Changing your name back in New Hampshire

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

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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 New Hampshire-specific.

Restore it in the divorceYesN.H. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 458:24
After the decree is finalYes separate statutory name-change petition
Newspaper publicationNot required There is no newspaper publication requirement. RSA 547:3-i, I
Background checkYes No fingerprints and no routine criminal record check for an ordinary adult. But RSA…
Separate petition feeNot establishedWe could not confirm this from an official fee schedule, so treat it as indicative and call the clerk before you write the check.
CourtCircuit Court, Probate Division… The probate court has jurisdiction over the change of names of ‘persons who reside in the…

Restoring your name in the divorce

New Hampshire restores a former name through the divorce itself, under N.H. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 458:24.

“In any proceeding under this chapter, except an action for legal separation, the court may, when a decree of divorce or nullity is made, restore a former name of the spouse, regardless of whether a request therefor had been included in the petition.” (full text of the section)

How much choice the judge has: discretionary – the court ‘may’ restore, but it may do so even if no request was pleaded

Who may ask: the party changing the name

Not a now-or-never decision

New Hampshire does not require this to be settled before the decree is final.

If the decree is already final

RSA 458:24 ties the restoration to the moment ‘when a decree of divorce or nullity is made’, so once the decree has entered the documented route is a name-change petition in the Circuit Court, Probate Division. RSA 547:3, I(g) gives the probate court exclusive jurisdiction over ‘the change of names of persons who reside in the county and who apply therefor.’ Note that RSA 458:24 excludes legal separation – a legal separation decree cannot restore a name.

Authority: N.H. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 547:3-i; § 547:3, I(g)

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: N.H. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 547:3-i; jurisdiction under § 547:3, I(g); notice under § 550:4
  • Court: Circuit Court, Probate Division (county of residence)
  • Residency: The probate court has jurisdiction over the change of names of ‘persons who reside in the county and who apply therefor’ (RSA 547:3, I(g)). No minimum durational residency is stated.
  • Publication: There is no newspaper publication requirement. RSA 547:3-i, I: ‘The probate court may grant the petition of any person to change the name of that person or the name of another person. The court shall not require the petitioner to obtain consents to the name change. The court may proceed with or without notice, in accordance with RSA 550:4.’ RSA 550:4 is the ‘Cases Requiring No Notice’ statute, giving the judge discretion to proceed without notice. Service IS required in the special-category cases described below, but that is service by sheriff on agencies and prosecutors, not newspaper publication.
  • Background check: No fingerprints and no routine criminal record check for an ordinary adult. But RSA 547:3-i, II imposes a heightened regime on specific categories: a person who is incarcerated, on probation or parole; a person required to register under RSA 651-B as a sexual offender or offender against children who is no longer under DOC supervision; or a person convicted of a ‘violent felony’ (enumerated: capital murder, first and second degree murder, manslaughter, class A felony negligent homicide, first and second degree assault, aggravated felonious or felonious sexual assault, kidnapping or criminal restraint, class A felony arson, robbery, trafficking in persons) or a ‘crime against a child’ as defined by RSA 651-B:1, VII. Those petitioners ‘shall make a compelling showing that a name change is necessary’ and must serve the petition, pursuant to RSA 547:29, on the Department of Corrections and/or Department of Safety and on the initial prosecuting jurisdiction. Under RSA 547:3-i, III the prosecuting jurisdiction must make a reasonable effort to notify the victim (or the victim’s next of kin), who may appear personally, by counsel, or by written statement, and the judge may consider those statements. Probate form PB 18 adds that service is by sheriff and that the court will not schedule a hearing earlier than 30 days after service.

Official forms

What catches people out in New Hampshire

RSA 458:24 lets the divorce court restore a former name ‘regardless of whether a request therefor had been included in the petition’ – New Hampshire is unusual in not requiring the request to have been pleaded.
RSA 458:24 does not apply to a legal separation. If you only got a legal separation, the divorce statute cannot restore your name.
No consents are required for a name change (RSA 547:3-i, I says so expressly), and the court can proceed with or without notice.
Electronic filing is MANDATORY in name change cases in New Hampshire – self-represented people use TurboCourt.
Fee waivers are hard to get here: probate form PB 18 states ‘No court will waive fees in connection with a petition for change of name, except for good cause shown.’
Name changes go to the Circuit Court PROBATE Division, except when done as part of a divorce or adoption, which are Family Division.
Worth knowing

no DOMESTIC-VIOLENCE PUBLICATION EXEMPTION EXISTS IN NEW HAMPSHIRE – BECAUSE no PUBLICATION IS REQUIRED IN THE FIRST PLACE. RSA 547:3-i, I lets the court proceed with or without notice under RSA 550:4, and I found no newspaper-publication mandate anywhere in RSA 547 or RSA 550. I checked for a survivor-specific exemption and there is none to find, because there is nothing to be exempted from. I could not read Circuit Court Probate Division Rule 173 (courts.nh.gov returns 403 to automated fetching), so if any confidentiality or impoundment mechanism for name-change files exists, it would most likely be there or in the general court records rules – I could not verify one either way.

RSA 547:3-i was amended by 2024, ch. 29, ss. 1-2, effective July 30, 2024, which is when the violent-felony and crime-against-a-child categories and the victim-notice provisions took their current form.

I could not find the Circuit Court filing fee for a name-change petition on a primary New Hampshire court page (the judiciary’s name-change page covers e-filing only, and the rules pages are blocked to automated access), so the fee is null.

hearing_required is null: PB 18 shows a hearing is scheduled in the special-category cases, but RSA 547:3-i does not state whether an ordinary adult petition gets a hearing, and I could not read Rule 173 to confirm.

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.courts.nh.gov/rules-circuit-court-state-new-hampshire-probate-division/rule-173-name-change-actions

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.