West Virginia Name Change and Gender Marker Guide 2026

West Virginia handles legal name changes under Article 25 of Chapter 48 of the West Virginia Code. One statute covers both an adult changing their own name and a parent changing a child's name, and it does so in the same provision: a person may apply to change “his or her own name, or that of his or her child.” That is a genuine advantage over states that run two separate procedures, because a household planning more than one change works from a single set of rules.

The petition goes to the circuit court or the family court of the county where you live. West Virginia has 55 counties organized into 30 judicial circuits, and the filing itself happens at the clerk's counter, so your local circuit clerk is the source of truth on forms, scheduling and local practice.

The numbers that drive a 2026 plan:

Residency is the first thing to check. Under §48-25-101(a)(1), the petitioner affirms that he or she has been a bona fide resident of the county for at least one year before filing. The statute allows exactly one alternative: a nonresident of the county who was born in the county, was married in the county, and was previously a resident of the county for a period of at least fifteen years may still file there.

Both the circuit court and the family court have jurisdiction over name changes, and the choice is often made for you by local practice. Some counties route these petitions to the family court docket; others keep them on the civil docket of the circuit court, which matters because the fee schedule and the docketing are handled by the same clerk's office either way. Call the circuit clerk before you pay anything.

If you are assembling the filing yourself, our legal name change process checklist covers the document set courts expect to see at the counter.

The petition is a verified document: you sign it under oath, so every statement carries the weight of testimony. Section 48-25-101(a) requires the petition to set forth and affirm ten specific matters. Read them before you draft anything, because two of them operate as eligibility bars rather than formalities.

West Virginia's circuit court filing fee is set by statute rather than by county whim. Section 59-1-11(a)(1) charges $200 for instituting any civil action, statutory summary proceeding, extraordinary remedy, or “any other action, cause, suit or proceeding,” and directs $30 to the Courthouse Facilities Improvement Fund, $45 to the Fund for Civil Legal Services for Low Income Persons, and $20 to the domestic violence legal services account. The published county fee schedules we reviewed in Hancock, Putnam and Hardy counties each list a flat “Name Change — $200.00.”

That statewide consistency is worth knowing, because third-party name change sites quote West Virginia anywhere from $100 to $300. Those ranges do not match the statute or the county schedules. Treat $200 as the filing number and confirm anything else with your clerk.

If $200 is out of reach, West Virginia does waive fees, costs and security in civil and domestic cases. The Supreme Court of Appeals published an administrative order and financial guidelines effective January 1, 2025, and posts the financial affidavit form SCA-C&M201 along with a review motion SCA-C&M202 on its fee waiver forms page. The forms are usable in magistrate, circuit and family court. County schedules also note that fees and costs are not collected from litigants with an approved waiver — but that publication costs go to the newspaper directly, so a waiver does not cover them.

You can size the total with our name change cost calculator and screen your household with the fee waiver checker.

Section 48-25-101(b) requires the petitioner to publish a notice of the time and place of the application as a Class I legal advertisement, at least ten days before the hearing. The publication area is the county, and the notice must state the name the petitioner intends to use.

The phrase “Class I” is doing real work here. Section 59-3-2(a) defines the classes of legal advertising: a Class I legal advertisement is published one time, a Class II advertisement runs once a week for two successive weeks, and a Class III runs once a week for three successive weeks. West Virginia therefore asks for a single insertion, not a multi-week run.

Several national name change guides describe West Virginia as requiring three or four consecutive weekly notices. That is not what the statute says, and the difference changes your budget: one legal advertisement in a West Virginia paper typically costs far less than a four-week schedule. Plan for one insertion and confirm the quote with the newspaper that carries legal notices for your county.

The practical sequence is: file the petition, get the hearing date from the clerk, publish the notice at least ten days ahead, then file the publisher's affidavit of publication with the court before the hearing. The notice must also state that the hearing may be rescheduled without further notice or publication, which is why missing the publication step costs you the hearing date rather than merely delaying it. For how notice rules compare across states, see publication requirement explained.

West Virginia builds a privacy option directly into the publication rule. If the petition shows that the name change is being requested because the petitioner wants to protect their identity for personal safety reasons, the petitioner does not have to set out the new name in the published notice. Upon good cause shown, the court may also hold a closed hearing.

Two limits are worth stating plainly. Publication is not eliminated — a notice still runs; only the new name is withheld from it. And the safety finding is tied to the petition, so the request has to be made at the drafting stage, not after the notice has already appeared. If publicity is the main risk in your situation, work through the privacy-safe name change checklist and put the safety language in the petition itself.

The same statute shapes what the public sees afterward. Section 48-25-103 requires the court to be satisfied that no injury will be done to any person before it grants the change, and the order is then recorded under §48-25-104 in a public index held by the county commission clerk.

