Can Text Messages Prove Adultery in a Divorce?
Reviewed by Jacob Reed, founder of Verity ·
Short answer
Sometimes they help, but the first question is whether adultery matters in your divorce at all, and that depends on your state's law. The second is how you got the texts: messages you received, or that were sent to you, are yours to keep; going into your spouse's phone or accounts without permission can create legal trouble of its own and can backfire in court. Keep what you lawfully have, change nothing, and ask a family lawyer in your state before you act on it.
Finding the messages is painful. What you do in the next few days can matter more than the messages themselves.
Does it matter in your case?
States differ on whether fault plays any part in a divorce, in dividing property or in support, and on what has to be shown when it does. Only a lawyer in your state can tell you whether an affair changes anything for you. In custody, courts decide on the children's best interests, so an affair tends to matter only as far as it affects the children.
How you got them matters
- Messages sent to you, or that you received, are your own record. Export and keep them.
- Logging into your spouse's phone, email or cloud account without permission is a different matter; see is it legal to read a co-parent's messages?
- Messages that show up on a shared iPad or old phone raise the same questions; see an old device with access to iCloud.
- Your lawyer can ask for the other side's messages through discovery, the lawful route.
What to do now
- Don't confront by text in anger; anything you send becomes part of the record.
- Don't delete anything, yours or theirs, and don't forward private messages to friends or family.
- Write down what you found, where, and how, with dates.
- See a family lawyer before you file or say anything; see sending texts to your lawyer.
Keeping your own messages in order
Verity reads an export of your own conversations in your browser, without uploading it, and numbers every message in date order, so your lawyer gets the whole exchange rather than screenshots.
This is general information, not legal advice. Divorce law varies by state; ask a family lawyer where you live. If you are in danger, call 911; the National Domestic Violence Hotline is 1-800-799-7233.
Your own messages, in order
Drop in your export and read every message numbered in date order. It is read in your browser and is not uploaded.