When is your criminal record expunged?

Work out your date

Answer these questions and you will know which period in article 136.1 of the Criminal Code applies to you and on what date it is completed. The calculation runs in your browser: what you type into this calculator is not sent to any server and is not stored on your device. This is data about criminal convictions —a category covered by article 10 of the GDPR— which is why we only ask for options, a duration and a date: never your name, the offence or the case number. If you then write to us through the chat, on WhatsApp or through the booking form, that does reach the office: how we handle it is set out in our privacy policy.

For guidance only. It applies the objective periods in article 136.1 of the Criminal Code (consolidated text on the BOE, in Spanish) and the counting rule in 136.2, but it cannot know whether the sentence is genuinely recorded as served in the Central Register of Convicted Offenders, which is what decides the real date: it does not replace a lawyer's analysis of your case or a reading of your full criminal record history, and using it creates no professional relationship. This calculation concerns only the records held by the Central Register of Convicted Offenders: convictions for offences against sexual freedom or for human trafficking also have a separate register with a different period.

The periods in article 136.1

The law does not draw its distinction from the offence but from the penalty and its length. These are the five periods, word for word:

• 6 months · for minor penalties (point a)
• 2 years · for penalties not exceeding twelve months and for those imposed for negligent offences (point b)
• 3 years · for the remaining less serious penalties of under three years (point c)
• 5 years · for the remaining less serious penalties of three years or more (point d)
• 10 years · for serious penalties (point e)

Whether a penalty is minor, less serious or serious is decided by article 33 of the Criminal Code, according to its nature and its length: a prison term of three months to five years is less serious and above five years it is serious; a fine of up to three months is minor and above three months less serious; a driving ban is minor up to one year, less serious up to eight and serious above that.

And the condition that is not a period

Article 136.1 requires the periods to run without reoffending. A later conviction within the period undoes it: it is not a matter of waiting a little longer, but that the count stops working and has to be redone on the new situation.

When the clock starts

From the day after the sentence was fully served (article 136.2). Not from the date of the offence, not from the judgment, and not from the day a guilty plea was signed: those three are the confusions that bring people to the office convinced their time was already up.

If the sentence was suspended and the court granted the final discharge, the law counts backwards: it takes as the starting date of the sentence the day after the court order granting the suspension, adds the length of the sentence, and the expungement period runs from the day after that date. In practice this means that, by the time the final discharge arrives, a good part of the period —sometimes all of it— has already been used up.

Expungement and certificate are not the same thing

This is the second half of the enquiry, and the one that causes most misunderstandings when someone needs the paperwork for a job or a visa.

Expungement

This is the removal of the entry from the Central Register of Convicted Offenders. It is ordered by the Ministry of Justice, of its own motion, on application, or on notification by the court (article 136.1 of the Criminal Code and article 19 of Royal Decree 95/2009). It is applied for through the Ministry's electronic portal or in person using the official application form, and the maximum time to decide and notify is three months.

The certificate

This is a different document: it certifies what the register holds today. It is requested separately and carries its own fee, form 790 with code 006. Until the entry has been removed, the certificate will keep showing it, however long ago the article 136 period was completed. Hence the sensible sequence: first check that the period is complete, then apply for expungement, and only then request the certificate you need to hand over.

A nuance worth a conviction

Even where expungement has not actually happened, article 136.5 requires the judge or court to disregard records that should already have been removed. Article 80.2.1.ª says the same when deciding on a suspension: records that have been expunged "or that should have been" do not count. It is an argument to be raised in court, not a form to be filled in.

Sexual offences: a different register and a different period

Here the period is not the same and this calculator is of no use to you. Convictions for offences against sexual freedom and for human trafficking are also entered in a register of their own, the Central Register of Sex Offenders and Human Trafficking Offenders, which exists for a different purpose: it is not a penalty, it is a screening filter for access to professions and activities involving minors.

Its expungement regime is in article 10 of Royal Decree 1110/2015, as worded by Royal Decree 407/2024, and it distinguishes two situations:

• If the victim was an adult, or the person was convicted for acts committed while they were a minor, expungement follows the general rules of the register the entry comes from.
• If the victim was a minor and the convicted person an adult, the entry is not removed until thirty years have passed without committing another offence against sexual freedom or of human trafficking, counted from the day after the sentence was served.

And there is one effect that surprises almost everyone: in that second situation, expunging the record held by the Central Register of Convicted Offenders does not remove the entry in the sex offenders register. They are two separate removals. If this is your case, do not rely on the date this tool gives you: ask us.

Civil liability, after the 2015 reform

Until 2015, article 136 expressly required the civil liability arising from the offence to have been met before a record could be expunged, except where insolvency had been declared. Organic Act 1/2015 removed that requirement from the article: today, 136.1 speaks only of the criminal liability having been extinguished and of the period running without reoffending.

That does not mean leaving the civil liability unpaid is neutral. It still weighs in two ways:

• A fine is not extinguished until it is paid. If the sentence is still live, the expungement period has not started to run, and the date this calculator gives is not yours.
• Suspending the execution of a sentence requires the civil liability to have been met (article 80.2.3.ª), or at least an undertaking to meet it in line with the person's means. A breach there can end in revocation, and then there is no final discharge to start from.

Where all this comes from

The consolidated texts, so that you can read them yourself. They are on the BOE and they are in Spanish, which is where the consolidated text lives:

• Article 136 of the Criminal Code — the periods and how they are counted, in the consolidated text on the BOE.
• Article 33 of the Criminal Code — which penalties are minor, less serious and serious.
• Article 19 of Royal Decree 95/2009 — how entries are removed and the time limit for deciding.
• Article 10 of Royal Decree 1110/2015 — the Central Register of Sex Offenders and Human Trafficking Offenders.
• Application to expunge a criminal record — the procedure, on the Ministry of Justice electronic portal.
• Form 790 — the fee for the certificate, which is a separate procedure.