North Carolina LLC fees (2026)

Every mandatory and optional fee North Carolina charges an LLC, verified against the official fee schedule — not a blog's memory of it. Statutes and source links are at the bottom of each section.

$200 statutory annual report fee, due April 15 each year (first report due the year after formation). Online submissions carry a small (~$2-3) electronic transaction fee on top of the $200. NC's $200 LLC annual report is notably higher than most peer states. Filed online via the NC SOS portal.

The full fee schedule

The filings and certificates an LLC actually ends up paying for, at the official rate.

Online vs. mail vs. counter

• Online — credit card: +$3.00 per transaction — "The $3.00 electronic filing fee for credit cards is non-refundable." So $125 Articles of Organization filed online by card = $128.00; a $200 annual report = $203.00. (source)
• Online — ACH / e-check: +$2.00 per transaction — "The electronic fee for ACH transactions is $2.00 and is also non-refundable." Paying by ACH instead of card saves $1.00 per filing. $125 formation = $127.00; $200 annual report = $202.00. (source)
• Mail / paper: $0 surcharge — statutory fee only — Paper filings carry no electronic transaction fee: the Secretary of State's own due-dates table prices the LLC annual report at $200.00 paper versus $203.00 online. Paper annual reports go to P.O. Box 29525, Raleigh, NC 27626-0525. The trade-off is speed, and the Secretary of State contradicts its own fee table on price — the paper-filing page says "The process to file a paper annual report takes longer and costs more than filing online," which is true of postage and staff time but not of the filing fee itself. (source)
• In person (walk-in): $0 surcharge documented — A paper annual report may be mailed "or bring it into the office" with the same filing fee; North Carolina publishes no separate counter/walk-in surcharge. Business Registration Division counter hours are Monday–Friday 8:00 am – 5:00 pm. (source)
• Paper invoice (account filers): 5%/yr interest + 10% late-payment penalty after 30 days — "Invoices are due and payable no later than 30 days from invoiced date. Failure to pay the entire invoice within the aforementioned time will result in an interest charge of 5% per year until the invoice is paid, as mandated by G.S. 147-86.23. An additional 10% penalty for late payment shall also be due on invoices not paid within 30 days." This is a receivables penalty on unpaid invoices, not a late fee on the annual report itself. (source)

Miss the deadline: what it actually costs

North Carolina charges NO late fee, penalty, or interest for filing an LLC annual report late — the fee stays $200 no matter how overdue it is. The sanction is administrative dissolution instead. Under G.S. 57D-6-06(a)(2) the Secretary of State may dissolve an LLC that "does not deliver its annual report to the Secretary of State on or before the 60th day after it is due," i.e. once June 14 passes without the April 15 report. The Secretary of State then mails a Notice of Grounds for Administrative Dissolution; under G.S. 57D-6-06(b) the LLC has 60 days from that mailing to file the report or show the ground does not exist, after which the Secretary signs a certificate of dissolution. Recovery is by Application for Reinstatement Following Administrative Dissolution (Form L-08), $100 under G.S. 57D-1-22(a)(18), and it only works once every delinquent $200 annual report has been filed and paid — the SoS instruction is to "Satisfy all grounds including filing any delinquent annual reports, if due" and "Submit fees for the application and all annual reports, if required." There is no statutory deadline to apply for reinstatement, and once granted it "relates back to and takes effect as of the date of the administrative dissolution" (G.S. 55-14-22(c)).

Recent fee changes

• 2014-01-01 — The entire LLC fee schedule now in force took effect. S.L. 2013-157 ("An act to amend and restate the North Carolina Limited Liability Company Act") enacted Chapter 57D, including G.S. 57D-1-22 with the $125 Articles of Organization fee and the $200 annual report fee; SECTION 34 of the act states "Except as otherwise provided, this act becomes effective January 1, 2014." The statute's credit line still reads "(2013-157, s. 2.)" and nothing else, so no North Carolina LLC filing fee has been amended since — the $125 and the $200 are the original 2014 numbers. (source)

