NC · read September 28, 2026

North Carolina LLC cost

What North Carolina's official pages state about the cost of a standard domestic LLC: the filing fee, the annual report and any annual tax, each with the page it was read on and the date.

Formation document: Articles of Organization
Formation fee: $125 source, read 2026-09-28 note
Periodic report: Annual Report, every year
Report fee: $203 source, read 2026-09-28 note
Report due: by April 15 each year, starting the year after the year the LLC was created source, read 2026-09-28
Annual tax: Franchise Tax: does not apply source, read 2026-09-28 note
Tax due: Does not apply
Publication: not read

Scope: a standard domestic LLC at standard processing speed, filed online where the online and paper fees differ. The figure shown is the one the cited page states; an add-on or a paper fee that the page also states is in the note under the figure, and nothing is computed from a note.

Compare North Carolina Every state Due dates

North Carolina LLC filing fee

$125 to file the Articles of Organization

Note from the reading Fee as listed in the Secretary of State's fee table for domestic and foreign LLCs. The table does not separate online from paper; whether the online creation service adds an electronic filing surcharge (as it does for annual reports) was not read.

“Articles of Organization $125.00”

Read 2026-09-28 (UTC) at www.sosnc.gov/fees/by_title/_Business_Registration_limit…

North Carolina LLC annual report and due date

$203 to file the Annual Report, every year

Note from the reading Online $203.00, which includes a $3.00 electronic filing fee for credit cards (the electronic fee for ACH is $2.00, i.e. $202.00). Paper $200.00. The fee table lists the Annual Report at $200.00.

Report: Annual Report
Required: Yes
How often: Every year
Fee: $203
Due: by April 15 each year, starting the year after the year the LLC was created
Calendar date: April 15
Read: 2026-09-28 (UTC)

“Your report is due on April 15th of each year after the year of creation. Online $203.00* Paper $200.00”

Read 2026-09-28 (UTC) at www.sosnc.gov/divisions/business_registration/annual_rep…

North Carolina LLC annual tax or franchise tax

Does not apply Franchise Tax

This is what the page read says about Franchise Tax, in its own words. It is a statement about that one tax. It is not a statement that North Carolina charges an LLC no tax of any kind.

“By default, an LLC is not a corporation under North Carolina franchise tax statutes and is not subject to the franchise tax”

Read 2026-09-28 (UTC) at www.ncdor.gov/documents/bulletins/2024-corporate-income-…

The rule By default an LLC is not subject to North Carolina franchise tax. An LLC that elects to be taxed as a corporation for federal income tax purposes is subject to franchise tax (and is allowed a credit tied to the difference between the LLC and corporation annual report fees).

No separate annual LLC tax by default; franchise tax reaches an LLC only if it elects to be taxed as a corporation.

Note from the reading Source is the Department of Revenue's Corporate Income, Franchise, and Insurance Tax Bulletin reflecting the 2024 session (issued February 2025), PDF page 18, section on Limited Liability Company (LLC).

Publication requirement

not read

Not read. No official page read states either that publication is required or that it is not; none of the pages read mentions a publication step.

Filing office and the state's own forms

North Carolina Secretary of State, Business Registration Division

File online www.sosnc.gov
Fee schedule www.sosnc.gov
Annual report due dates www.sosnc.gov
File an annual report www.sosnc.gov

Looked for and not read

The online creation page (https://www.sosnc.gov/online_filing/filing/creation) returned HTTP 403 to an automated fetch, so any electronic filing surcharge on the $125 Articles of Organization was not read.
A newer edition of the Department of Revenue bulletin than the one reflecting the 2024 session was not looked for beyond the search result.

The researcher's notes

Written by the researcher who read the pages, unedited. Field names such as due_kind are the names in this site's data file.

Report fee recorded as the ONLINE credit-card figure ($203.00) per the schema's online-first rule; the statutory fee in the fee table is $200.00 (https://www.sosnc.gov/fees/by_title/_Business_Registration_limited_liability_companies) and the due-dates page explains the $3.00 difference as an electronic filing fee (https://www.sosnc.gov/divisions/business_registration/annual_report_due_dates). These two pages do not conflict; they describe the same fee with and without the surcharge. tax.applies is false for a default (non-corporate-electing) LLC only.

Fees change. The state's own page is the authority: open the source link beside a figure before you file or pay. This desk is a reading of public pages. It is not legal advice and it is not tax advice.