What a Maryland divorce actually costs to file.
Not a range, not an estimate, not a lawyer’s blog. Every figure below is traced to a statute, a court fee schedule, or a clerk’s own published page — and linked to it.
See a different stateMaryland
It costs $165.00 to file for divorce in Maryland. Below is where that money goes, what it does not cover, and what to do if you do not have it.
Worth knowing before you file. Two-thirds of the $165 is not really court money: the Schedule’s own footnotes disclose that $55 of it is a Maryland Legal Services Corporation Fund surcharge and $30 is a Circuit Court Real Property Records Improvement Fund surcharge, leaving about $80 as the actual docketing fee – so a divorce filer is funding legal aid and land-records digitisation. The practical trap is on the waiver: if the court denies a Request for Waiver of Costs, mdcourts.gov warns you have only 10 days to pay, and ‘if you do not pay the fee as required, your case will be considered to have been withdrawn.’
Where the money goes
Maryland does publish a partial breakdown, but only as two footnotes disclosing what is bundled INSIDE the single $165 figure, not as a full itemised list. The two surcharges ($55 MLSC Fund and $30 Real Property Records Improvement Fund) are printed; the $80 remainder is arithmetic on my part and is labeled as such above. Do not read the $80 as a published line item.
| Component | Amount |
|---|---|
| Circuit court initial filing fee for docketing a civil action (base portion)DERIVED BY SUBTRACTION, not published as a separate line: the Schedule states a single ‘$165’ filing fee carrying footnotes 1 and 2, and the footnotes disclose $55 and $30 of surcharge inside it. $165 – $55 – $30 = $80. The $165 total and both surcharge figures are printed; this residual base is not printed separately, and is flagged as such. Md. Rule / Schedule II.A.1(A) under Courts Article § 7-202 | $80.00 |
| Maryland Legal Services Corporation Fund surchargePrinted footnote 1: ‘Includes Maryland Legal Services Corporation Fund surcharge of $55.’ Schedule footnote 1 to Schedule II.A.1(A) | $55.00 |
| Circuit Court Real Property Records Improvement Fund surchargePrinted footnote 2: ‘Includes Circuit Court Real Property Records Improvement Fund surcharge – $30 for initial filing and $6 for reopened filings.’ Schedule footnote 2 to Schedule II.A.1(A) | $30.00 |
| TOTAL, complaint for limited or absolute divorcePrinted in the Summary chart as ‘DIVORCE – COMPLAINT FOR LIMITED OR ABSOLUTE $165’, payable to the Circuit Court clerk at filing. Schedule II.A.1(A); CJ § 7-202(e) | $165.00 |
Does it change by county?
No — the fee is the same everywhere in Maryland
CORRECTION TO A COMMON ASSUMPTION: the Maryland circuit court divorce filing fee does NOT vary by county. It is fixed statewide by the Schedule of Charges, Costs and Fees promulgated under Courts Article § 7-202, which applies ‘to court charges, costs, and fees in connection with all actions filed or pending in a circuit court’. Montgomery County’s own Circuit Court says so in terms: ‘The Montgomery County Circuit Court’s Filing Fees are based on the latest Schedule of Charges, Costs, and Fees to be charged by the Clerks of the Circuit Courts under Maryland Code, Courts and Judicial Proceedings, Title 7 … § 7-202’. Anne Arundel and Howard County circuit court pages likewise link straight to the statewide mdcourts.gov fee schedule rather than publishing their own. What DOES vary by county is (a) sheriff’s service fees, which the Schedule expressly leaves to statute and rule under CJ § 7-402 and lists only as ‘appropriate fee for service provided’, (b) court-designated mediator hourly rates set locally under Md. Rule 17-208, and (c) whether and at what price a co-parenting class is required. The county-specific entries that do appear in the statewide chart (Somerset, Carroll, Charles, Howard, Prince George’s) are alcoholic-beverage license-board appeals, not divorce.
What the filing fee does not cover
The filing fee is usually the smallest predictable number in a divorce. This is where the rest of the budget lives — and where “not published” appears most often.
Nothing extra to e-file
We looked for a portal fee and a card surcharge in Maryland and found neither published. That is not the same as a guarantee — clerks can charge for things they do not put on a web page — but there is no extra charge we can point you at. Whether you have to e-file at all is on the Maryland kit.