Publication exists to give people a chance to object. Section 48-25-102 lets any person who is likely to be injured by the change of name, or who knows of any reason the name should not be changed, appear at the time and place named in the notice and be heard in opposition.

At the hearing the court must be satisfied that the notice was published, that the matters affirmed in the petition are true, that no injury will be done to any person, that reasonable and proper cause exists, and that the change is not desired because of any fraudulent or evil intent (§48-25-103). The signed order is the deliverable; ask the clerk for several certified copies, because every agency downstream will want one.

One step gets missed often: §48-25-104 requires the petitioner to file a certified copy of the order with the clerk of the county commission of the county where they live. That clerk records it in a book kept for the purpose and indexes it under both the old and the new name, charging the same fee as for a deed. It is a second filing, in a second office, and it is what links your two names in the public index.

West Virginia's statute sets no processing deadline. Counties schedule hearings around the publication date, and third-party estimates cluster around six to ten weeks from filing to signed order. Treat any specific timeline as a local question: Verify with the court that will hear your petition.

West Virginia's restrictions are unusually explicit, and they appear twice in the code. Section 48-25-107 makes it unlawful for a person convicted of first degree murder, or of an offense under §61-2-14a for which a life sentence was imposed, to apply for a change of name for ten years after discharge from imprisonment or parole, whichever occurs later. It is also unlawful for anyone required to register with the State Police under article twelve, chapter fifteen to apply while that registration period is running, and for anyone convicted of a felony to apply while incarcerated. Subsection (d) makes a violation a misdemeanor punishable by a fine of not less than $250 nor more than $10,000, up to one year in jail, or both.

Section 48-25-103 states the same limits from the court's side: the court may not grant a change of name in those circumstances during those periods.

Then there is the affirmation that catches people by surprise. Section 48-25-101(a)(8) requires the petitioner to affirm that they are “not a convicted felon in any jurisdiction.” A petition signed under oath by someone with any felony conviction is not a truthful document, even if the conviction is decades old, non-violent, or from another state, and even if the person is not incarcerated. Guidance that reduces this to generic “restrictions may apply” language is not useful here. If you have a felony conviction on your record, talk to a West Virginia attorney before you sign anything.

The Division of Motor Vehicles handles this administratively with its own form, and no court order is required. Form DMV-99-RO, the Gender Designation Form, states that the DMV will change the gender designation on your driver's license or ID card once the form is fully and accurately completed. It expressly provides that the applicant is not required to have changed the gender designation on their birth certificate or other forms of identification first, and it directs DMV employees not to request additional gender-related information beyond what the form requires or to inquire about the applicant's private medical history.

The form has two parts. The applicant attests to the change and selects male or female. A licensed physician then certifies the applicant's gender identity, signing under penalty of perjury and providing a medical license number. There is no X designation available on the form, so a nonbinary marker is not an option on West Virginia credentials; our nonbinary X marker guide explains how people weigh a neighboring state's credentials instead.

What to bring to the counter: the completed form, any current state-issued license or ID card to surrender, the applicable application with the correct fee (form DMV-DS-23P for a standard driver's license or ID card, form DMV-CDL-1 for a commercial driver's license), and availability for a new photograph. The DMV forms index is where those documents live, and the form itself carries the current revision stamp.

Name changes on a West Virginia license are a separate track with a hard prerequisite. The DMV requires documentation of the name change and requires that the change already be reflected in your Social Security record. It also notes that name changes can be processed at any time, regardless of gender designation — which is why our Social Security name change guide starts one step earlier in the sequence.

Birth records are amended through the state Health Statistics Center rather than the courts. The agency's Corrections and Amendment Forms page sets out the two paths that matter here: an affidavit to correct a birth record for an adult, and a sex designation change that pairs a physician-completed Sex Designation Form with that affidavit.

Applications for corrections must be supported by documentary evidence: at least two original items established at least five years before the application, or within seven years of the event, each showing the full correct name and the date of birth or age. Marriage licenses, an expired driver's license or ID, a passport issued more than five years ago, elementary school enrollment records, military discharge papers and early childhood medical records are all on the agency's example list.

The fees are stated plainly. Amendments carry a $10 fee, with no fee for amendments made within the first year after the vital event, for court-ordered paternity, or for paternity affidavits submitted within the first year of birth. Each certified copy of the record is $12. The agency cites West Virginia Legislative Rule 64CSR51, Appendix D, effective July 1, 2023.

If you cannot produce the required documentary evidence, the agency's answer is a court order: petition a court in the county where you reside, or, if you are a nonresident, the Kanawha County Circuit Court, then send the certified order to the registration office. That is the point where a name change petition and a birth record correction reconnect.

Not every change needs a petition. Section 48-5-613 requires the court, on ordering a divorce, to allow either party who asks to resume the name used before the marriage, without a separate petition under §48-25-101. The court also issues a certificate of divorce reflecting the name change. That certificate must be no longer than one page, must be certified by a clerk of the court, and is notably not considered an order — a confidentiality carve-out that keeps the details out of the order file. It may be used for all lawful purposes, including as proof of a legal name change for driver licensing or a state identification card at the Division of Motor Vehicles.

