The rest of what we have written about Texas. Every figure is quoted from Texas’s own statute or its courts’ own published schedule, and carries the date we last checked it.
Free and low-cost divorce help in Texas
There is no public defender for a divorce in Texas, 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.
See a different stateTexas
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 Texas it is called Statement of Inability to Afford Payment of Court Costs or Appeal Bond. Form CB-CFFW-100-Guided (TexasLawHelp guided version). Asks the court to waive filing fees; whether fees are actually waived is up to the judge’s discretion (per Texas Access, txaccess.org).
- Ask whether your spouse can be ordered to pay your lawyer. In a suit for dissolution of marriage, the court may award reasonable and necessary attorney’s fees, court costs, and expenses, and may order these to be paid directly to an attorney, as the court considers reasonable. (Tex. Fam. Code sec. 6.708 (Attorney’s Fees, Court Costs, and Expenses))
- Check the statewide legal-aid portal. TexasLawHelp.org lists the program that covers your county and what it takes.
- Use the court self-help service. TexasLawHelp.org Guided Legal Forms / Court Basics. Free guided and fillable legal forms including divorce forms and the Fee Waiver (Statement of Inability to Afford Payment of Court Costs) Guided Form (CB-CFFW-100-Guided).
- Try the bar referral service. State Bar of Texas Lawyer Referral & Information Service (LRIS), plus locally certified referral services (e.g., Texas Lawyer Referral Service / txlrs.org, Lawyer Referral Service of Central Texas). Up to a 30-minute consultation for no more than $20 through State Bar LRIS. A separate Modest Means Program (referenced via the Texas State Law Library’s guide) offers reduced-fee legal services to income-qualifying clients.
Legal aid in Texas
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Lone Star Legal Aid | 72 counties in eastern and Gulf Coast Texas (incl. Houston area) | Serves people at or below 125% of federal poverty guidelines. |
| Legal Aid of NorthWest Texas | 114 counties across North and West Texas | Legal Aid Line: 1-888-529-5277. |
| Texas RioGrande Legal Aid (TRLA) | 68 counties in Southwest Texas | Free civil legal services; central toll-free line referenced by TexasLawHelp.org’s directory entry. |
Worth knowing about Texas
- Texas is unusual in having three large regional legal-aid nonprofits (Lone Star, NorthWest, TRLA) that together cover the whole state rather than one single statewide organization; TexasLawHelp.org is the shared statewide portal.
- Did not confirm a specific Texas law-school family-law/divorce clinic within the research budget; left null rather than guess (several Texas law schools run family-law clinics).
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 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 Texas divorce kit — forms, fees and deadlines
- Doing it without a lawyer
- Questions to ask a lawyer
- What divorce costs
- What two households cost