An obituary does two jobs at once: it announces a death, and it makes a first attempt at describing a life. Most drafts fail because they try to do the second before the first.
The obituary and the announcement are not the same text
An obituary is public: it is for the people you cannot reach one by one. The people you can reach — friends, colleagues, the old neighbours — usually hear from you directly, by message, email or card. That announcement is shorter and more direct, and it mostly carries the service details. Three versions:
Plain, which works in every case.
Anne and David Whitfield are sad to let you know that their mother, Margaret Whitfield (Peggy), died on September 3, 2026, aged 74. The funeral will be on Wednesday, September 9, at 2:30 p.m., at Oakwood Crematorium.
After an expected death, when people already knew she was ill.
Many of you have asked after Peggy over the last few months. She died at home on September 3, with her children beside her. We will say goodbye on Wednesday, September 9, at 2:30 p.m., at Oakwood Crematorium.
After a sudden death, when the text also has to say you cannot talk yet.
Margaret Whitfield (Peggy) died in an accident on September 3, 2026. We are letting you know without being able to say more today. The funeral will be on Wednesday, September 9, at 2:30 p.m., at Oakwood Crematorium. Please don't call for now — we will be in touch.
The five things it must contain
- Full name, including the name they were known by. "Margaret Whitfield (Peggy)". Half the people who need to see this know only one of the two.
- Dates. Born, died. Write the month in words — 08/09 is read as two different dates on two sides of the Atlantic, and this is the one notice where that cannot happen.
- Who survives them. Spouse, children, grandchildren, by name. This is the part families argue about; agree it before you publish, because a name left out of a printed notice is remembered for a generation.
- The practical details. Where and when the service is, whether it is open to everyone or family only, and whether there is a gathering afterwards. Put this high — it is the information most readers actually came for.
- What to do instead of flowers, if anything. Naming a charity is standard practice, and it gives people who cannot attend something to do.
Then one line about who they were
Not a paragraph of virtues. One concrete line, and it can carry more than a whole eulogy:
She taught at the same primary school for thirty-one years, and was still being stopped in the street by former pupils at eighty.
He kept bees, badly, and gave away the honey anyway.
If you write nothing else personal, write that.
What it costs
Newspaper notices are usually charged by the line, the word or the column centimeter, and the total surprises most families. A long tribute in a national paper can run into hundreds; a local paper is considerably less. Photographs cost extra.
Two consequences worth planning around. Put the essential information first, in case you need to cut. And consider splitting the job: a short paid notice for the facts, and a longer piece somewhere that costs nothing — a memorial page, a funeral director's website — for the life.
The tone
Obituaries have a register of their own: "passed peacefully surrounded by loving family", "will be sadly missed by all who knew her."
Those phrases have a reason to exist: their gentleness spares the people reading, and using them is not a mistake. "Died", more direct, works just as well. Choose the words the family recognises itself in — and whichever you pick, write the way you would speak, then cut a third of it.
Online
If you publish it anywhere permanent, remember that a printed notice disappears within a week and an online one does not. Two practical points:
- Be careful with addresses and dates of birth. An obituary with a home address and a full date of birth is a gift to anyone looking for one, and empty houses during a funeral are a known target.
- Make it somewhere you control. A notice on a platform you do not own can be behind a paywall in five years, or gone. Whatever the family writes about this person is worth keeping somewhere the family keeps.
The same text on social media follows different rules — announcing a death on social media says which. People who want to reply will find the words in what to write in a sympathy card, and after the funeral come thank-you notes. The rest is in the main guide.
