An electronic will is a will created, signed, and stored as a digital document, and it is legally valid only in the roughly dozen U.S. states that have passed their own statute authorizing one. There is no federal law that makes electronic wills valid nationwide, so whether you can execute one, how you have to sign it, and whether it will hold up at probate all depend on the law of your state.
Why Your State Decides
The Electronic Signatures in Global and National Commerce Act, passed in 2000, validated electronic records and signatures across most of commerce. Wills were deliberately left out. Section 103(a)(1) says the law does not apply to “a statute, regulation, or other rule of law governing the creation and execution of wills, codicils, or testamentary trusts.”1Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 USC 7003 – Specific Exceptions
That single carve-out is why electronic wills exist in a patchwork. A digital will executed perfectly in one state may have no legal standing in the state next door. To bring some order to this, the Uniform Law Commission approved the Uniform Electronic Wills Act (UEWA) in 2019 as a template statute for states to adopt.2Kentucky Legislative Research Commission. Uniform Electronic Wills Act The UEWA does not become law on its own. Each legislature has to pass it, and most that do modify the bracketed sections to fit local policy, especially on remote witnessing.
What Signing an Electronic Will Requires
The format rule sounds simple but rules out a lot: the document must be readable as text at the time of signing.3Uniform Law Commission. Uniform Electronic Wills Act Readable by a person, not by software parsing code. A scanned photo of a handwritten will does not qualify. Neither does a file stored as raw data that needs specialized software to decode. The will has to exist natively as a digital text document.
The signature itself can take many forms. Under the UEWA, “sign” covers any electronic symbol or process logically associated with the record, as long as the person intends to authenticate or adopt it.2Kentucky Legislative Research Commission. Uniform Electronic Wills Act A typed name works. So does a cryptographic digital signature. What matters is clear intent.
Witnesses
The UEWA requires at least two witnesses to sign in the presence of the testator within a reasonable time after watching the testator sign or acknowledge the will.4Wyoming Legislature. Uniform Electronic Wills Act The single biggest split among adopting states is what “presence” means. The UEWA brackets the words “or electronic,” leaving each state to decide whether witnesses can attend by real-time audiovisual technology or must be in the same room.
In states that allow remote witnessing, the platform has to support identity verification and real-time interaction. Witnesses usually confirm the signer’s identity through government-issued ID and knowledge-based questions, and the session is typically recorded as part of the will’s audit trail.
Making the Will Self-Proving
A self-proving will spares your estate the trouble of tracking down witnesses at probate. The witnesses’ sworn affidavits, made at execution, stand on their own. Under UEWA Section 8, an electronic will can be executed, attested, and made self-proving in one sitting if the testator and witnesses sign acknowledgments and affidavits before an officer authorized to administer oaths, and the officer’s certificate, under seal, is affixed to or logically associated with the electronic will.4Wyoming Legislature. Uniform Electronic Wills Act Skipping this step does not invalidate the will, but probate becomes considerably more complicated.
The Harmless Error Safety Net
Section 6 of the UEWA is an optional provision some adopting states include. It lets a court validate an electronic will that was not executed in perfect compliance with the formalities, if the proponent proves by clear and convincing evidence that the deceased intended the record to serve as their will.4Wyoming Legislature. Uniform Electronic Wills Act The evidentiary burden is high, and not every state has this safety net.
Where Electronic Wills Are Recognized
As of 2024, seven states plus the District of Columbia and the U.S. Virgin Islands had enacted the UEWA specifically. Several additional states authorize electronic wills through their own statutes, some of which predate the uniform act. The total keeps growing, but most states still do not recognize electronic wills at all.
Nevada
Nevada was among the first states to authorize electronic wills. NRS 133.085 requires the testator’s electronic signature plus at least one of three additional authentication methods: a biometric identifier such as a fingerprint or retinal scan, the electronic signature and seal of an electronic notary public, or the electronic signatures of two or more attesting witnesses. Nevada is notable for allowing biometric authentication as a standalone verification method, an option most other states have not adopted. The statute also requires a qualified custodian for the will to be self-proving.5Nevada Legislature. Nevada Revised Statutes Chapter 133 – Wills
Florida
Florida Statutes § 732.522 permits electronic signatures and allows remote witnessing through audio-video communication, but only when a notary public supervises the session as an online notarization. The witness must hear the signer acknowledge the signature, and the whole process has to comply with Florida’s detailed online notarization rules. Florida also treats any electronically signed instrument as “executed in this state” if the document states the signer intends to execute it under Florida law.6The Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 732.522 – Method and Place of Execution
Other Adopting States
Indiana, Arizona, Utah, and Colorado are among the other states with electronic will legislation. Indiana’s framework includes dedicated provisions covering execution, definitions, and the maintenance and transfer of electronic wills.7Justia. Indiana Code Title 29 Article 1 Chapter 21 – Electronic Wills Arizona has established its own statutory pathway.8Arizona Legislature. Arizona Code Title 14 Section 14-2518 Each state’s statute reflects its own choices on remote witnessing, custodian rules, and approved technology platforms, so anyone considering an electronic will needs to check the specific law in their state.
