Marriage Biodata Format
A clean one-page marriage biodata: personal details, education and work, family, horoscope if you want it, and contact.
Details
marriage biodata formatRed highlights mark what is still blank. Everything stays on this device.
Personal details
| Name | [full name] |
| Date of birth | [date of birth] |
| Height | [height] |
Education and work
| Education | [qualifications, one per line] |
| Occupation | [occupation and place] |
Family
| Father | [father’s name and occupation] |
| Mother | [mother’s name and occupation] |
Contact
| Address | [family address] |
| Contact | [phone and email] |
What is a Marriage Biodata?
A marriage biodata is a one-page introduction a family sends to prospective matches: who the person is, what they studied and do, the family behind them and how to get in touch. It travels through relatives, community networks and matrimonial services, and is often all the other side sees before deciding whether to talk. Without one, details pass by word of mouth and shift with each telling; with a padded or careless one, talks stall or your number reaches strangers.
Parents usually prepare it, though many people now write their own. It goes out when a family starts looking: to relatives who know suitable families, to a community association that keeps a register, to a marriage bureau, or to a matrimonial website alongside the online profile. It is also what gets forwarded from phone to phone after a promising first call, and what the other family prints and shows to grandparents. Because several people read it over several weeks, it has to make sense without anyone there to explain it.
What goes on the page is set by the family and its community, not by any law, and it differs widely. Where families match horoscopes, the other side will expect rashi, nakshatra and gotra, or a full birth chart; elsewhere nobody asks. Whether to include community, religion or a horoscope is the family's choice, and each can be left out. If a matrimonial service holds the biodata, its privacy policy decides who can see it, so read it and check how to delete a profile. In the EU and the UK, data protection law also gives you rights over what the service holds.
A biodata is an introduction, not a record or a promise. Nothing on it is verified, so each family checks education, work and family details for itself before any commitment, and sending one commits nobody to anything. It plays no part in registering a marriage, which has its own documents. And it must never carry a dowry demand. The Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961 makes giving, taking or demanding dowry an offence, so partner preferences, and any covering message, should never mention dowry, gifts, cash or what the family ‘expects’ to receive.
What to put in a Marriage Biodata
These are the details this template asks for. Anything left blank is marked in red on the preview so you can see what is still missing.
| Field | What goes in it |
|---|---|
| Line at the top optional | For example a blessing or the family deity’s name. Leave blank for none. |
| Full name | To add a photograph, use “Add your logo” above — it places the picture at the top of the biodata |
| Date of birth | For example: 14 March 1998 |
| Time of birth optional | For example: 6:40 a.m. |
| Place of birth optional | For example: Guntur, Andhra Pradesh |
| Height | For example: 5 ft 4 in (163 cm) |
| Religion optional | For example: Hindu |
| Community optional | Include it only if you want to |
| Mother tongue optional | For example: Telugu |
| Horoscope details optional | One per line — for example rashi, nakshatra, gotra. Leave blank if not relevant. |
| Education | One qualification per line |
| Occupation | For example: Senior Data Analyst, Hyderabad |
| Annual income optional | Free text |
| Father | For example: Ramesh Sharma — retired government employee |
| Mother | For example: Lakshmi Sharma — school teacher |
| Brothers and sisters optional | One per line |
| Family address | For example: H.No 12-4-56, Brodipet 4th Line, Guntur 522002 |
| Contact | For example: Ramesh Sharma (father): +91 98480 00000 |
| About me optional | For example: Calm and family-oriented; enjoys Carnatic music, cooking and weekend treks. |
| Partner preferences optional | For example: Well educated and working, based in India or abroad. |
How to write a Marriage Biodata
Start with the top line and birth details
The line at the top is the family's choice: a short invocation such as a deity's name, or just the word Biodata. Give the full name as it appears on certificates. Write the date of birth in full, the time of birth as the family recorded it, with am or pm, and the place as town and State — ‘Guntur, Andhra Pradesh’, not ‘AP’. Give height in the unit families around you use.