Marriage works the other way. West Virginia has no statute dedicated to adopting a spouse's name, so the marriage certificate does the work administratively at the Social Security Administration and at the DMV. See name change after marriage and changing your name after divorce for the record-by-record sequence.

The order is the start of a chain rather than the end of one. Social Security comes first, because the West Virginia DMV will not process a name change on a driver's license until the new name is reflected in your Social Security record, and most other agencies then accept the sequence you have already established.

A practical order of operations for a West Virginia file:

West Virginia's 2026 Regular Session produced a bill that would have rewritten this page. House Bill 4171, titled “Gender identification on forms of ID,” was introduced on January 14, 2026 and referred to the House Committee on Health and Human Resources and then to Judiciary. It would have required medical documentation that an applicant had undergone gender reassignment surgery plus a court order declaring the applicant's gender designation in order to obtain a driver's license, identification card or instruction permit denoting a sex other than the applicant's sex at birth. It would also have amended birth record law so that sex at birth could be listed only as male or female and could not be changed on the record.

The Legislature's bill history page records a single action date for the bill: the January 14, 2026 referral. The bill did not advance, so the DMV gender designation procedure described above — DMV-99-RO with a physician's certification — remains the operative rule, and the physician-completed sex designation form remains the route for a birth record.

Two habits protect you here. Check the revision date on any state form before you rely on it, and never work from a cached copy: the DMV form currently in circulation is stamped “REV 07/21,” which tells you it predates the 2026 session. If a bill like HB 4171 passes in a future session, the change will appear first on the agency's form and fee pages, not in a blog post.

Q: How much does it cost to change your name in West Virginia? A: The circuit court filing fee is $200 under W. Va. Code §59-1-11(a)(1), and published county fee schedules list “Name Change” at the same $200. Add one Class I newspaper notice, the fee your county commission clerk charges to record the order under §48-25-104, and certified copies. A fee waiver can cover the court fee but not the newspaper's charge.

Q: Do I have to publish my name change in a West Virginia newspaper? A: Yes. Section 48-25-101(b) requires a Class I legal advertisement at least ten days before the hearing, in the county. Class I means one publication. If the petition states that you are changing your name to protect your personal safety, the notice does not have to include your new name, and the court may close the hearing on good cause.

Q: Can a convicted felon change their name in West Virginia? A: The petition itself requires an affirmation that the petitioner is not a convicted felon in any jurisdiction (§48-25-101(a)(8)). The code separately bars filing while incarcerated for a felony, while a sex offender registration requirement is active, and for ten years after discharge for first degree murder or certain life-sentence convictions (§48-25-107). A violation is a misdemeanor carrying a fine of $250 to $10,000, up to a year in jail, or both. Anyone with a felony record should get legal advice before signing.

Q: How do I change the gender marker on a West Virginia driver's license? A: Use form DMV-99-RO. You complete the applicant section, and a licensed physician completes and signs the certification section. The DMV does not require your birth certificate or other identification to be changed first, and its employees are directed not to ask for extra gender-related information. The form offers male or female only, and you will need to surrender your current card, file the applicable application with the fee, and have a new photograph taken.

Q: How long does a West Virginia name change take? A: The statute sets no deadline. The clock is driven by the newspaper notice, which must run at least ten days before the hearing, and by how quickly your county schedules a hearing date. Verify with the court where you file rather than relying on a general estimate.

Q: Can I get my former name back in a West Virginia divorce without filing a petition? A: Yes. Under §48-5-613, the court that grants the divorce must allow either party who asks to resume the name used before the marriage, with no separate §48-25-101 petition, and it issues a one-page certificate of divorce reflecting the change that the DMV accepts as proof of a legal name change.

Primary sources for this guide, all checked for 2026: West Virginia Code §48-25-101 (petition, residency, notice), §48-25-102 (objections), §48-25-103 (when the court may order a change), §48-25-104 (recordation of the order), §48-25-107 (unlawful change of name), §48-5-613 (divorce name restoration), §59-1-11(a)(1) (circuit court filing fees) and §59-3-2 (classification of legal advertisements). Agency sources: the West Virginia Judiciary fee waiver forms, the Division of Motor Vehicles forms index and form DMV-99-RO, the Health Statistics Center corrections and amendment forms, and the Legislature's HB 4171 bill history.

Not legal advice. This guide summarizes published West Virginia statutes and agency forms as of 2026. Fees, forms and local practice change, and courts apply the rules to individual facts. Confirm current requirements with your circuit clerk, the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources, or a licensed West Virginia attorney before you file.

Ready to price out the filing? Start with the name change cost calculator, then check whether a fee waiver applies to your household.