Most people assume "getting something notarized" is one single thing you either do or don't do. It isn't. Kansas notaries perform several distinct notarial acts, and the two you'll run into constantly — acknowledgments and jurats — aren't interchangeable, even though the finished page can look nearly identical to someone who isn't looking closely. Use the wrong one, and a bank, title company, or court can bounce your document right back to you.
I get asked about this more than almost anything else, so let's get it sorted out properly.
The difference in one sentence
An acknowledgment confirms you appeared before the notary and admitted the signature on the document is yours, given freely. A jurat confirms you appeared before the notary, swore or affirmed that the contents of the document are true, and then signed it in the notary's presence. One is about the signature. The other is about the truthfulness of what's written.
Acknowledgments: the more common of the two
With an acknowledgment, you can technically sign the document before your appointment — what matters is that you personally appear before the notary and acknowledge, out loud, that it's your signature and you signed it willingly. This is the notarization attached to most:
- Real estate deeds and mortgage documents
- Powers of attorney
- Trust documents and certain estate paperwork
- Business formation documents, like LLC operating agreements
The notary isn't asking whether the document is true. A deed doesn't contain sworn factual claims the way an affidavit does — it just needs to be clear that the right person signed it and meant to.
Jurats: sworn statements under oath
A jurat is a different animal. Here, you're not just acknowledging a signature — you're swearing (or affirming, if you prefer not to swear on religious grounds, which Kansas law allows) that what's written in the document is true, to the best of your knowledge. Because of that, two things change: you must sign the document in front of the notary — not beforehand — and the notary administers a verbal oath first. You'll typically see a jurat attached to:
- Affidavits and sworn statements
- Statements submitted to a court
- Certain applications where you're certifying facts, not just identity
This is also why lying on a notarized affidavit is treated so seriously — you didn't just sign a piece of paper, you swore an oath to a commissioned public official that its contents were true. That's the entire legal weight a jurat carries, and it's worth taking that oath as seriously as it's meant.
A small but important detail: pre-signed documents
This trips more people up than anything else in my experience. If your document calls for a jurat and you've already signed it at home before your appointment, we have to ask you to sign again in front of us — a jurat legally requires the signature to happen after the oath, in the notary's presence. Acknowledgments are more forgiving on this point. If you're not sure which one applies to your document, it's simplest to just leave it unsigned and bring a pen you like.
What happens if the wrong one gets used
The notarial wording — the certificate language at the bottom of the page, or on an attached loose certificate — has to match what actually happened during the signing. If a document is notarized with acknowledgment language but the situation called for a jurat (or vice versa), the receiving party can reject it, and you'll need to redo the whole notarization. This is one of the most common reasons documents get kicked back — we cover the rest in our article on avoided rejections.
The good news: you don't have to figure out which one you need on your own. Most documents already specify the certificate language, and where they don't, we can tell within about thirty seconds of looking at what you've brought in.
How to tell which one your document needs
Look at the bottom of the page, or the last page, for a paragraph starting with something like "State of Kansas, County of ___." If it says the signer "acknowledged" the document, that's an acknowledgment. If it says the signer was "sworn" or the document was "subscribed and sworn to before me," that's a jurat. No such language on the document at all? That's common too — we'll attach the correct loose certificate based on what the document actually requires and what you tell us about where it's headed.
Bringing a document you're not sure about?
That's fine — most people aren't. Bring it as-is, unsigned if you can, and we'll sort out which notarization applies before you sign anything.
Where this fits into the bigger picture
Acknowledgments and jurats cover the large majority of what we do day to day, but they're not the only notarial acts Kansas notaries perform — oaths and affirmations, witnessing signatures, and certified copies exist too, each with their own narrow rules. You don't need to memorize any of it. That's the whole point of bringing your document to a general notarization appointment rather than trying to self-diagnose it — we handle the wording, you handle showing up with a photo ID.
A third act worth knowing: oaths and affirmations
Acknowledgments and jurats cover most of what comes across my desk, but Kansas notaries can also administer oaths and affirmations on their own, separate from notarizing a written document. This shows up less often in everyday practice, but it exists for situations like a sworn oral statement required before a proceeding, or a deposition where an oath needs to be administered before testimony is recorded. If you've ever seen a courtroom scene where someone is asked to "swear to tell the truth," that's functionally the same act a notary can perform outside a courtroom, for narrower purposes. Most people will never need this service specifically, but it's worth knowing it exists as a third category, distinct from either acknowledgments or jurats.
A worked example
Say you're signing an affidavit for a small-claims filing. You'll appear before the notary, raise your right hand — or affirm, if you'd rather not swear — state that the contents of the affidavit are true, and then sign it in the notary's presence. The notary then completes a jurat certificate, not an acknowledgment, because you swore to the truth of the contents, not just that the signature is yours. If instead you were signing a simple acknowledgment of a deed, you'd skip the oath entirely; the notary would just confirm your identity and that you're acknowledging the signature as your own.
Common questions
Can I choose to affirm instead of swear? Yes — Kansas law allows an affirmation for anyone who prefers not to swear an oath for religious or personal reasons. Both carry the same legal weight.
What if I don't know which one my document needs? Bring it in unsigned and we'll tell you — this is exactly the kind of thing a notary sorts out in the first minute of an appointment, not something you need to diagnose yourself beforehand.
A related but separate act: certified copies
While we're on the subject of notarial acts that get confused with each other, it's worth mentioning certified copies, since people sometimes ask for one thinking it's the same as an acknowledgment. It isn't. A certified copy is the notary confirming that a photocopy is a true, accurate copy of an original document — no signature, no oath, just a comparison and a certification. Kansas notaries can certify copies of some documents but not others; certain official records, like birth certificates, generally have to be certified by the issuing agency itself rather than a notary. If you need a copy certified, mention it specifically when you book, since it's a different process than either an acknowledgment or a jurat, with its own rules about what qualifies.