The state-by-state Articles of Organization filing fee dataset, sourced from our own state guides and checked against Secretary of State primaries.
The state filing fee to form an LLC in 2026 ranges from $35 in Montana to $500 in Massachusetts, based on the formation-document fee (Articles of Organization, Certificate of Organization, or Certificate of Formation, depending on the state) charged directly by each state's Secretary of State or equivalent filing office.
Every U.S. state charges a one-time fee to file the document that legally creates an LLC, most commonly called the Articles of Organization, though Delaware, Texas, and Washington call it a Certificate of Formation, and Connecticut, Iowa, Massachusetts, Nebraska, and Pennsylvania call it a Certificate of Organization. As of July 2026, that fee ranges from $35 (Montana) to $500 (Massachusetts), with a 50-state average of $130 and a median of $100. Many states also bill a recurring annual or biennial report or franchise fee after formation, separate from the one-time filing fee; those figures are in the table below and vary independently of the initial cost. Every row in this dataset traces back to the figure published on this site's own state formation guide, and a sample of eight states was cross-checked against the state's own Secretary of State fee schedule in July 2026 (see Methodology).
| State | Abbr. | Filing document | Filing fee | Annual/biennial fee |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alabama | AL | Articles of Organization | $200 | $50 |
| Alaska | AK | Articles of Organization | $250 | $100 |
| Arizona | AZ | Articles of Organization | $50 | None |
| Arkansas | AR | Articles of Organization | $45 | $150 |
| California | CA | Articles of Organization | $70 | $820 |
| Colorado | CO | Articles of Organization | $50 | $25 |
| Connecticut | CT | Certificate of Organization | $120 | $80 |
| Delaware | DE | Certificate of Formation | $110 | $300 |
| Florida | FL | Articles of Organization | $125 | $138 |
| Georgia | GA | Articles of Organization | $100 | $50 |
| Hawaii | HI | Articles of Organization | $50 | $15 |
| Idaho | ID | Articles of Organization | $100 | None |
| Illinois | IL | Articles of Organization | $150 | $75 |
| Indiana | IN | Articles of Organization | $95 | $31 |
| Iowa | IA | Certificate of Organization | $50 | $45 |
| Kansas | KS | Articles of Organization | $160 | $50 |
| Kentucky | KY | Articles of Organization | $40 | $15 |
| Louisiana | LA | Articles of Organization | $100 | $35 |
| Maine | ME | Certificate of Formation | $175 | $85 |
| Maryland | MD | Articles of Organization | $100 | $300 |
| Massachusetts | MA | Certificate of Organization | $500 | $500 |
| Michigan | MI | Articles of Organization | $50 | $25 |
| Minnesota | MN | Articles of Organization | $155 | None |
| Mississippi | MS | Articles of Organization | $50 | None |
| Missouri | MO | Articles of Organization | $50 | None |
| Montana | MT | Articles of Organization | $35 | $20 |
| Nebraska | NE | Certificate of Organization | $100 | $10 |
| Nevada | NV | Articles of Organization | $425 | $350 |
| New Hampshire | NH | Articles of Organization | $100 | $100 |
| New Jersey | NJ | Articles of Organization | $125 | $75 |
| New Mexico | NM | Articles of Organization | $50 | None |
| New York | NY | Articles of Organization | $200 | $9 |
| North Carolina | NC | Articles of Organization | $125 | $200 |
| North Dakota | ND | Articles of Organization | $135 | $50 |
| Ohio | OH | Articles of Organization | $99 | None |
| Oklahoma | OK | Articles of Organization | $100 | $25 |
| Oregon | OR | Articles of Organization | $100 | $100 |
| Pennsylvania | PA | Certificate of Organization | $125 | $7 |
| Rhode Island | RI | Articles of Organization | $150 | $50 |
| South Carolina | SC | Articles of Organization | $110 | None |
| South Dakota | SD | Articles of Organization | $150 | $50 |
| Tennessee | TN | Articles of Organization | $300 | $300 |
| Texas | TX | Certificate of Formation | $300 | None |
| Utah | UT | Articles of Organization | $59 | $18 |
| Vermont | VT | Articles of Organization | $125 | $35 |
| Virginia | VA | Articles of Organization | $100 | $50 |
| Washington | WA | Certificate of Formation | $200 | $70 |
| West Virginia | WV | Articles of Organization | $100 | $25 |
| Wisconsin | WI | Articles of Organization | $130 | $25 |
| Wyoming | WY | Articles of Organization | $100 | $60 |
Filing fees in this table come from two internal sources that are kept in sync: the constants used in the LLC cost calculator and the fee stated in the lead paragraph of each of this site's 50 state formation guides (for example, Start an LLC in Texas). Both sources were compared programmatically and matched for all 50 states as of July 2026.
To check that internal figure against reality, eight states, covering the cheapest, most expensive, and several mid-range and high-volume states, were verified directly against the state's own Secretary of State (or equivalent) fee schedule in July 2026:
All eight spot-checked figures matched this site's existing data exactly. No corrections were needed in this update. Fees are set by state legislatures and filing offices and change without much notice; always confirm the current amount on your state's Secretary of State website before filing, and treat this dataset as a planning baseline rather than a final quote.
Last verified and updated: July 2, 2026. Annual/biennial figures are informational and not independently re-verified against primaries in this pass; see each state's own guide page for detail on what the recurring fee covers.
StartAnLLCGuide, "2026 LLC Formation Filing Fees by State," 2026, https://startanllcguide.com/2026-llc-filing-fees-by-state.
Priya covers tax, regulation, and compliance: the rules that decide what you can and cannot do, usually filed in an obscure subsection that most people skip. She reads federal register notices in her spare time and is at peace with that being unusual.