keep reading
- The national picture — fee waivers, unbundling, fee awards
- The Florida divorce kit — forms, fees and deadlines
- Doing it without a lawyer
- Questions to ask a lawyer
- What divorce costs
- What two households cost