SmartWills is not a law firm. Each will is prepared through the SmartWills process and reviewed by UAE-licensed partner lawyers.

The decision that brings people here

Most people arrive at this page in the middle of something. A mortgage completes. A second child starts school. A colleague's father dies at home and the paperwork abroad takes eight months. Someone says the words "three registries" over lunch, and the evening disappears into comparison tables that put Dubai Courts in the last row with the word slow beside it.

What follows uses a worked example, invented for this guide. It is not a client, and not a case anyone handled here. It exists so that the timings and the conditions have a person attached to them.

Call her Elena. Forty-four, nine years in Dubai, finance director at a logistics company out near Jebel Ali. A two-bedroom flat in Al Furjan with most of the mortgage still running, a salary account, an investment account she opened offshore in 2019, and a seven year old daughter at school in Al Barsha. Her husband works here too. She is non-Muslim, so the register is open to her.

The flat is what moved her. A will made by a foreigner over immovable property in the UAE is governed by UAE law, whatever that will says about the law of home. Article 17(5), Federal Decree-Law 25 of 2025.

A Dubai Courts will has two halves and two clocks

This is the sentence the rest of the guide hangs from. The route is made of two halves that run on different clocks, and the word slow was only ever true of one of them.

The first half is preparation. Someone writes the English text, settles who the executor is and what happens to each asset, and has the Arabic produced and certified. That half belongs to the people doing the work. It can move in days or drift for a month, and the difference there is scheduling.

The second half is registration. The will goes onto the register, and the register belongs to the court. It moves at the court's pace, under the court's procedure on the day.

That structure also answers a question the comparison tables skip: why three registries exist at all. Article 6(a) of Dubai Law 15 of 2017 created a Register of Wills of non-Muslims at the Dubai Courts and a second one at the DIFC Courts. Abu Dhabi Judicial Department is a separate emirate's register. The choice matters after death as well as before it, because Article 29(a) allocates disputes by where the will was filed: "Depending on the place of registration of a Will, the Dubai Courts or the DIFC Courts will have jurisdiction to determine disputes related to that Will."

The bilingual point sits inside the first half. The Arabic governs, which means the translation is part of the instrument rather than a service bolted onto the end of it. A reader who takes nothing else from this page should take that: translation here is drafting, and it is finished before anything reaches a register.

People who call the route slow have hold of something real. The Arabic has to be settled before registration, and public accounts in 2026 still describe waiting on translation and appointment availability. Then that friction gets attached to the whole route, including the half a competent adult can schedule.

Elena's three working days

In recent SmartWills files, the draft and the certified Arabic translation were completed within a three-working-day window. Here is what a window like that has to contain.

Day one is mostly decisions. No English text can be written until Elena answers the things she has been putting off. Who executes the will. What happens to the flat while the mortgage is still running. Whether the offshore account belongs inside this instrument or is dealt with elsewhere. Who raises her daughter if both parents die in the same week. Article 8 of Dubai Law 15 of 2017 requires the will to nominate an executor and to state how the willed property will be disposed of, which is condition 3 of six. She names her husband, and her sister in Manchester as the alternate. That conversation is the day.

Day two is the Arabic. The English text goes to a legal translator and comes back certified. This is the step outsiders picture as a queue, and it is the step that decides what the will actually means, because Arabic is the governing text. Someone reads the two columns against each other: her daughter's name exactly as the passport spells it, the description of the title on the flat, the wording of what happens to whatever is left over. A translation that reads well in general terms can still be wrong about one specific asset.

Day three is signature and check. Article 8 requires the testator's signature, seal or fingerprint in the presence of two witnesses, and requires that the text carries no deletion, erasure, addition or insertion. So two people are in the room, and the pages signed are the pages filed. Condition 6 is that the fees are paid.

What did not appear on Elena's calendar in that period was a notary appointment. In recent SmartWills files, the process ran without one on the client's diary.

At the end of day three she has a finished bilingual instrument and a set of decisions she can explain to her sister. Registration has not started.

What the recent files support, and where they stop

One firm claim, one hedge, one calendar observation, one boundary.

