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In England and Wales an unmarried partner has no automatic right to inherit if there is no will, and may be left out of a will. Under the Inheritance Act 1975, a partner who lived with the person who died in the same household, as if married or in a civil partnership, for the whole of the two years before the death can ask the court for reasonable financial provision for their maintenance. A partner who falls short of two years may still claim if they were being maintained by the person who died. The claim is due within six months of the grant.
When an unmarried partner dies, the surviving partner can be left in a very exposed position. If there was no will, the intestacy rules give them nothing. If there was a will, it may not mention them, or may have been made long before the relationship began. The Inheritance (Provision for Family and Dependants) Act 1975 is the law that allows a surviving partner to ask a court for financial provision from the estate.
This page explains who qualifies, the two routes into a claim, the standard the court applies, the factors it weighs, and the time limit. For the Act as a whole — every category of applicant, the orders the court can make, and the Supreme Court's decision in Ilott — see our main guide to Inheritance Act 1975 claims. This page is information about the law, not advice on any individual situation.
This page covers England and Wales. The Act applies only where the person who died was domiciled in England and Wales, and it does not extend to Scotland or Northern Ireland (sections 1(1) and 27(2)). Scotland has a separate cohabitant's claim, noted at the end.
The Ministry of Justice's 2026 consultation states the current position plainly: "Cohabitants currently have no automatic right to inherit when a partner dies without a will". However long the relationship, and whether or not there are children, the intestacy rules pass the estate to relatives instead. See our guides on what happens if there is no will and intestacy rules for unmarried partners.
Some property may pass to a partner outside the will or intestacy — for example a home owned as joint tenants passes to the surviving joint owner. An Inheritance Act claim is about the rest of the estate, though section 9 also lets the court treat the deceased's share of jointly owned property as part of the estate available for provision (see joint tenants and tenants in common).
An Inheritance Act claim does not say the will is invalid. It accepts the will, or the intestacy, and asks the court to alter its effect. If the question is whether the will itself is valid, that is a different claim — see contesting a will.
Section 1(1)(ba) allows a claim by a person to whom section 1(1A) applies. Section 1(1A) applies if the death was on or after 1 January 1996 and, "during the whole of the period of two years ending immediately before the date when the deceased died, the person was living—
These words were inserted by the Law Reform (Succession) Act 1995 and later updated so that they apply equally to same-sex couples. Three points follow from them.
Both conditions, for the whole two years. The partner must have been sharing a household with the person who died and living with them as a couple, throughout the two years ending with the death. Living together as friends, as a carer or as a lodger is not enough on its own, however long it lasted.
A temporary interruption is not necessarily fatal. In Gully v Dix [2004] EWCA Civ 139, Mrs Gully and Mr Dix had lived together for about 27 years. Because of his drinking and threatening behaviour, she left the house on the advice of her daughter and her doctor, and he died about three months later. The Court of Appeal upheld the finding that she still qualified. The court looks at the whole two-year period and, where necessary, before it, "to discover what the established relationship between the parties was. If that relationship has come to an end, then of course the applicant will not satisfy the test during the whole of the relevant period. If, however, the relationship was merely suspended … the applicant can … satisfy the test" (paragraphs 17 and 18, approving the trial judge). A couple who had separated for good before the death would not qualify.
The court looks at the relationship as a whole. The Act does not define "household" or list what makes a relationship one "as if" married. The Ministry of Justice's consultation paper summarises the position under the Act: the court assesses the relationship "holistically by reference to factors such as shared residence, financial arrangements, mutual commitment and the public presentation of the relationship". Evidence of those things — a shared address, shared finances, how the couple presented themselves to family and friends — is what these claims are decided on.
A partner who cannot meet the two-year rule — because the relationship was shorter, or because they did not live together — is not necessarily without a claim. Section 1(1)(e) allows a claim by any person, not falling into another category, "who immediately before the death of the deceased was being maintained, either wholly or partly, by the deceased".
