Countries Where Gender Selection Is Legal

Last reviewed 2026-10-27

Non-medical sex selection is prohibited across most of the English-speaking world and most of Europe, and is not prohibited at federal level in the United States. The United Kingdom bars it by statute, Canada makes it a criminal offence carrying up to ten years' imprisonment, Australia prohibits it through national ethical guidelines backed by state law, and Ireland restricted it by statute in 2024. That is why the treatment is a travel decision for almost everyone who searches for it.

How to read this table

Nearly every page you will find on this subject gives you a list of countries with no sources attached, and the lists disagree with each other. So this table carries a fourth column saying how far we actually checked. We would rather show you a row marked unverified than pass off a guess as a finding.

Mark	What it means
primary	We opened the statute, regulation or official text ourselves and read the provision. The article number in the table is the one we read.
secondary	Taken from academic, professional-body or law-firm sources that cite the instrument. Consistent across sources, but we have not read the primary text.
unverified	We could not obtain a primary text and the available sources disagree. Treat the row as a question, not an answer.

Where it stands, country by country

Country	Non-medical sex selection	Instrument	Checked
United States	Not prohibited federally	No federal statute. Governed by individual clinic policy and ASRM ethics guidance.	secondary
United Kingdom	Prohibited	Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 1990, Schedule 2, para 1ZB(1) — a licence “cannot authorise any practice designed to secure that any resulting child will be of one sex.” Exception at 1ZB(3) for a particular risk of a gender-related serious disability, illness or condition.	primary
Canada	Criminal offence	Assisted Human Reproduction Act 2004, s.5(1)(e) — prohibits any procedure that would increase the probability of an embryo being of a particular sex or that would identify the sex of an in vitro embryo, except to prevent, diagnose or treat a sex-linked disorder. Penalties, s.60: up to C$500,000 and ten years on indictment.	primary
Australia	Prohibited	NHMRC Ethical guidelines on the use of assisted reproductive technology (2017), ¶8.14.1, binding on accredited clinics; separately legislated in Victoria (ART Act 2008), Western Australia and South Australia.	secondary
Ireland	Prohibited (statutory, 2024)	Health (Assisted Human Reproduction) Act 2024, s.48 — permitted only where a specialist considers there is significant risk of a genetic disease on the Register of Genetic Diseases that affects one sex, or one sex significantly more. ⚠️ Commencement was still outstanding when last reported.	secondary
New Zealand	Prohibited (reported)	Human Assisted Reproductive Technology Act 2004 and ACART guidelines. We did not obtain the provision.	unverified
Türkiye	See the note below — not straightforward	ÜYTE Yönetmeliği, Resmî Gazete 30/9/2014 №29135 (as amended to 2023). Treatment is restricted to married couples (art. 19(2)). Art. 32 repealed the 2010 regulation, which did contain an express sex-selection ban.	primary
Northern Cyprus (TRNC)	Contested — see the investigation below	Clinics there market it openly. A TRNC regulation, reported as art. 22, is said to prohibit preimplantation screening for sex selection except on medical grounds with board approval. We could not obtain the official gazette text.	unverified
Republic of Cyprus	Prohibited (non-medical)	Law on Medically Assisted Human Reproduction, 69(I)/2015. A different jurisdiction from the TRNC — do not read one across to the other.	secondary
Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria and most of the EU	Prohibited	National statutes, e.g. Germany's Embryonenschutzgesetz and Italy's Law 40/2004. Measured search demand in these countries is close to zero, which is consistent with a settled prohibition.	secondary
India	Criminal offence, including advertising it	Pre-conception and Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques Act, 1994.	secondary
Mexico	No specific federal prohibition reported	No dedicated federal statute identified. Practice varies by state and by clinic.	unverified

Status as at October 2026. Reproductive law moves faster than clinical practice does, and a clinic's website is not evidence of the law where it operates. If a decision turns on this, take advice from a lawyer in the relevant country.

The United States: not prohibited is not the same as unregulated

There is no federal statute barring sex selection in the United States, which makes it the default destination for English-speaking patients and the most expensive one. But “legal” here means “left to the clinic.” Individual programmes set their own policy, and some decline non-medical sex selection on ethical grounds or will only do it for family balancing — where you already have at least one child of the other sex. Ask the specific clinic before you plan around it, because the answer is theirs to give, not the country's.

Canada is the strictest, and the reason surprises people

Canada does not merely prohibit choosing an embryo's sex. Section 5(1)(e) prohibits any procedure that identifies the sex of an in vitro embryo at all, outside the sex-linked disorder exception. In practice that is why Canadian patients who have PGT-A are often not told the sex of their embryos, a fact that routinely startles people who assumed it was simply withheld by convention. It also means the offence sits in criminal law, with penalties of up to C$500,000 and ten years on indictment, rather than in a professional code.

Türkiye: the prohibition is not where you would expect it

This is worth stating carefully, because clinics in the region trade on the confusion. We downloaded the current consolidated text of the Turkish assisted reproduction regulation from the government's own legislation database on 27 October 2026 and read it end to end.

The regulation in force is the one published in the Official Gazette of 30 September 2014, №29135, as amended through 2023.
Its article 32 repealed the earlier 2010 regulation — and the 2010 text was the one carrying the express sentence barring embryo selection and transfer aimed at determining a child's sex.
The word cinsiyet (sex) does not appear anywhere in the current consolidated text.
The current regulation does restrict treatment to married couples (article 19(2)) and bars donor gametes and surrogacy.

