Swiss inheritance law regulates who inherits in the event of death and how the estate is divided among spouses and other heirs. A will or inheritance agreement allows you to partially or fully modify the statutory succession.

What does an estate include?
Upon death, all assets, including debts—referred to as the estate—are transferred to the heirs. They form a community of heirs and can only manage the estate collectively. Division is carried out according to a marital property settlement. If the heirs cannot reach an agreement, the court makes the decision.

If you do not leave a will or inheritance agreement, the law determines who inherits. Your spouse is always entitled to a share. The inheritance rights of other family members depend on their degree of kinship, which is divided into three so-called “orders.”
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1st order: Children and grandchildren
2nd order: Parents, siblings, and their descendants
3rd order: Grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins

Distant relatives inherit only if no closer relatives are alive.

Order of succession
The order of succession is regulated as follows: If you leave relatives of the first order, i.e., children or grandchildren, only they and your spouse inherit, while all other relatives receive nothing. If you have no children, only your spouse and relatives of the second order—your parents, siblings, and their descendants—inherit. Relatives of the third order—your grandparents and their descendants—inherit only if there are no heirs of the first and second orders and your spouse has already passed away.

Inheritance shares
If there is no will or inheritance agreement, the size of the inheritance shares is determined by statutory provisions. How much your spouse receives depends on who else is entitled to inherit. If you have children, your spouse receives half of the estate. Your spouse receives three-quarters if the estate must be shared with relatives of the second order. If only relatives of the third order exist, your spouse inherits the entire estate.

Will
A will allows you to decide who inherits what, even beyond the statutory rules. For example, you can favor your spouse or include friends. A will can be amended or revoked at any time.

There are two possibilities:
- Public will: prepared by a notary or authorized official
- Holographic will: entirely handwritten, dated, and signed by the testator

Secure storage with a notary, bank, or trusted person is recommended.

Inheritance Contract
An inheritance contract is concluded between two or more persons and is legally binding. Married couples can use it to secure each other and establish binding arrangements for their estate. For the contract to be valid, it must be executed in the presence of a notary public.

Will or Inheritance Contract – What Do They Regulate?
Both instruments allow for individual solutions. However, certain statutory inheritance portions, known as compulsory shares, must be respected. You are free to dispose of the remaining, freely available portion as you wish.

Usufruct
If you only have joint descendants, you may, through a will or an inheritance contract, grant your husband or wife the usufruct of the entire estate instead of an ownership share. Usufruct means that while your descendants become the legal owners of the inherited assets, your husband or wife retains the right to manage the assets and benefit from their income until the end of his or her life.

The Regulation of the Division
With a will or an inheritance contract, you can also regulate the division in detail. For example, you may stipulate that a specific item should go to your daughter and another to your son. The value of these items will be credited to your daughter’s and son’s respective shares of the inheritance, unless you determine otherwise.

Consideration of Non-Shared Children
Children from a previous marriage or another relationship do not have a statutory inheritance right against a stepmother or stepfather. Anything a stepparent bequeaths passes to their own direct relatives. The situation is different only if the stepchildren are explicitly included in a will or an inheritance contract.

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