Decide on religion, community and horoscope
These lines are optional, and a blank one is a decision, not a gap. If the families you are approaching match horoscopes, give rashi, nakshatra and gotra as your family records them, or say that a birth chart is available on request. If horoscopes play no part, drop the section rather than filling it with guesses. Add mother tongue, which helps when families from different regions are talking.
Set out education, work and income honestly
List the highest qualification first, with the college and city: ‘B.Tech in Civil Engineering’ and where you studied says more than ‘Engineer’. For occupation, give the role, the employer and the city. Income is the line most often inflated, so give a yearly figure or a range you would be comfortable having checked — ‘₹8–10 lakh a year’, as an illustration. A family that finds a padded figure rarely carries on.
Introduce the family and give a safe contact
Give the father's and mother's names with their occupations, or ‘retired’ with the former job. For brothers and sisters, say what each does and whether they are married. For the family address, the town and area are enough at this stage; the full address can follow once both sides are talking. For the contact, many families give a parent's number rather than the candidate's own.
Write ‘about me’ and partner preferences
Keep ‘about me’ to a few sentences about how you actually live: work hours, where you plan to settle, what fills your weekends, what matters to you at home. For partner preferences, name the things that would rule a match in or out — education, city, willingness to relocate, diet — and stop there. A long list of demands reads as rigid, and a line about dowry or gifts has no place on it.
Common mistakes
- Putting Aadhaar, PAN or bank details on a biodata, which gets forwarded far beyond the people you sent it to and hands strangers what they need for identity fraud.
- Rounding up height, income or job title, which comes out at the first meeting or the first enquiry and usually ends the talks there.
- Guessing the time of birth or getting am and pm wrong, so any horoscope matching is done on the wrong chart.
- Using an old, heavily filtered or group photo, so the first meeting starts with the other family feeling misled.
- Mentioning dowry, gifts or ‘a family that will do things properly’ in partner preferences, which puts in writing a demand the Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961 makes an offence.
Frequently asked questions
What should I write in a marriage biodata?
Cover five things: personal details (name, date, time and place of birth, height, and religion or mother tongue if you want them), education and work, family (parents, their occupations and siblings), a contact number, and a short ‘about me’ with partner preferences. Horoscope details are optional. Leave out Aadhaar, PAN and bank details, and consider giving a parent's number rather than your own. Everything on it should be something you are happy to have checked.
What is the format of a marriage biodata?
There is no fixed format, but most follow the same order on a single page: an optional line at the top, the name, personal details, horoscope details if used, education and occupation, family details, address and contact, then ‘about me’ and partner preferences. A photo usually sits at the top right or goes separately. Use headings and short label-and-value lines rather than paragraphs, so a reader finds the height or the job at a glance.
Should I include my horoscope in a biodata?
Include it if the families you are approaching match horoscopes, because they will ask for it anyway and may not go further without it. Give rashi, nakshatra and gotra as your family records them, with an accurate time and place of birth, or say that a full chart is available on request. If horoscopes play no part for either family, leave the section out. It is the family's choice, not a requirement.
What is the difference between a biodata and a resume?
A resume is a short, targeted summary of skills and work, written for an employer. A marriage biodata is written for another family, so it adds what a resume leaves out — birth details, height, family background, a horoscope if used, and partner preferences — and keeps the career part brief. A job biodata is different again: it adds personal particulars to a work history and ends with a signed declaration.
What photo should I use for a marriage biodata?
Use a recent, clear photo of you alone, head and shoulders, in natural light against a plain background, dressed as you would be for a family function. Many families also send one full-length photo separately. Avoid heavy filters, sunglasses, group shots and pictures that no longer look like you. The photo will be compared with the person at the first meeting, so it should show you on an ordinary good day.
This page explains general practice and is not legal advice. Requirements differ between countries and, in some cases, between states — check what applies where the document will be used.