In 2006, the Spanish parliament passed Law 14/2006 on assisted human reproduction techniques, which in Article 10 expressly declared surrogacy contracts void — without legal effect regardless of whether the compensation was commercial or limited to covering expenses. Since then, any couple or single person in Spain who wants to become a parent through a surrogate has faced the same choice: give up on this path, or look for it outside the country. The Czech Republic — a member of the European Union and the Schengen area, with years of experience treating foreign patients in reproductive medicine — has become one of the destinations most often approached for exactly this reason.
The Czech Republic itself, however, hasn't chosen to explicitly permit surrogacy — it has chosen the silence of the law instead. What that actually means in practice, how surrogacy in the Czech Republic differs from egg donation, which is fully legal there and regulated by its own law, and what legal steps need to be taken before conception rather than after the child is born, is the subject of this article.
The Czech Republic has no dedicated surrogacy law — neither one that bans it nor one that permits it. The basic principle of Czech family law, set out in the 2012 Civil Code that came into force in 2014, is captured in a simple Latin phrase: mater semper certa est — 'the mother is always certain.' The law recognises as the child's mother whoever gave birth to them, regardless of whose egg was used at conception. That means a surrogacy agreement has no direct legal force on its own: under Czech law, the surrogate remains the child's legal mother at the moment of birth, whatever the contract with the intended parents says.
Only the altruistic model is permitted: a surrogate may be reimbursed for actual costs related to the pregnancy, monitoring and delivery, but not paid as for a service. In practice, the line between 'expense reimbursement' and 'payment' is drawn by the clinics and legal intermediaries themselves — which is exactly why choosing the right intermediary in the Czech Republic matters as much as choosing the clinic.
After the birth, a procedure called osvojení — adoption — begins, in its simplest and fastest form if all parties act in agreement. Within the period set by law, usually at least six weeks after birth, the surrogate gives her consent to hand over the child, after which the intended parents go through the adoption process via the child-welfare authorities and the courts.
If the child's genetic father is one of the intended parents — meaning his sperm was used — paternity can usually be established through a paternity acknowledgment, bypassing part of the adoption process. The genetic father's partner — spouse or otherwise — has to go through adoption either way to gain parental rights. For unmarried couples and single people, the procedure gets more complicated and depends heavily on the specific court district and family structure.
This process takes anywhere from several months to a year and requires being physically present in the Czech Republic at key stages — something worth factoring into travel and leave planning.
The difference between these two paths to parenthood in the Czech Republic isn't medical complexity — it's who physically carries the pregnancy. If a donor egg is fertilised and transferred into the intended mother's own uterus, she automatically becomes the child's legal mother from the moment of birth: motherhood is determined by the fact of giving birth, and she's the one giving birth. No legal complications arise here, which is why egg donation in the Czech Republic is covered by its own law and runs as a routine medical service. Surrogacy works differently: one person carries the pregnancy, and someone else is meant to raise the child — and a law built around the fact of birth, rather than genetics or intent, simply wasn't written for that situation.
The cost of surrogacy in the Czech Republic is made up of several separate line items, and the price differences between agencies and clinics are mainly explained by what's included in the package, not by differences in the quality of medical care.
Cost item
Approximate cost
IVF medical protocol (stimulation, retrieval, transfer)
€4,000–7,000
Donor egg, if used
€2,500–4,000
Surrogate compensation
€10,000–15,000
Legal support and the adoption process
€3,000–6,000
Agency programme coordination
€5,000–10,000
Full turnkey programme
€35,000–55,000
By comparison, a similar programme in the United States costs roughly two to three times as much, while Greece or Cyprus run 10–20% cheaper, though with noticeably less developed infrastructure for English- and Spanish-speaking clients.
Since surrogacy is banned in Spain itself, it's worth comparing the Czech Republic not just to the legal situation at home, but to other destinations Spanish-speaking patients actually turn to.
Country
Legal status of surrogacy
Spain
Banned: contracts are legally void under Law 14/2006
Czech Republic
Not covered by a dedicated law: a legal grey area, only the altruistic form is allowed, adoption is required after birth
Greece
Permitted for heterosexual couples and single women with a medical indication; requires prior court authorisation
Ukraine
Permitted only for married heterosexual couples who are not Ukrainian citizens
Georgia
Permitted for married heterosexual couples; relatively developed infrastructure for foreigners
United States (in some states, e.g. California)
Permitted, including commercial surrogacy; the most developed legal protection for intended parents
Mexico
Depends on the state; access for foreign nationals has been heavily restricted since 2021
Colombia
Not covered by a dedicated law; practised within general adoption rules
The most common and most expensive mistake is studying Czech law carefully and not studying the law of the country the family will return to with the child. Spain doesn't recognise surrogacy and won't automatically recognise a Czech adoption ruling or a foreign document on the child's parentage if it contradicts the mater semper certa est principle, which also applies under Spanish law. That means the genetic father can usually be recognised as a parent through a DNA test, while his partner can only become a legal parent through an adoption procedure carried out in Spain itself — which takes extra time and requires its own legal strategy, agreed on in advance, before the programme in the Czech Republic begins, not after coming home with the child.
Most surrogacy programmes in the Czech Republic follow the same sequence of stages, spread across 12 to 18 months in total — not just the medical part.
Stage 1. Matching with a surrogate and the legal team (1–3 months)
The agency offers several candidates based on medical indications, lifestyle and the intended parents' personal preferences. Not every candidate is medically suitable, and a good rapport doesn't always form on the first try — which is why this stage rarely takes less than a month.
Stage 2. Medical protocol: from stimulation to transfer (2–3 months)
If the intended mother's own egg or a donor egg is used, the protocol starts with standard ovarian stimulation and egg retrieval; the embryo is then cultured in the lab and transferred into the surrogate's prepared uterus. The success rate for the first transfer is roughly 40–60%, depending on the egg donor's age and embryo quality, so it's worth discussing with the clinic in advance what happens if the first attempt doesn't result in pregnancy.
Stage 3. Pregnancy and monitoring from a distance (9 months)
Intended parents usually spend most of the pregnancy in their own country, getting regular updates from the clinic and, by agreement, from the surrogate herself. That creates a particular feeling — depending on someone the intended parents barely know, in a situation they don't fully control — and it's worth talking about openly rather than treating it as an uncomfortable topic to avoid.
Stage 4. Birth, adoption and coming home (1–3 months)
After the birth, intended parents typically spend anywhere from a few weeks to a couple of months in the Czech Republic — exactly as long as it takes to file the adoption paperwork, obtain a Czech birth certificate, and handle the documents the child needs to leave the country.
Expectations vary enormously from surrogate to surrogate and from one set of intended parents to another. Some surrogates want photos and updates about the child for years after the birth; others prefer to end all contact as soon as the legal process is complete. Neither option is 'correct' by default — problems arise when the two sides' expectations don't match and were never discussed beforehand.
Good practice is to put preferences about contact in writing before the protocol begins, rather than leaving the question to 'see how it goes.' That applies not just to the period after birth, but to the style of communication during the pregnancy itself: how often the two sides check in, who attends scans, how quickly the surrogate reports any change in how she's feeling.
Law 14/2006 closed off the path to surrogacy inside Spain for Spanish families, but it didn't close off the path to parenthood — it simply moved it abroad, to places where the law either explicitly allows it or, as in the Czech Republic's case, simply doesn't ban it. The difference between those two formulations is small on paper, but it's exactly where the main source of both opportunity and risk lies for those who choose the Czech Republic.