The firm claim: in recent SmartWills files, the draft and certified Arabic translation were completed within a three-working-day window. That is historical evidence about completed work.

The hedge: in several of those files, the attested will came back inside the same window. Several means several. No percentage, no success rate and no service deadline sits behind that word.

The calendar: in those files there was no notary appointment on the client's diary. That describes what the client had to attend, and nothing beyond it.

The boundary: the registry controls its own work, the procedure in force on the day is the procedure that applies, and the next file keeps its own completion date. Recent files are not your file.

So the useful question is narrower than "how long does Dubai Courts take". Ask which stages the quoted window covered, whether the Arabic was certified inside it, what appeared on the client's diary, and whether the speaker is describing finished files or quoting a target. Those four questions separate an operating fact from a sales figure, whoever is talking.

Rules, procedures and fee reporting move. SmartWills tracks every rule change that touches your UAE will, dated.

The fee stays a range until filing

Dubai Law 15 of 2017 prints no figure. Article 32(a) provides that for its services under the Law the Dubai Courts "will charge the fees prescribed by a resolution of the Chairman of the Executive Council", and that resolution is where the live number sits. Publicly circulating figures cluster between AED 2,000 and 3,000, and they disagree with each other.

The honest formulation: treat AED 2,000 to AED 3,000 as a declared range for early planning, and rely on the amount confirmed at filing. A precise number copied from a comparison page written two years ago produces false certainty at exactly the moment Elena is working out whether the route is affordable this quarter.

For the wider bill, including the other government-fee figures used across the main UAE routes, see the full cost breakdown, government fees included.

Where Dubai Courts sits beside DIFC and ADJD

Three distinct registry choices, and a fast preparation window on one recent group of files is one input among several. The rest are structural: which instrument governs, which court hears a dispute about it, where probate runs afterwards. For Elena, the flat in Al Furjan and the Dubai Courts probate forum carry more weight than three days ever will. The route guide sets out which registry route fits which profile.

Who should put it back on the shortlist

Three situations. Someone who wants a bilingual instrument inside the Dubai Courts framework, with Arabic governing and probate through Dubai Courts, because that is a structural preference and should be judged as one. Someone whose file is time-sensitive, where a preparation window worth asking about changes the shape of a month. And the undecided file, where Dubai Courts was dropped early on a speed assumption that came from a table rather than from anything recent.

Then the people who should leave this alone. Anyone who has already chosen DIFC or ADJD for reasons specific to their own file gains very little by reopening the decision because one preparation window looks attractive. The governing instrument and the probate forum outlast the three days by decades.

Frequently asked questions

Is the Dubai Courts will only in Arabic?

It is bilingual. English and certified Arabic translation sit in one instrument, and the Arabic text governs. In recent SmartWills files, both the draft and the certified Arabic translation were completed within a three-working-day window.

What does it cost?

Figures circulating between AED 2,000 and 3,000 should be treated as a declared range. The Law itself sets no amount: Article 32(a) leaves the fee to a resolution of the Chairman of the Executive Council. Rely on the number confirmed at filing. For figures across the main registry routes, use the full cost breakdown, government fees included.

Do I have to appear in person?

In recent SmartWills files, the process ran with no notary appointment on the client's diary. Signature is a separate matter: Article 8 requires the testator's signature, seal or fingerprint in the presence of two witnesses. Confirm the current procedure for your own case at the time of filing.

Can I use this register if I am Muslim?

No. It is a register of wills of non-Muslims, and the first of the six conditions in Article 8 is that "the testator must be non-Muslim". The federal register set up under Cabinet Resolution 122 of 2023 carries the same condition.

How fast is a Dubai Courts will really?

The preparation half moved inside a three-working-day window in recent SmartWills files, and in several of those the attested will returned in the same window. The registration half sets its own pace, on the next file as much as on the last one.

How does it compare with DIFC and ADJD?

Each route fits a different file. Use the route guide on which registry route fits which profile. The recent timing result is one input in that decision, and not the heaviest one.

Last updated: 24 July 2026

Changelog: 2026-07-24: first published. 2026-07-26: rewritten for clarity, with no change to its legal content.

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