Record Atlas
23 FamilySearch collections · 2 archives · 676 places · 1498–1953

Belgium

Where the records of Belgium are, who holds them, and what it costs to look. 18,624,535 indexed records reachable through FamilySearch alone.

Where to start in Belgium

1 of the 2 checked sources here can be opened tonight. 1 needs a free account. 1is paid or part-paid. On top of that, 9 worldwide services reach Belgium without a subscription.

Write to Rijksarchief / Archives de l'État for what is not online. FamilySearch has 23 collections covering it, running 1498–1953, 18,624,535 indexed records. 2 pieces of this ground are mapped for jurisdiction, so the atlas can say whose archive held it in a given year.

676 places placed, 12 volumes walked. Open Belgium on the map, or tell us what is missing.

Whose archive this ground was

Record regions mapped in Belgium — which empire held the ground, and therefore which archive holds its paper.

The archives

  • Rijksarchief / Archives de l'État Brussels, Belgium

    The State Archives of Belgium, which hold the parish registers and the civil status registers for the whole country — the thing a Belgian search actually needs, and which this atlas was pointing at Geneanet for. WHAT WAS VERIFIED AND WHAT WAS NOT, on 23 Sep 2026: arch.be itself opens. Its genealogical search has moved to agatha.arch.be, which arch.be links to and which would not answer us at all — it completes a TLS handshake and then closes the connection, to a script and to a browser alike. The old host, search.arch.be, is retired and answers 200 for every path with an end-of-life notice, including the three URLs the State Archives' own «Search engines» page still links to. `account` is the class because consulting the scans requires a free registration; that is documented rather than tested here, and this note is the honest record of which.

  • Geneanet mixed

    Member-contributed trees and transcriptions, strongest in France. Much is free; a Premium tier gates some search and images.

And 12 worldwide providers reach Belgium too — the full list.

23 FamilySearch collections

Grouped by the ground each one covers, nationwide. A free account opens the images; some are restricted to a Family History Centre.

Belgium — nationwide 23

1 more collections, contributed

A directory David assembled, sorted by what kind of record each one is. Read this differently from the rest of the page. The descriptions are his, not an archive's catalogue, and nobody here has opened the volumes behind them. Every link was tried on 2026-09-20 and answered; the ones that did not are not listed.

Church and parish registers 1
  • State Archives in Belgium Primary Record Collection & Archival Series ↗ State Archives in Belgium 1700–2026

    Principal digitized record collection and archival series hosted by State Archives in Belgium. Free digitized Belgian parish registers and civil status registers. NOTE, 23 Sep 2026: search.arch.be has been retired. Every one of its URLs — including the three the State Archives' own «Search engines» page still links to — answers 200 with a static end-of-life notice, so a status-code check passes it. The genealogical search has moved to agatha.arch.be/search/genealogie/, which arch.be links to and which would not answer us; this row therefore points at the institution, which was opened and does.

Civil registration and vital records 1
  • State Archives in Belgium Primary Record Collection & Archival Series ↗ State Archives in Belgium 1700–2026

    Principal digitized record collection and archival series hosted by State Archives in Belgium. Free digitized Belgian parish registers and civil status registers. NOTE, 23 Sep 2026: search.arch.be has been retired. Every one of its URLs — including the three the State Archives' own «Search engines» page still links to — answers 200 with a static end-of-life notice, so a status-code check passes it. The genealogical search has moved to agatha.arch.be/search/genealogie/, which arch.be links to and which would not answer us; this row therefore points at the institution, which was opened and does.

676 places, 12 volumes

The 250 carrying the most collections are listed; 426 more are in Belgium and on the map. Every place lists them all.

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