What trips people up

• Filing online costs an NC LLC MORE than filing on paper. The LLC annual report is $203 online by credit card versus $200 by mail, because G.S. 57D-1-22(a)(28) sets a flat $200 with no electronic discount and the $3 card fee simply stacks on top. Business corporations get the opposite deal: $21 online versus $25 paper, because G.S. 55-1-22 prices the annual report at $25 on paper (item 23) but $18 electronically (item 23a). LLCs are not alone in the penalty — LLPs and LLLPs are also $203 online versus $200 paper on the same table — but corporations and banks are the entity types that get the electronic discount. That same LLC report is also 8x the corporation's $25. (source)
• North Carolina franchise tax only touches an LLC that elects corporate taxation. G.S. 105-114(b)(2) defines "corporation" for franchise tax purposes to include "a limited liability company or a partnership that elects to be taxed as a corporation under the Code, but does not otherwise include a limited liability company or a partnership." A default pass-through NC LLC owes no franchise tax — so the $200 annual report is the whole recurring state bill, whereas an LLC that checks the box for C-corp treatment picks up a franchise tax return on top. (source)
• For $200 the Secretary of State will proofread your filing before you file it. Under G.S. 55D-12 the Secretary "shall review a document prior to its submission for filing to determine whether it satisfies applicable filing requirements" and then "notify the person submitting the document of any deficiencies in the document that would prevent its filing" — the review is to be completed within 24 hours after submission, excluding weekends and holidays. This advisory review is priced identically to, and is separate from, the $200 same-day expedite under G.S. 55D-11. (source)

Sources

• Official North Carolina fee schedule
• {'cite': 'N.C. Gen. Stat. § 57D-1-22', 'title': 'Filing, service, and copying fees (LLC fee schedule — $125 articles of organization, $200 annual report, $100 reinstatement, $1/page copying, $15 paper / $10 electronic certificate)', 'sourceUrl': 'https://www.ncleg.gov/EnactedLegislation/Statutes/HTML/BySection/Chapter_57D/GS_57D-1-22.html'}
• {'cite': 'N.C. Gen. Stat. § 57D-2-24', 'title': 'Annual report for Secretary of State — first report due April 15 of the year following formation, and by April 15 every year thereafter', 'sourceUrl': 'https://www.ncleg.gov/EnactedLegislation/Statutes/HTML/BySection/Chapter_57D/GS_57D-2-24.html'}
• {'cite': 'N.C. Gen. Stat. § 55D-11', 'title': 'Expedited filings — $200 same business day (received by 12:00 noon), $100 within 24 hours', 'sourceUrl': 'https://www.ncleg.gov/EnactedLegislation/Statutes/HTML/BySection/Chapter_55D/GS_55D-11.html'}
• {'cite': 'N.C. Gen. Stat. § 55D-12', 'title': 'Advisory review of documents — $200 pre-submission review returned within 24 hours', 'sourceUrl': 'https://www.ncleg.gov/EnactedLegislation/Statutes/HTML/BySection/Chapter_55D/GS_55D-12.html'}
• {'cite': 'N.C. Gen. Stat. § 55D-23', 'title': 'Reserved name — exclusive use for a nonrenewable 120-day period', 'sourceUrl': 'https://www.ncleg.gov/EnactedLegislation/Statutes/HTML/BySection/Chapter_55D/GS_55D-23.html'}
• {'cite': 'N.C. Gen. Stat. § 57D-6-06', 'title': 'Administrative dissolution — grounds include failure to deliver the annual report on or before the 60th day after it is due; 60-day cure window after notice is mailed', 'sourceUrl': 'https://www.ncleg.gov/EnactedLegislation/Statutes/HTML/BySection/Chapter_57D/GS_57D-6-06.html'}
• {'cite': 'N.C. Gen. Stat. § 55-14-22', 'title': 'Reinstatement following administrative dissolution (applied to LLCs by § 57D-6-06(c)) — no statutory deadline to apply; reinstatement relates back to the dissolution date', 'sourceUrl': 'https://www.ncleg.gov/EnactedLegislation/Statutes/HTML/BySection/Chapter_55/GS_55-14-22.html'}
• {'cite': 'N.C. Gen. Stat. § 105-114(b)(2)', 'title': 'Franchise tax — "corporation" includes an LLC that elects to be taxed as a corporation under the Code, but does not otherwise include an LLC', 'sourceUrl': 'https://www.ncleg.gov/EnactedLegislation/Statutes/HTML/BySection/Chapter_105/GS_105-114.html'}
• {'cite': 'N.C. Gen. Stat. § 147-86.23', 'title': 'Interest and penalties on past-due state receivables — authorizes interest at the rate set under G.S. 105-241.21 plus a late-payment penalty of no more than 10%; the statute itself does not name a 5% rate, but the Secretary of State cites it as the mandate for the 5%/yr interest it charges on unpaid paper invoices', 'sourceUrl': 'https://www.ncleg.gov/EnactedLegislation/Statutes/HTML/BySection/Chapter_147/GS_147-86.23.html'}

Figures verified against official North Carolina sources. Fees change — the official schedule linked above controls. This page is general information, not legal or tax advice; FilingDesk is not a law firm.