Can the Deadline to Contest a Will Be Extended in Texas?

By Paul Romano, Partner, Romano & Sumner, PLLC — Board Certified in Estate Planning and Probate Law, Texas Board of Legal Specialization.

Quick Answer

In Texas, you generally have two years from the date a will is admitted to probate to contest it (Texas Estates Code § 256.204). That clock does not start when the person dies, and it does not wait until you find out — it often starts running before you ever hear the will was probated. A few narrow situations can shift the deadline (fraud or forgery, a minor or incapacitated heir, and in some cases active-duty military service), but outside of those, two years from admission is the deadline.

Most people who ask us about will-contest deadlines have usually done some internet sleuthing, landed on two years, and done the calendar math. What trips them up isn’t the two years — it’s which day the two years start, and the fact that Texas runs two different deadlines, on two different clocks, at the same time.

The Short Version (Start Here)

If you only read one thing, read this. To contest a will in Texas:

You generally have two years from the date the will is admitted to probate — not from the date of death — to file your contest (§ 256.204(a)).
If you were a minor when the will was admitted, the clock doesn’t run against you while you’re a minor. You generally have until your 20th birthday (two years after you turn 18) to act (§ 256.204(b)).
If you were on active-duty military service when the will was admitted, that service time doesn’t count against you. Federal law (the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act, 50 U.S.C. § 3936) pauses the clock while you serve, so your two years effectively resumes after your service ends.
If the will was forged or fraud was used to get it admitted, your two years runs from when you discovered — or reasonably should have discovered — the fraud (§ 256.204(a)). But because a probated will is a public court record, courts often treat that as running from the admission date anyway. (This is the single most misunderstood point, and it’s covered in depth in the exceptions to the will-contest deadline.)

(That last point corrects a common myth. There is no rule that fraud gives you unlimited time “as long as you act quickly.” Fraud shifts the two-year clock’s start date; it does not remove the clock.)

How Long Do You Have to Contest a Will in Texas?

Two years. Specifically, Texas Estates Code § 256.204(a) gives an “interested person” — an heir, a beneficiary named in the will, a spouse, a creditor, or anyone else with a real stake in the estate (§ 22.018) — until the second anniversary of the date the will was admitted to probate to file a suit contesting it.

“Admitted to probate” is the key phrase. It means a court has already reviewed the will, accepted it as valid, and entered an order. That order is what starts your two-year clock — not the funeral, not the reading of the will, not the day you got a bad feeling about it.

When Does the Clock Actually Start — and Why It’s Often Already Running

Here’s where Texas quietly works against you. There are two separate deadlines on a will, and they start on two different events:

The four-year clock to probate a will starts at the person’s death. A will generally can’t be admitted to probate more than four years after the testator dies (§ 256.003).
The two-year clock to contest a will starts when the will is admitted to probate (§ 256.204) — which can be months or years after the death.

Because the contest clock starts at admission, not death, someone can probate a will fairly quietly, and your two years can be well underway before you even learn it happened. Texas law only requires the executor to send notice to beneficiaries named in the will after the will is admitted — generally within 60 days of the order (§ 308.002). By the time that notice lands in your mailbox, part of your two-year window is already gone. If you were left out of the will entirely, you may get no notice at all.

The practical takeaway: the moment you suspect something is wrong with a will, find out whether it has already been admitted to probate and on what date. That date is the one your whole deadline turns on.

Attorney Insight — Paul Romano

In our will-contest practice, the deadline mistake we see most isn’t what people expect. It isn’t clients who miscount the two years. It’s filings that were “sent” and never actually landed: a lost internet connection, a rejected envelope no one opened the confirmation email about, a “save draft” click instead of “submit.” E-filing is a real trap that way: the system generates an envelope the moment you start, but a submission you never actually transmitted has no filing date at all, and a submission the clerk rejects doesn’t save your date unless it’s cured within the clerk’s short cure window.*

Because the e-filing system copies everyone still on a case’s service list (including matters where our work wrapped up long ago), our inboxes stay full of rejection notices, most of them not even ours. That steady stream is exactly why we know how often filings bounce back, and how fast a cure window closes. When a rejection lands on a contest filing near the two-year deadline, the “we sent it” reflex is what turns a strong case into no case at all — the notice sits buried in the stack until the window is gone.

Find out on day 731 that the submission you were sure had gone through actually never landed, and it doesn’t matter how strong your case was. If you’re inside the last few weeks of your two years, treat the deadline as if it’s three weeks earlier than it actually is — and confirm the accepted status, not just the submission.

* Under Texas Rule of Civil Procedure 21(f)(5), an electronically filed document is deemed filed when transmitted to the filing party’s electronic filing service provider. A filing the clerk rejects can lose that transmission date if it isn’t cured in time — under Rule 21(f)(11) the clerk identifies the defect (wrong court, wrong fees, wrong cover sheet, formatting problem) and sets a deadline to resubmit in conforming form, and Texas courts have not been uniform on whether a corrected refiling relates back to the original date, which is the last thing you want to be arguing days from your deadline. Rule 21(f)(6) does allow the court to grant a reasonable extension for a true technical failure or system outage — but that relief has to be requested, it isn’t automatic, and it doesn’t cover human error like a submission that was never actually completed.

