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State Fee Facts

Every state fee, with its source.

Methodology

How this site works

State Fee Facts lays out what each state charges, then ranks the filing services by the size of their own bill over three years and by how much of the state paperwork that bill takes in. State numbers come first, each with its source; the services are ranked afterward by a published five-part method.

Facts compiled by State Fee Facts

Where the state numbers come from

Fees, due dates and rules all come straight from a state fee schedule, a state form or a state statute. Next to every figure you will see where it came from and the month we last confirmed it, and each state page repeats those sources in a list at the bottom.

How the 50-state ranking is calculated

LLC ranking: the filing fee, plus reports in years 2 and 3 (a biennial report counts once), plus any minimum tax each year. Agent ranking: one year of state fees, which means the report at its yearly rate plus any minimum tax. Foreign LLC ranking: the registration fee plus reports in years 2 and 3. Costs with no fixed amount, such as newspaper publication, are explained on the state page and kept out of the totals. States with equal totals share a rank, and number 1 is the lowest total.

How the services are ranked

  1. Service bill, years one to three (34%). What the service itself bills across years one, two and three, read from the first-year and renewal prices on its website. Whichever service files, the state collects the same fee, so that fee is stated on the page and left out of the score.
  2. Paperwork inside the price (28%). Which of the repeating chores come with the price: the agent on record, the state's periodic report and the EIN application.
  3. Second-year price (14%). Whether the amount charged from year two matches the first-year amount or goes up.
  4. Match to the state (13%). How closely the plan follows the state report cycle, the late penalties and the rules for the registered office.
  5. State fee shown apart (11%). Whether the state fee appears as its own line and is billed at the amount the state sets.

If two services land within a few points of each other, the entry says which criterion made the difference.

Which services appear

Mainstay Filing appears on every state page because it serves all fifty states. The registered agent brands built around the state sit beside it. A service is listed for a topic only if its own website sells that service at a posted price, read on the build date shown on the page.

What this site does not offer

There are no customer ratings, no customer quotes and no legal or tax advice. The order of the services is our editorial opinion, applied through the criteria above.