Whether the documents you use to apply for admission to a degree programme have to be diplomatically certified (legalised) and translated, depends on the country in which you have completed your secondary-school certificate/ studies. The diplomatic legalisation must be made before the translation and has to be certified on the original documents. Only then you can apply for admission.

In the following table you will find the legalisation regulation ordered by country.

Translation

All for the application process necessary documents have to be translated (after the legalisation), if they are not issued in German or English. This translation has to be done by a court sworn translator after the documents were legalised, as the legalisation has to be translated as well.

Full diplomatic certification (= legalisation)

For a full diplomatic certification, you first require a national certification

• by the Ministry of Education and
• additionally by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (or in some countries Ministry of Justice)

of the country responsible for the issuance of the documents.

Last, the Austrian representation (embassy or consulate) responsible for the country of issuance of the documents has to authenticate these national certifications.

For some countries, this authentication by the Austrian representation is suspended. If that is the case, only the national certifications by the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Foreign Affairs are required.

Applicants from China (People's Republic) have to additionally present a certificate by the Academic Evaluation Centre (Akademische Prüfungsstelle - APS) of the German embassy in Peking.