Since Prince Harry and Meghan Markle split from the monarchy in 2020 and moved to the United States, they have faced regular backlash from critics in Britain over the use of their royal titles.
When Harry and Meghan stepped down from their working royal roles, their titles were unaffected. They agreed with Buckingham Palace that they would no longer use their HRH (His/Her Royal Highness) styles, but they legally retained them. They still have full use of their titles as Prince and Princess of the United Kingdom and Duke and Duchess of Sussex.
The Sussex titles have been a particular point of contention for United Kingdom-based critics, as Harry and Meghan spent little time in the country from which they took the name during their time as working royals.
In 2023, a Conservative member of Parliament in Britain proposed a bill that would have taken steps toward removing the couple's Sussex titles. However, this has not been resubmitted since the change in government and is no longer before the House.
Here, Newsweek looks at what Prince Harry has said himself about the possibility of relinquishing his royal titles.
If Need Be
Prince Harry first publicly revealed that he had considered relinquishing his Duke of Sussex title in his six-part Netflix docuseries Harry & Meghan.
The series was broadcast in December 2022 and charted the course of the couple's love story as well as their dramatic split from the monarchy and establishment of their new home base in California.
In the show, Harry gave an on-camera interview, discussing the period of time when he and Meghan had taken an extended vacation to Canada at the end of 2019, where they were considering relocating and reducing their work with the monarchy.
The prince revealed that he had offered to give up his Sussex title if no arrangement could be reached that would allow him and Meghan freedom to remove themselves from the pressure and press in the U.K.
"By the time I was speaking to my father from Canada, the family and their people knew that we were trying to find a different way of working for a minimum of two years," he said.
"'OK, Canada.' I was speaking to my father. 'This is the plan.' He says, 'Can you put that in writing?' And I said, 'I'd rather not because of what happened last time.'
"He says, 'I can't do anything unless you put it in writing.' Sent him emails on 1st, 2nd and 3rd January. And in one of those, I'd mentioned that, you know, if this wasn't gonna work out, then we would be willing to relinquish our Sussex titles if need be. So that was the plan."
Harry then claimed that his father's office leaked the content of his emails to the press after the key details about the titles showed up in print.
"It became clear that the institution leaked the fact that we were going to be moving back to Canada. And the key piece of that story that made me aware that the contents of the letter between me and my father had been leaked was that we were willing to relinquish our Sussex titles," he said. "That was the giveaway."
King Charles III did not publicly respond to the allegation, following Buckingham Palace's blanket "no comment" position.
What's the Difference?
Harry repeated this revelation in his 2023 memoir, Spare.
He wrote: "In the first days of January 2020, I sent him [Charles] a watermarked letter broadly outlining the idea, with bullet points, and many details. Throughout the exchanges that followed, all marked PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL, I hammered the essential theme: we were prepared to make any sacrifice necessary to find some peace and safety, including relinquishing our Sussex titles."
Evidently, Harry and Meghan have not relinquished their titles, and 60 Minutes correspondentAnderson Cooper questioned the prince about this in an interview promoting Spare.
"Why not renounce your titles as duke and duchess?" Cooper asked, to which Harry responded simply: "And what difference would that make?"
James Crawford-Smith is Newsweek's royal reporter, based in London. You can find him on X (formerly Twitter) at @jrcrawfordsmith and read his stories on Newsweek's The Royals Facebook page.
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