The Custodian and Why It Matters
An electronic will custodian is the person or entity responsible for securely storing your digital will and producing it when it is needed for probate. The UEWA itself does not include detailed custodian rules; states that want them add their own. Nevada and Florida both have robust custodian frameworks, and they illustrate what the role involves.
Under Florida Statutes § 732.524, a qualified custodian must be domiciled or incorporated in Florida. The custodian must use a secure system to store the electronic will along with associated records like witness affidavits and notarization documentation. Access is restricted to the testator, people the testator authorizes, the nominated personal representative after death, or a court order. Once the custodian learns of the testator’s death, they must deposit the will with the probate court, and they cannot charge a fee for that filing. During the testator’s lifetime, the custodian must provide a paper copy on request, with the first copy free.9The Florida Legislature. Florida Statutes 732.524 – Qualified Custodians
Nevada requires a qualified custodian to agree in writing to serve, and prohibits an heir or beneficiary from acting in that role.5Nevada Legislature. Nevada Revised Statutes Chapter 133 – Wills The neutrality requirement is there to prevent conflicts of interest from tainting the document.
The custodian carries real legal exposure. Under Florida law, a qualified custodian is liable for damages caused by negligent loss or destruction of the electronic will while it is in the custodian’s possession, and the statute is explicit that the custodian cannot contractually limit this liability.10Florida Senate. Florida Statutes 732.524 – Qualified Custodians That is what separates a qualified custodian from ordinary cloud storage. If the file is lost, the law puts the risk on the custodian, not on your estate.
How to Revoke an Electronic Will
Section 7 of the UEWA gives you two paths.
The first is to execute a subsequent will that expressly revokes the earlier one or is inconsistent with it. The new will can be paper or electronic.4Wyoming Legislature. Uniform Electronic Wills Act
The second is revocation by physical act, adapted for digital files. Deleting the file, destroying a flash drive, or using a custodian’s designated deletion mechanism all qualify. Printing a copy and writing “revoked” across it works. So does typing “revoked” on an electronic copy that has not been locked by notarization. The act must be intentional; accidental deletion does not revoke a will. If you direct someone else to do it, that person must be in your physical presence, not on video.
One trap catches people: sending an email that says “I revoke my will” is not a physical act performed on the will itself. It could potentially serve as a subsequent will if it meets all execution formalities, but on its own it does not revoke anything.
If You Move to Another State
Interstate recognition is one of the biggest practical concerns. Section 4 of the UEWA addresses it directly: an electronic will that does not comply with local execution rules is still valid if it was executed in compliance with the law of the jurisdiction where the testator was physically located at signing, or where the testator was domiciled at the time of signing or death.4Wyoming Legislature. Uniform Electronic Wills Act Most states also have general choice-of-law provisions in their probate codes that recognize wills valid under the law of the place of execution or the testator’s domicile.
The risk sits on the other side of that rule. If you execute an electronic will in an adopting state and then move to a state that has passed no electronic will legislation at all, the receiving state has no obligation to recognize a document format its own laws do not authorize. The safest move for someone who relocates is to re-execute the will under the new state’s laws, even if that means going back to paper.
Making Sure the Will Is Found
A will nobody can find is a will nobody can probate. Paper wills usually have a physical location: a safe deposit box, an attorney’s office, a filing cabinet. Electronic wills can sit on platforms, devices, or custodian systems your executor may not know about.
When a qualified custodian holds the will, the process is straightforward, because state law requires the custodian to deposit the will with the court once they learn of the death. The harder cases arise when no custodian was designated, or the executor does not know who the custodian is. Telling your personal representative which custodian or platform holds the will is as important as choosing witnesses and signing correctly.
For access to digital accounts more broadly, nearly every state has adopted the Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act, which gives executors and personal representatives legally protected access to a deceased person’s digital accounts, generally on presentation of a certified death certificate and proof of the fiduciary’s authority. Individual platforms also have their own post-death procedures, which vary considerably.