Michigan Child Custody Laws: Best-Interest Factors and Parenting Time

Michigan’s child custody laws come from the Child Custody Act of 1970, which gives circuit courts authority over where a child lives and who makes major decisions for that child until the child turns 18.¹ The same rules apply whether parents were married, are divorcing, or were never together. In every case the child’s best interests control the outcome, and judges can revisit custody orders anytime circumstances genuinely change.²

Two Kinds of Custody, Decided Separately

A Michigan custody order answers two different questions, and the answers can differ. Legal custody is the authority to make major decisions about medical care, education, and religious upbringing. Physical custody is where the child lives day to day.

Joint legal custody gives both parents a say in the big decisions. Neither parent can unilaterally switch schools or authorize elective surgery. Sole legal custody puts those decisions in one parent’s hands. When at least one parent asks for joint legal custody, the court must consider whether the parents can cooperate on important decisions before granting or denying it.³

Joint physical custody means the child spends meaningful time living with each parent, though not necessarily on a 50/50 schedule. Sole physical custody places the child’s primary home with one parent and gives the other scheduled parenting time. Joint physical custody is less common in practice than joint legal custody because it requires the parents to live close enough that frequent transitions still work for school and daily life.

How Judges Decide: The 12 Best-Interest Factors

Michigan law requires the judge to evaluate 12 statutory factors on the record before entering a custody order. This is not a scoring contest. Judges weigh the factors based on what the evidence shows in a particular family, and some factors matter more than others depending on the facts.⁴

The love, affection, and emotional ties between each parent and the child.
Each parent’s capacity to give affection, guidance, and continued education or religious upbringing.
Each parent’s ability to provide food, clothing, and medical care.
How long the child has lived in a stable, satisfactory environment and the value of continuity.
The permanence, as a family unit, of the proposed custodial home.
Each parent’s moral fitness as it relates to parenting.
Each parent’s mental and physical health.
The child’s record at home, school, and in the community.
The child’s reasonable preference, if the court finds the child old and mature enough.
Each parent’s willingness to support the child’s relationship with the other parent. A parent who takes reasonable steps to protect against domestic violence or sexual assault cannot be penalized under this factor.
Any history of domestic violence, whether or not it was directed at or witnessed by the child.
Any other factor the court considers relevant.

The domestic violence factor applies broadly. A parent does not need to prove the child was the target or even present. A pattern of violence between adults in the household is treated as relevant to the child’s safety.⁴

Rights When the Parents Were Never Married

If the parents were not married when the child was born, the mother has initial custody by default. The father has rights, but he has to establish parentage before a court will consider his custody or parenting time request.⁵

The simplest route is for both parents to sign an Affidavit of Parentage (form DCH-0682), usually offered at the hospital at birth but signable anytime during the child’s life. Both signatures must be notarized. Once filed with the State Division of Vital Records, the affidavit carries the same legal weight as a court order of parentage and gives the father standing to seek custody or parenting time.⁵ If the mother won’t sign or paternity is in dispute, the father can file a court action to establish parentage through genetic testing. An existing affidavit can also be challenged under the Revocation of Parentage Act for fraud, mistake of fact, newly discovered evidence, or duress, though those challenges carry strict deadlines and a high evidentiary burden.⁶

Parenting Time

Michigan law presumes a child benefits from a strong relationship with both parents, and parenting time is awarded in a frequency and duration meant to foster that relationship.⁷ A parent can be denied parenting time entirely only if the court finds, by clear and convincing evidence, that contact would endanger the child’s physical, mental, or emotional health. That is a deliberately high bar.

When parents agree on a schedule, the court will approve it unless clear and convincing evidence shows the terms are not in the child’s best interests.⁷ Disputed parenting time runs through the same best-interest analysis as custody. Specific orders work better than vague ones. “Reasonable parenting time” sounds flexible but creates enforcement problems when disagreements come up, because neither parent has a schedule to point to.

Child Support

Child support is calculated under the Michigan Child Support Formula, which courts must follow unless the facts justify a deviation.⁸ The formula allocates support in proportion to each parent’s share of their combined net income. Net income under the formula is not the same as take-home pay; it has its own list of allowed deductions.

A support calculation generally includes:

Base support, drawn from both parents’ net incomes and the number of children.
A parenting time offset that reflects cost shifts when a parent has the child for a significant number of overnights.
Medical support, covering health insurance premiums and uninsured medical costs, split by income share.
Work-related child care costs, also split by income share.

The Friend of the Court runs the calculation and includes the recommended amount in its written recommendation. A parent who believes the formula amount is unfair can object and argue for a deviation, but the burden is on that parent to explain why the standard amount would be unjust or inappropriate.

The Friend of the Court

Every Michigan county has a Friend of the Court office that gets involved in nearly every custody, parenting time, and support case. On disputed issues, the Friend of the Court investigates by interviewing parents, reviewing documents, and sometimes visiting homes, then issues a written recommendation to the judge. Recommendations are not binding, but they carry weight. If you disagree with one, you have 21 days from the date you receive it to file a written objection and request a hearing.

