CUBA · CERTIFIED TRANSLATION
Certified Translation of Cuba Documents for USCIS
Cuban civil documents are among the trickiest Caribbean records to translate for USCIS, because so many of them are handwritten extracts pulled from bound tomo (volume) and folio (page) registers held in one of the island's 168 municipal Registro del Estado Civil offices. Unlike much of Latin America, Cuba never joined the Hague Apostille Convention, so families cannot get an apostille — which makes a clean, USCIS-compliant certified translation the part of the process you actually control. Cuban names also carry two surnames (paternal then maternal) and married women keep their birth surnames, conventions that must survive intact so they match a client's passport. At Translation HelpDesk, our native-Spanish specialists read registrar handwriting and old abbreviations daily and reproduce every seal, tomo/folio citation, and marginal annotation exactly as USCIS expects.
Updated July 11, 2026 · Reviewed by Victor Luján, Founder — certified translations since 2018
DOCUMENTS FROM CUBA
Pick Your Document
Cuban Birth Certificate →
Cuban Marriage Certificate →
Cuban Divorce Decree →
Cuban Death Certificate →
Cuban Diploma →
Cuban Academic Transcript →
Cuban Police Record →
Cuban Single Status Certificate →
GOOD TO KNOW
Issuing Authority & Authentication
Civil records in Cuba are issued by the Registro del Estado Civil (Civil Registry), under the Ministerio de Justicia / MINJUS (Ministry of Justice) · official language(s): Spanish. Cuba is not a party to the Hague Apostille Convention, so Cuban documents cannot receive an apostille; they instead follow the consular legalization chain — legalized inside Cuba by the Ministry of Justice (MINJUS, which absorbed this function from the foreign ministry MINREX in 2025) and then by the appropriate consulate. Note that for a USCIS filing no apostille or legalization is actually required: USCIS asks only for a complete certified English translation with a signed Certificate of Accuracy meeting 8 CFR 103.2(b)(3).
Every document above is translated by a native specialist, reviewed by a second linguist, and delivered with a signed Certificate of Accuracy that USCIS accepts under 8 CFR 103.2(b)(3) — or we fix it free and cover your resubmission fee.
FAQ
Frequently Asked Questions
Does a Cuban birth certificate need an apostille for USCIS?
No. Cuba is not a member of the Hague Apostille Convention, so Cuban documents cannot receive an apostille at all. USCIS does not require legalization either — it requires a complete certified English translation with a signed Certificate of Accuracy meeting 8 CFR 103.2(b)(3), which is exactly what we provide.
My Cuban certificate is handwritten and hard to read — can you still translate it?
Yes. Many older Cuban Registro del Estado Civil entries are handwritten extracts from bound tomo and folio volumes. Our native-Spanish specialists decipher registrar handwriting and abbreviations daily, and if a word is genuinely illegible we mark it [ilegible] rather than guessing, which is how USCIS expects it to be handled.
How should Cuban two-surname names appear in the translation?
Exactly as written. Cubans carry a paternal and a maternal surname, and married women keep their birth surnames, so we reproduce names verbatim to match your passport and other filings. Mismatched or 'merged' names are a common cause of Requests for Evidence.
How much does translating a Cuban birth or marriage certificate cost, and how fast is it?
At $0.05 per word a standard Cuban birth or marriage certificate typically runs about $15–25 total and is returned in 24–48 hours. Every order is backed by our USCIS Rejection Pledge — if a translation is ever rejected for accuracy we fix it free and cover the resubmission fee — and you can request a free 250-word sample first by email at info@translationhelpdesk.com.