Do not read that as “sex selection is permitted in Türkiye.” We did not find an express prohibition in this instrument; that is not the same as finding permission. Other instruments, professional rules and Ministry practice may carry it, Turkish clinics do not offer the service, and the absence of a sentence in one regulation is a question for a Turkish health lawyer rather than a green light. We publish the finding because it is checkable and because every other page on the subject states a confident answer without having opened the text.

Northern Cyprus: the destination nobody can document

Northern Cyprus is the single most-advertised destination for this treatment in Europe, and it is the one row in our table we could not resolve. The sources split cleanly in two, and which side a source is on correlates with whether it sells the treatment.

What the source says	Who says it
Family-balancing sex selection is lawful there and routinely performed.	Clinics and medical-tourism agencies operating in or selling to the TRNC.
A TRNC regulation — reported as article 22 — prohibits preimplantation screening performed for the purpose of sex selection, with an exception on medical grounds subject to approval by a coordinating board. Some accounts date a restriction to autumn 2016.	A fertility-travel guide and a clinic site quoting the article; neither reproduces the gazette text.

We searched for the TRNC Official Gazette text in both English and Turkish and did not obtain it. Until we do, this site will not tell you that sex selection is lawful in Northern Cyprus, and it will not tell you that it is unlawful either. What we will tell you is what to do about it: ask any clinic there, in writing, to name the instrument under which it performs the procedure and to state whether a board approval exists for your case. A clinic that cannot answer that question in writing has answered it.

If you have that gazette reference, or a written answer from a clinic, send it to us through the contact form and we will publish the correction with the source. This row is the one we most want to close.

Does the law where you live follow you abroad?

This is the question people actually want answered, and the honest response is that it depends on your country and we are not able to give you legal advice. Most prohibitions in this field bind licensed providers operating in that country rather than patients who travel — which is precisely why cross-border fertility treatment exists at the scale it does. But that is a general pattern, not a guarantee, and a few countries draft more broadly. If your decision turns on it, pay for an hour with a lawyer in your own jurisdiction before you pay a clinic deposit. It is the cheapest line item in the whole exercise.

Which country is the most common destination for people from the UK?

The United States for those who can meet the cost, and Northern Cyprus for those who cannot — which is why the unresolved row above matters more than its length suggests. Measured UK search demand reflects exactly this split: `ivf cyprus` is by a wide margin the most-searched destination phrase in the British market.

Need the legal position for one specific clinic?

Tell us the country and we will tell you what to ask for in writing, what a good answer looks like, and what the warning signs are. If an introduction we make leads to treatment we may be paid a referral fee.

Ask about a country

Which countries allow IVF gender selection?

The United States has no federal prohibition and is the main lawful destination in the English-speaking world. Several other jurisdictions permit or do not prohibit it. It is prohibited in the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Ireland, India and most of the European Union.

Is gender selection legal in the UK?

No, other than for medical reasons. The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 1990, Schedule 2, paragraph 1ZB(1) prevents a licence from authorising any practice designed to secure that a child will be of one sex, with an exception where there is a particular risk of a gender-related serious disability, illness or condition.

Is gender selection legal in Canada?

No. Section 5(1)(e) of the Assisted Human Reproduction Act 2004 makes it a criminal offence, and it goes further than most laws by also prohibiting identifying the sex of an in vitro embryo except to prevent, diagnose or treat a sex-linked disorder. Penalties reach C$500,000 and ten years.

Is gender selection legal in Australia?

No, other than for medical reasons. The NHMRC's 2017 ethical guidelines on assisted reproductive technology prohibit non-medical sex selection at paragraph 8.14.1, and Victoria, Western Australia and South Australia legislate on it separately.

Is gender selection legal in Northern Cyprus?

We could not establish it. Clinics there advertise the service, while other sources cite a TRNC regulation prohibiting preimplantation screening for sex selection except on medical grounds with board approval. We were unable to obtain the official text and do not state an answer we cannot support.

Is gender selection legal in Turkey?

Turkish clinics do not offer it. The current regulation, published 30 September 2014, repealed the 2010 regulation that contained the express prohibition, and the word for sex does not appear in the current consolidated text. That absence is not permission, and anyone relying on it should take Turkish legal advice.

Can I travel abroad for gender selection if it is banned where I live?

Prohibitions in this field generally bind licensed providers in that country rather than patients who travel, which is why cross-border fertility treatment exists. That is a general pattern and not legal advice; take advice in your own jurisdiction before committing.

Sources

Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 1990, Schedule 2 (UK) — text read 27 October 2026 — link
Assisted Human Reproduction Act, S.C. 2004, c. 2, s.5 (Canada) — text read 27 October 2026 — link
Assisted Human Reproduction Act, s.60, penalties (Canada) — link
Üremeye Yardımcı Tedavi Uygulamaları ve Üremeye Yardımcı Tedavi Merkezleri Hakkında Yönetmelik, Resmî Gazete 30/9/2014 №29135 (Türkiye) — consolidated text downloaded from the Mevzuat Bilgi Sistemi and read in full, 27 October 2026 — link
Health (Assisted Human Reproduction) Act 2024, s.48 (Ireland) — link
NHMRC, Ethical guidelines on the use of assisted reproductive technology in clinical practice and research (2017), ¶8.14.1 — as cited in the Australian bioethics literature
American Society for Reproductive Medicine Ethics Committee — opinion on sex selection for non-medical reasons — link

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