The office also offers mediation. If mediation fails, the mediator reports only that no agreement was reached and does not make a recommendation, so what you say in mediation does not flow into the recommendation process. After a case is resolved, the Friend of the Court monitors compliance and can initiate enforcement when a parent falls behind on support or violates parenting time. An $80 Friend of the Court fee is assessed at filing.⁹

Filing a Custody Case

A custody case is filed in the circuit court of the county where the child lives. The core document is a complaint for custody, which states what you are asking for and explains why Michigan has jurisdiction. You will also file a summons (form MC 01) and a UCCJEA Affidavit (form MC 416), which lists every place the child has lived in the past five years and the people the child lived with. The court uses the UCCJEA Affidavit to confirm Michigan is the child’s “home state,” generally meaning the child has lived here with a parent for at least six consecutive months before filing.¹⁰ A Confidential Case Inventory (form MC 21) discloses any other court cases involving the child.¹¹

Standard filing fees for a new custody case total $255: a $150 civil filing fee, an $80 custody and parenting time fee, and a $25 electronic filing system fee.⁹ A Fee Waiver Request (form MC 20) is available if your household income is below 125% of the federal poverty guidelines, you receive means-tested public assistance such as Medicaid or SNAP, or paying the fees would cause financial hardship.¹²

After the clerk stamps your documents, the other parent must be served. A process server or any neutral adult 18 or older who is not a party to the case can do it; you cannot serve the papers yourself. The other parent then has 21 days to file a written response if served in person, or 28 days if served by mail or outside Michigan.

Changing a Custody Order Later

Modifying custody after an order is final is intentionally harder than getting the original order. The parent asking for a change must first show “proper cause” or a “change of circumstances” before the court will reopen the best-interest analysis.² Something has to have happened, usually since the last order, that relates to one of the best-interest factors and has had or will likely have a significant effect on the child. Developing substance abuse, a parent’s absence from the home, and documented abuse or neglect qualify. A child simply preferring the other parent, normal maturation, or a parent’s financial difficulties generally do not.

If the threshold is cleared, the standard for actually changing custody depends on whether an “established custodial environment” exists. An environment is established when, over an appreciable period, the child naturally looks to the custodian for guidance, discipline, daily needs, and comfort.² When one exists, the parent seeking the change must prove by clear and convincing evidence that the change serves the child’s best interests. That is the highest standard applied in custody cases and the point where most modification requests stall. A child can have an established custodial environment with one parent, both parents, or a non-parent caregiver.

Moving With the Child: The 100-Mile Rule

Once a custody order is in place, Michigan limits how far a parent can move the child’s legal residence. If both parents share legal custody and the other parent does not consent, you need court permission before moving more than 100 miles from the child’s current residence or out of state. Court permission is not required if you have sole legal custody, the other parent consents, the two residences were already more than 100 miles apart when the case began, the move brings the homes closer together, or the parents previously agreed in writing on how relocations would be handled.¹³

When the court has to decide, it looks at five relocation factors:

Whether the move has the capacity to improve life for both the child and the relocating parent.
Each parent’s compliance with the existing parenting time schedule, and whether the move is motivated by a desire to undermine the other parent’s time.
Whether a modified parenting time schedule can preserve the child’s relationship with both parents, and whether each parent is likely to follow it.
Whether the parent opposing the move is primarily trying to gain a child support advantage.
Any history of domestic violence, regardless of whether the child was the target.

The relocating parent carries the burden of proving the move is justified by a preponderance of the evidence. A parent who has routinely skipped their own parenting time will have a hard time persuading the court that preserving that time now outweighs the benefits of the move.

Emergency Custody Orders

When a child faces immediate danger, a parent can ask the court for an ex parte order, meaning a temporary order issued without first notifying the other parent. Michigan courts grant them only when waiting for a regular hearing would cause irreversible harm, or when notifying the other parent would prompt harm before the judge could act.

There are no fill-in-the-blank statewide forms for emergency custody motions. The motion and proposed order have to be drafted by you or your attorney, and the motion needs specific factual allegations describing the immediate threat. General concerns about the other parent’s fitness are not enough; the court looks for concrete evidence of imminent danger such as recent physical abuse, credible threats of abduction, or active substance abuse that endangers the child. An ex parte order is temporary. The court sets a hearing shortly after issuing it so the other parent can respond and the judge can decide whether to extend, modify, or dissolve it.

1
Michigan Legislature. Michigan Compiled Laws – Act 91 of 1970 – Child Custody Act of 1970
2
Michigan Legislature. Michigan Compiled Laws 722.27 – Powers of Court
3
Michigan Legislature. Michigan Compiled Laws 722.26a – Joint Custody
4
Michigan Legislature. Michigan Compiled Laws 722.23 – Best Interests of the Child Defined
5
Michigan Department of Health and Human Services. Affidavit of Parentage – DCH-0682
6
Michigan Legislature. Michigan Compiled Laws 722.1437 – Action for Revocation of Acknowledgment of Parentage
7
Michigan Legislature. Michigan Compiled Laws 722.27a – Parenting Time
8
Michigan Courts. 2025 Michigan Child Support Formula Manual
9
Michigan Courts. Circuit Court Fee and Assessments Table
10
Michigan Courts. Michigan Courts – Uniform Child Custody Jurisdiction Enforcement Act Affidavit MC 416
11
Michigan Courts. Michigan Courts – Confidential Case Inventory MC 21
12
Michigan Courts. Michigan Courts – Fee Waiver Request MC 20
13
Michigan Courts. Changing Child’s Legal Residence – 100-Mile Rule Checklist