The Office of Vital Records and Statistics, part of the Utah Department of Health and Human Services, holds birth records from 1905 to the present. Its birth certificate application carries the essentials on its first page, including a warning that it is a criminal violation to make false statements on the application or to fraudulently obtain a vital records certificate, and a note that certificates may also be ordered online.
The money is described as a search fee rather than a certificate price. Twenty two dollars buys the search and includes one certified copy, each additional copy ordered at the same time costs ten dollars, expedited processing adds fifteen dollars, and an amendment, where one is involved, adds five. All fees paid are non refundable. County health departments also issue birth and death certificates in Utah, which is the quicker route for anyone near one. Local offices that issue vital records appear on the Utah county pages.
- Twenty two dollars to search: the fee includes one certified copy and is never refunded.
- Ten dollars for extras: each additional certified copy ordered at the same time.
- Ninety days to fill a gap: where required information is missing, the request is closed with no refund if it is not supplied in that time.
- Records from 1905: the start of the state's birth register, with earlier events held elsewhere.
Written by SearchSystems.net from Utah's own systems: the Utah birth certificate application, the Office of Vital Records and Statistics, the office's page on ordering a vital record certificate, the office's birth records page, a county health department page on ordering a birth or death certificate, each read on October 15, 2026 by the SearchSystems editorial team.
The ninety day rule
Most states will simply return an incomplete application. Utah sets a clock instead, and prints it on the form: if required information is missing from the application, the applicant has ninety days to provide the missing information before the request is closed with no refund. That turns an omission into a deadline, and because the search fee is non refundable, a request abandoned after an office query costs the applicant twenty two dollars for nothing.
The practical answer is to work through the checklist on the form before sending it: the application fully completed, the payment ready with a cheque or money order payable to Vital Records enclosed for a postal order, and identification ready with a copy enclosed, chosen from the list the office publishes on the reverse of the form.
What the form asks
The identifying section asks for the full name on the certificate, the birth date, the birth city and county, the hospital or place of birth, and both parents' full names with their birth dates, with most of those fields marked as required. A separate question asks whether the certificate holder is still living, which routes the request correctly where the person has died. The applicant section asks for the relationship to the certificate holder, with boxes for self, parent, sibling, spouse, child, grandparent and grandchild, and an other box which requires documentary proof of relationship or legal need together with a description of it.
The applicant gives their printed name, telephone number, postal address and email address, and signs and dates the form.
Working out the fee
The form contains its own calculation block, which is the clearest statement of Utah's pricing. One search, non refundable, including one certified copy, is twenty two dollars. Additional certified copies are ten dollars each. Expedited processing, if wanted, adds fifteen dollars. An amendment fee of five dollars applies where an amendment forms part of the request. The total goes at the foot. Because the search fee stands alone, ordering three copies at once costs forty two dollars rather than sixty six, and returning later for a second copy costs the full search fee again.
Where to send it, and how to order online
Postal applications go to the office's post office box in Salt Lake City, with a physical address on North 1460 West for anyone attending in person, and the office publishes its telephone and fax numbers and an email address for enquiries. The form carries a scannable code for ordering a birth certificate online, which is the route the office highlights for speed. County health departments also issue birth and death certificates, and for a recent birth in a populous county that is usually the fastest counter, with its own published hours and fees.
Privacy, and who sees the application
Utah is unusually explicit about what happens to the data on the form. The department states that the information supplied will only be used by it to process the request, and that if necessary it may also be accessed by contractors who are part of its technical team, and it notes that the request cannot be processed without the requested information. The application also identifies the records series the data belongs to, which is the reference a requester would use if they later wanted to know how the state retains it.
For anyone cautious about handing over parents' names and dates of birth, that paragraph is the state's own answer.
Amendments and older records
The five dollar amendment fee on the form is for changes handled alongside a certificate request; larger corrections follow the office's own amendment process, with its own evidence requirements. For births before 1905 the state register does not help, and research moves to county and church material and to the state archives. For a birth in Utah that was never registered, the office's delayed registration route creates the record first, after which a certificate can be ordered in the ordinary way, at the same twenty two dollar search fee.
Questions about Utah birth certificates
Related Utah records
Utah's other records guides on this site are the Utah public records law guide for GRAMA, the Utah death records guide for the same office, the Utah court records guide for the judiciary's case search, and the Utah county pages for every county office.