Clarity changes families.
INHERIT is the open data standard for estate planning information — supporting succession law across common law, civil law, Islamic, Jewish, Hindu, Japanese, and African customary legal traditions.
Every INHERIT document is a data product
Four inseparable facets — not just a file format.
Data
The estate information itself — people, assets, bequests.
Structure
JSON Schema 2020-12 with format assertion for every field.
Meaning
Field descriptions, annotations, and the primer that explains intent.
Context
Who created it, when, governance metadata, and provenance.
Built for three audiences
Developers
Evaluating INHERIT for your estate planning software? Browse the schema reference, try the web validator, generate TypeScript types.
Legal Firms
Considering a jurisdiction partnership? One firm per jurisdiction maintains the INHERIT extension and joins the steering committee.
Standards Community
Assessing credibility? INHERIT draws from OpenAPI, FHIR, CloudEvents, OCDS, JSON Schema, Schema.org, and W3C.
36 schemas across 10 legal traditions
18
Core EntitiesPerson, asset, bequest, will, executor, beneficiary — the universal building blocks of any estate plan.
5
Common Types
Shared primitive types — monetary amounts, dates, addresses, and identifiers — reused across all schemas.
13
ExtensionsJurisdiction-specific overlays that layer local succession rules onto the universal core without breaking interoperability.
10 launch jurisdictions
One INHERIT extension per jurisdiction, maintained by a local partner firm on the steering committee.
London
GB-ENG
Edinburgh
GB-SCT
Dublin
IE
New York
US-NY
Toronto
CA-ON
Sydney
AU-NSW
Singapore
SG
Dubai
AE
Tokyo
JP
Mumbai
IN-MH
Get started in minutes
Clone the repository, run the test suite, and generate TypeScript types from the schemas.
git clone https://github.com/openinherit/openinherit.git
cd openinherit
pnpm install
pnpm test # Run the test suite
pnpm run generate # Generate TypeScript typesStanding on the shoulders of giants
INHERIT did not invent these problems — it assembled the best existing solutions.
OpenAPI
RESTful contract design and path conventions
FHIR
Domain-specific open standard governance model
CloudEvents
Event envelope structure and metadata fields
OCDS
Open Contracting Data Standard — extension registry pattern
JSON Schema
2020-12 vocabulary for structural validation
Schema.org
Semantic vocabulary for people and assets
W3C
JSON-LD context and linked data best practices
Itelman & Viotti
The data product framework — data, structure, meaning, context