Kentucky court costs
Kentucky probate filing cost: not published
KRS 64.012 is a statewide statutory schedule of county-clerk fees; recording a will or other probate document of five pages or fewer is $33.00. This is a recording fee, not the District Court opening cost, so the court filing fee itself is not published here.
No statewide figure is published. Sources reviewed August 9, 2026. Sources rechecked October 3, 2026. This page last revised .
What Kentucky statutes set in probate fees at a $100,000 estate
- Court filing: no current statewide amount; the next section says why.
- Personal representative: capped at 5% by KRS 395.150, on a base it defines, so it is not priced from the estate’s value; see the Kentucky executor fee page.
Statute text checked October 3, 2026: KRS 395.150.
Why Kentucky has no statewide figure
The statewide statutory schedule (KRS 64.012) is the county CLERK’s fee schedule — e.g., $33.00 to record a will or other probate document of five pages or fewer — which is a recording fee, NOT the District Court cost of opening the estate. KRS 64.012 does not set the District Court's opening cost, and this page gives no figure for it; ask the District Court clerk. Where the amount is set: KRS 64.012 (county clerk recording fees) for the recording charge; the District Court clerk / Court of Justice for the estate-opening cost..
What the Kentucky figure leaves out
The Kentucky caveats are listed once, on the Kentucky overview.
Other costs: probate cost lines.
Kentucky prices a will by the page, and exempts it from the surcharge
Kentucky’s recording costs sit in KRS 64.012(1)(a), a long list of instruments that share one price. Recording and indexing any of them — including, at subdivision w., a "Will or other probate document pursuant to KRS Chapter 392 or 394" — costs $33.00 "if the entire thereof does not exceed five (5) pages."
Above five pages the statute charges $3.00 for each additional page, but it writes an exception straight into the surcharge: the per-page charge applies to everything in the subsection "except any will or other probate document pursuant to KRS Chapter 392 or 394 under subdivision w. of this subparagraph, or any court-ordered name change pursuant to KRS Chapter 401 under subdivision x." A long Kentucky will therefore records for the same $33.00 as a short one. A separate $4.00 applies "for each additional reference relating to same instrument."
The $33 is split by statute rather than kept whole: $27 is retained by the county clerk, and $6 "shall be paid to the affordable housing trust fund established in KRS 198A.710," remitted within ten days after the end of the quarter in which it was received and accompanied by a summary report on a form prescribed by the Kentucky Housing Corporation.
This is a county clerk charge, not the District Court’s. It is the line that attaches to putting the will and probate documents on the public record, and it is separate from whatever the District Court collects to open the estate.
Source: KRS 64.012, read from the enacting state’s own official publication on 2026-09-17. Quoted wording is the statute’s; the surrounding explanation is this site’s reading of it and is not legal advice.
Sources rechecked October 3, 2026: Kentucky source list · how sources are checked · report a correction