| Cost | Amount |
|---|---|
| Service of process by sheriff, per respondentThe statewide Summary chart lists ‘SHERIFF’S FEES – CIVIL ACTION’ with the amount given literally as ‘Appropriate fee for service provided’, paid to the sheriff (payee code 5). The Schedule itself confirms at I.B.1 that it ‘does not affect any charge, cost or fee set or required to be assessed by statute or rule’, citing sheriffs’ fees among the examples. So this genuinely varies by county and no figure is published centrally. Not estimated. Md. Code, Courts and Judicial Proceedings § 7-402; Md. Rule 2-603(b) | ‘Appropriate fee for service provided’ – no statewide dollar figure published |
| Parenting/parent-education class, if requiredMANDATORY IN AT LEAST SOME CIRCUITS, BUT NO FEE PUBLISHED. Baltimore County Circuit Court states: ‘In all cases involving contested child custody issues, parents are ordered to attend an online, six-hour Co-Parenting Class. The class must be completed prior to the mediation session.’ No price is published on that page, and no statewide co-parenting seminar fee appears on mdcourts.gov. So: mandatory where there is contested custody in that circuit, cost unknown. Not estimated. | not published |
| Court-ordered mediationCOUNTY-SPECIFIC, not statewide. Montgomery County Circuit Court: ‘In accordance with Maryland Rule 17-208, if the court designates the mediator, the parties pay the reduced hourly rate set by the court. The court rate for Track 2 and 3 cases is currently $200 per hour; the court rate for Tracks 4 through 6 is $250 per hour.’ If the parties pick their own mediator the court rate does not apply and they pay that mediator’s private rate. Its separate Custody Mediation Program ‘is free of charge, as long as the parties have an open case and they qualify’. Separately, the statewide chart prices a ‘REQUEST FOR MEDIATION’ at $50 – but that entry is the foreclosure mediation request fee under Schedule II.A.1(E), NOT divorce mediation, and should not be quoted as a divorce cost. Md. Rule 17-208 | Montgomery County: $200.00 per hour (Track 2 and 3 cases) or $250.00 per hour (Tracks 4 through 6), shared pro rata between the parties. Custody mediation: free. |
| E-filing or credit-card surchargeNot confirmed. No e-filing or credit-card surcharge appears in the statewide Summary chart or the Schedule. Montgomery County publishes only which cards it takes: ‘The Circuit Court accepts cash, money order, check payable to the Clerk of the Court, Discover, MasterCard and Visa for filing fees. We do not accept debit cards or American Express. Also, we do not accept credit card payments over the phone’ – with no surcharge stated. Not estimated. | not published |
| Motion to modify alimony, custody, support or visitation (post-judgment)Charged per request received. Worth knowing because most divorce filers hit this later. Schedule II.A.1(B)(2); CJ § 7-202(e) | $31.00 |
If you cannot afford to file
More people qualify than apply. If this section applies to you it is the most useful thing on this page.
Maryland has a way to file without paying up front
This is a normal court procedure, not a favor you have to plead for.
- Who qualifies: ‘The court will consider the MLSC Client Income Eligibility Guidelines in evaluating your request, although it is ultimately up to the court to decide whether or not to grant the waiver. The court may also consider other factors.’ No fixed income cut-off is published on the waiver page itself, so no numeric threshold is asserted here.
- What it covers: Prepaid court costs (the up-front filing fee) and, on a separate later request, open costs at the end of the case. Appellate costs and the cost of assembling the record on appeal are covered by separate forms (CC-DC-091, CC-DC-092).
- What to ask for: CC-DC-089 (Request for Waiver of Costs); CC-DC-090 (Request for Final Waiver of Open Costs); MDJ-008 (Notice Regarding Restricted Information) must accompany it. A Guide and File interview is available for CC-DC-089.
- How it works: File a Request for Waiver of Costs (CC-DC-089) together with the complaint, plus a Notice Regarding Restricted Information (MDJ-008). No fee is required at the time of filing. A judge reviews it and mails an order. If GRANTED, the clerk accepts the filing and opens the case; if DENIED, the fee must be paid within 10 days or ‘your case will be considered to have been withdrawn and no further action will be taken by the court.’ The waiver of PREPAID costs is decided at the start; a separate Request for Final Waiver of Open Costs (CC-DC-090) is decided at the end of the case.
What we could not find out
Open questions on this page
- The price of the mandatory co-parenting class – Baltimore County confirms parents ‘are ordered to attend’ a six-hour online Co-Parenting Class in all contested custody cases, but publishes no fee, and no statewide figure exists.
- Sheriff’s service-of-process fees – the statewide chart deliberately says only ‘Appropriate fee for service provided’ (CJ § 7-402), so there is no statewide number to report.
- Any e-filing or credit-card surcharge under MDEC – not published on the sources reached.
- The $80 base component is arithmetic (165 – 55 – 30), not a printed line item, and is labeled as derived.
- Mediation rates outside Montgomery County – each circuit sets its own court-designated rate under Md. Rule 17-208.
- A Prince George’s County cross-check – the county site returned HTTP 403.
- Sources we could not read: https://www.princegeorgescountymd.gov/departments-offices/circuit-court – HTTP 403. Not bypassed.
We would rather show you a blank than a plausible number. Everything above is a real limit on what Maryland’s own agencies publish, not an omission on our part.
How we know this
Every figure on this page came from a statute, a state court system, or a clerk’s own published fee schedule — never a law firm’s blog, a legal-forms company, or a fee aggregator. Where a state publishes no date on its fee schedule, we say so rather than implying the number is current. Where nothing is published, we leave it blank.
Court fees change, and they change without announcement. Confirm with your clerk before you write the check.
What people actually report paying
Everything above is the filing fee, traced to the statute. It is also the smallest number in a divorce. Here is the other side of it — and a warning about how to read it.
We read hundreds of public accounts from people who have been through it. Three findings held up across nearly all of them:
- The total is bimodal, not an average. Self-filers cluster around $300–$500. Anyone with two lawyers and a real disagreement clusters around $20,000–$30,000. Almost nobody reports the middle, so “the average divorce costs X” describes almost no actual divorce.
- Cost is driven by the other person’s conduct, not by how complicated your assets are. People with millions who agreed to split evenly reported paying filing fees only. People with one house and one child reported $45,000 because the case got dragged out.
- Every large surprise is a third professional. The guardian ad litem, the custody evaluator, the forensic accountant, the QDRO preparer — all billed separately from both lawyers, and often introduced by the court before anyone had budgeted for one.
These are anecdotes, not prices. People post about a divorce cost when the number shocked them, so the high figures are heavily over-represented and the ordinary divorce is nearly invisible. Every figure on the full page is labeled with how many people reported it.
See what people report paying →Know someone in Maryland staring at this number?
A straight answer about money is more useful than most advice, and it costs nothing to pass along. Nothing here asks for their real name, and nobody finds out they looked.
Now the part the fees don’t cover
The forms, the deadlines, the residency rule, and what actually happens next.
Or find someone to help
Maryland attorneys, mediators, CDFAs and therapists, credentials checked against the state’s own records. Nobody paid to be there.