Section 1(3) says a person counts as maintained "only if the deceased was making a substantial contribution in money or money's worth towards the reasonable needs of that person, other than a contribution made for full valuable consideration pursuant to an arrangement of a commercial nature". That wording was substituted by the Inheritance and Trustees' Powers Act 2014 for deaths after 1 October 2014. Providing a home rent-free, or paying household bills, can be such a contribution. The question is the settled arrangement between the two, not a snapshot at the moment of death: the Court of Appeal in Gully v Dix approved the approach that a temporary interruption at the end of life does not defeat an arrangement that was otherwise continuing (paragraphs 12 to 16).
Because category (e) is only for people who do not fall into an earlier category, a partner who qualifies as a cohabitant under section 1(1A) claims under that category, not this one. Under section 3(4), in a dependency claim the court looks in addition at how long and on what basis the deceased maintained the applicant, how much they contributed, and how far they had assumed responsibility for the applicant's maintenance.
The Ministry of Justice's consultation paper also notes that a surviving cohabitant "may have a claim under the I(PFD)A 1975, regardless of duration or nature of relationship, if they can prove they were being maintained, either wholly or partly, by the deceased immediately before their death".
A surviving spouse or civil partner can claim whatever provision is reasonable in all the circumstances, whether or not needed for their maintenance. An unmarried partner cannot. Under section 1(2)(b), provision for a cohabitant or a dependant is limited to what "it would be reasonable in all the circumstances of the case for the applicant to receive for his maintenance".
The Supreme Court explained "maintenance" in Ilott v The Blue Cross [2017] UKSC 17. It "cannot extend to any or every thing which it would be desirable for the claimant to have. It must import provision to meet the everyday expenses of living" (paragraph 14). But it "is not limited to subsistence level" and the level "is clearly flexible and falls to be assessed on the facts of each case" (paragraph 15). The Court approved Browne-Wilkinson J's description in In re Dennis [1981]: payments which "enable the applicant in the future to discharge the cost of his daily living at whatever standard of living is appropriate to him".
Maintenance can be provided as a lump sum rather than regular payments, and it can include housing. The Supreme Court added that where housing is provided as maintenance, it is "likely more often to be provided by such a life interest rather than by a capital sum" (paragraph 15) — the right to live in a property for life, rather than owning it outright.
The standard is also objective: the court does not ask whether the person who died acted reasonably, but whether the result makes reasonable provision for the applicant (Ilott, paragraphs 16 to 18).
The court weighs the general factors in section 3(1), for every applicant:
For a claim under the cohabitant category, section 3(2A) adds:
The court takes the facts as they are at the date of the hearing (section 3(5)). It makes a single assessment in light of all the relevant factors; the Act does not say how much weight each carries (Ilott, paragraph 34). We have not found any official source that publishes the outcomes of cohabitants' claims, so this page does not suggest what a claim is likely to produce.
Section 4 says a claim may not be made more than six months after "the date on which representation with respect to the estate of the deceased is first taken out" — the grant of probate or letters of administration — except with the court's permission. For deaths after 1 October 2014, the same section also says "nothing prevents the making of an application before such representation is first taken out", so a claim can be made before a grant.
The six months runs from the grant, not the death. Negotiating with the family does not pause it. After six months the personal representatives are protected under section 20 if they distribute the estate, though property already distributed can still be recovered if an order is made. For the detail, see time limits for contesting a will. A standing search tells you when a grant is issued.
A caveat stops a grant being issued. GOV.UK describes it as a way to raise a dispute about who can apply for probate, whether a will exists, or whether it is valid; an Inheritance Act claim does not dispute any of these. See how to enter a caveat for what a caveat does. Many estate disputes are discussed with the help of a mediator; see mediation in estate disputes.
On 5 June 2026 the Ministry of Justice opened a consultation, A fairer end to relationships, which closed on 14 August 2026. Its part on death proposes, for England and Wales:
(The consultation also proposes a separate scheme for couples who separate, which would require three years of living together or a shared child. That three-year threshold is for separation, not for inheritance.)
This is a consultation, not a change in the law. The paper says "any legislation will be introduced when parliamentary time allows". As of September 2026 the rules on this page apply unchanged.
The Inheritance Act does not apply in Scotland. Section 29 of the Family Law (Scotland) Act 2006 lets a surviving cohabitant apply to court where their partner died without a will and domiciled in Scotland. The application must be made within six months beginning with the day of the death — not the grant — and any award cannot exceed what the survivor would have received as a spouse or civil partner.
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