If you’re anywhere near your two-year deadline, don’t guess — call Romano & Sumner at (281) 242-0995, and we’ll confirm where you actually stand before the clock decides it for you.

Who Has to Prove What?

The deadline isn’t the only thing that turns on timing — so does the burden of proof, and it flips at the same milestone.

Before a will is admitted, the person offering the will has to prove it’s valid — that it was properly signed, that the person was of sound mind, and that it wasn’t revoked (§ 256.152).
After the court admits the will, the order creates a presumption the will is good. Now the person challenging it carries the burden, and has to prove it’s invalid by a preponderance of the evidence — more likely than not. Texas courts have applied this framework for decades (Croucher v. Croucher).

Most people don’t learn of a problem until after the will is admitted, which means they end up fighting from the harder side of that line. That’s not a reason to give up — it’s a reason to move quickly, so you can gather evidence while it still exists.

Can the Two-Year Deadline Ever Be Extended?

Sometimes — but only in narrow, specific situations, and each one turns on your facts:

Fraud or forgery. If the will was forged or fraud was used to get it admitted, your two years runs from when you discovered, or reasonably should have discovered, the fraud (§ 256.204(a)). The catch is the public-record rule: because the will and the order admitting it are open court records, you’re generally charged with knowing what’s in that file, so in practice this often still runs from admission (Mooney v. Harlin, 622 S.W.2d 83 (Tex. 1981)).
A minor or incapacitated heir. The clock doesn’t run against someone who was a minor or legally incapacitated when the will was admitted; their two years starts when that disability ends — turning 18, or having capacity restored (§ 256.204(b)).
Active-duty military service. Federal law pauses any civil limitations clock during a servicemember’s active duty (SCRA, 50 U.S.C. § 3936).

These exceptions are real but narrow, and telling a genuine one from wishful thinking is where people most often misjudge their own case. We walk through each of them, with the Texas cases and a worked example, in our guide to the exceptions to the will-contest deadline. This page is about the general deadline; that one is about the ways it bends.

What to Do If You Think Time Is Running Out

Find the admission date. Not the date of death, not the day you found out — the date the court admitted the will. Every calculation starts there. It’s in the public probate file.
Count from that date. Two years from admission is your working deadline unless a specific exception clearly applies.
Don’t assume an exception saves you. Fraud, minority, and military service can move the clock, but each has to actually fit your facts and be provable.
Preserve what you have — the will, any notices you received (with dates), medical records, anything showing what happened and when — before memories fade and records disappear.
Talk to a will contest attorney before you write off the deadline — or before you assume you still have plenty of time. Both mistakes are common, and both are avoidable.

How Romano & Sumner Can Help

We’re a Sugar Land probate, guardianship, and estate-litigation firm, and we handle will contests in the Harris County statutory probate courts, the Fort Bend County courts at law that hear probate matters, and the surrounding counties. When someone calls worried about a deadline, the first thing we do is pin down the admission date and tell them honestly whether they’re inside the window — and, if the window looks closed, whether a real exception might still be in play. That’s usually a short, free conversation, and it can save you from either giving up too early or spending money on a case the clock already decided.

If something about a loved one’s will is bothering you, don’t guess at the deadline. Call Romano & Sumner at (281) 242-0995 for a free consultation, and bring whatever paperwork you have. For the full picture on grounds, process, and cost, see our guide to contesting a will in Texas.

Our will-contest work is led by partners Paul Romano, Kenneth “Kenny” Sumner Jr., and Nicholas “Nick” Noe.

Frequently Asked Questions

How long do you have to contest a will in Texas? Generally two years from the date the will is admitted to probate (Texas Estates Code § 256.204). The clock runs from the court’s order admitting the will — not from the date of death and not from when you personally found out about it.

Does the deadline start when the person dies or when the will is probated? When the will is probated (admitted). Death starts a different clock — the four-year deadline to probate a will (§ 256.003). The two-year clock to contest a will starts only once the will is admitted to probate, which can be much later.

What happens if I miss the two-year deadline to contest a will? In most cases, the will stands, and you lose the right to challenge it, regardless of how strong your underlying claim was. A narrow set of exceptions (fraud or forgery, a minor or incapacitated heir, or active-duty military service) can extend or pause the deadline, but they have to genuinely fit your facts. If you think you may be past the deadline, talk to a will contest attorney before assuming the door is closed.

How long does a minor have to contest a will in Texas? A minor’s two-year clock generally doesn’t start until they turn 18, so they usually have until their 20th birthday to contest — or two years after a court removes the disabilities of minority earlier (§ 256.204(b)).

Is there really no deadline to contest a will if there was fraud? No — that’s a common misconception. Fraud or forgery changes when your two years starts (from discovery of the fraud rather than from admission), but it does not give you unlimited time. And because the probate file is a public record, courts often treat even a fraud claim as running from the admission date (Mooney v. Harlin, 622 S.W.2d 83 (Tex. 1981)). The details are in our guide to the exceptions to the will-contest deadline.

This article is for general informational purposes only and is not legal advice, and it is not a promise or guarantee of any particular result. Reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Every situation is different. For advice about your circumstances, speak with a qualified Texas attorney.