"The British people have made the decision to leave the EU... so today we have introduced a bill in parliament which will allow us to formally trigger Article 50 by the end of March," said Brexit minister David Davis.
The two-clause European Union Notification of Withdrawal Bill asks parliament to give May authority to start the formal mechanism by which Britain will leave the bloc.
The government said MPs would get their first chance to debate and vote on it on Tuesday and Wednesday next week.
May's government was forced to consult parliament following a landmark Supreme Court ruling this week that rejected its argument that executive powers allowed it to proceed without MPs having a vote.
The governing Conservatives have a majority of 16 in the 650-seat lower House of Commons.
The bill is expected to get the go-ahead from MPs, although opposition parties have said they plan to put forward amendments that could slow it down.
Davis said he hoped that parliament would "respect the decision taken by the British people and pass the legislation quickly", arguing that MPs had supported holding the referendum in the first place.
Commons leader David Lidington told parliament that the bill's third and final reading in the lower house -- followed by a final vote by MPs -- would be on February 8.
WATCH: UK needs parliament to trigger Brexit
'Proper scrutiny'
The bill will then pass to the upper House of Lords, where progress is less certain as the government has no majority there and no control over the timing.
"The Lords will not block or wreck the bill but they will want to give it proper scrutiny, especially if they think the scrutiny in the Commons has been inadequate," Robert Hazel and Alan Renwick from University College London's Constitution Unit wrote on their blog.
If approved by the Lords, the bill would then have to be signed off by Queen Elizabeth II before May can trigger Article 50 of the EU's Lisbon Treaty -- the formal process for leaving the bloc.
May has said she is confident she will be able to stick to her timetable of triggering Article 50 by the end of March at the latest and the government has said it hopes to start Brexit talks within the following months.
Britain voted to leave the EU in a referendum on June 23 last year following a bitter campaign and divisions have persisted since then.
A majority of Britain's 11 Supreme Court judges on Tuesday ruled that withdrawing from the EU meant there would have to be changes in Britain's domestic laws and therefore parliament had to be involved.
The main opposition Labour Party has said it is planning amendments including a clause calling for the protection of workers' rights, while the Scottish National Party wants to put forward dozens of changes.
Insufficient time for debate?
However, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said Thursday he would impose a "three-line whip" on his MPs, meaning any shadow cabinet minister voting to block the government's bill would lose their job.
Labour MP Chris Leslie slammed the government's timetable for the bill, accusing it of trying to "railroad this incredibly important law through parliament without sufficient time for proper debate.
"It beggars belief that we will have far less time to debate the legislation that takes us out of the EU than we did previous European treaties," he said.
The bill came as official data showed Britain's economy grew solidly in the final months of last year, even as it prepares for a difficult departure from the EU.
Gross domestic product expanded 0.6 percent between October and December, matching growth during the previous two quarters, the Office for National Statistics said.
The economy has performed better than expected since the Brexit vote, though analysts have said they expect a more difficult 2017.
