Best LLC Formation Services in North Dakota

North Dakota's Articles of Organization do not ask for member or manager names. A formation service or registered agent can sign as organizer, so your name stays off the founding document. The privacy stops there. NDCC 10-32.1-89 requires every annual report to carry the names and addresses of the managers and governors, or of the managing members. Your first one is due by November 15 of the year after you form. Plan for one filing of privacy, not lasting anonymity.

That November date is not everyone's. The Secretary of State sets the annual report deadline by entity type, and the two farm entities file seven months earlier than the rest.

Licensed professionals have a second date coming. From 1 January 2027 a PLLC must file a Certificate of Professional License with its annual report, form SFN 13610, completed by the licensing board for every governor and member who practices the profession. The board fills that form in, not the Secretary of State. Start it early.

Series LLCs are recognized in North Dakota. One parent LLC can hold separate series, each with its own assets and liabilities. That beats paying $135 per standalone company. One catch. A series created after the parent's articles are filed must be named in articles of amendment, and that is another $50.

Naming is forgiving here. Say the name you want is already registered. North Dakota will still take your filing if the current holder signs a Consent to Use Business Name. The fee is $10. A near miss on the FirstStop portal does not send you back to the drawing board.

North Dakota has no statewide business license. But sell taxable goods or services and you need a North Dakota sales and use tax permit before you collect the state's 5% sales tax.

1. Get your North Dakota registered agent in place. Your agent must have a physical street address in North Dakota (no P.O. boxes). Your LLC cannot be its own agent.
2. Apply for your federal EIN from the IRS. It is free. Applying online takes minutes. You will need it to open a business bank account and hire employees.
3. File your Annual Report by November 15 each year with the North Dakota Secretary of State. The fee is $50. A farming or ranching LLC files by April 15 instead, and so does an authorized livestock farm LLC. Your first report is not due until the year after the calendar year you formed in. Miss it and the state moves you into Not Good Standing. File the past due report within a year and you can be reinstated. Past that, the company is dissolved or terminated.
4. If you sell taxable goods or services, apply for a North Dakota sales and use tax permit through the Office of State Tax Commissioner before making any sales.
5. Skip the BOI report. FinCEN exempted every company formed in the United States in March 2025, so a domestic North Dakota LLC files nothing. A final rule made that permanent on 14 August 2026. Only companies formed abroad still report. A letter asking for a fee to file one is a scam, and FinCEN says so.
6. Draft an operating agreement. North Dakota does not require one by law, but banks often ask for it when opening a business account, and it protects your limited liability status in disputes.

North Dakota taxes personal income at three rates, 0%, 1.95% and 2.50%. The 2.50% top rate is set in NDCC 57-38-30.3. The rates are fixed in the statute. Only the income bands move, once a year, with the cost of living.

Your LLC profit lands on your own return by default. The state tax on it lands there too. There is no franchise tax. There is no capital stock tax either. Nothing is owed to North Dakota simply for existing as an entity.

One thing to watch before you elect. Ask the IRS to tax your LLC as a corporation and you move onto the state corporate income tax under NDCC 57-38-30. That is a separate return with its own bill. The $50 annual report is a filing fee, not a tax. You owe it either way.

• $50 every year, forever - The annual report is due November 15, or April 15 for farm and ranch LLCs. The fee does not scale with size. A dormant North Dakota LLC still costs $50 a year to keep alive.
• $50 to change your articles - A name change is a $50 filing. So is adding a series.
• $20 Certificate of Good Standing - You need one to register your LLC in another state. Lenders and contract counterparties ask for it too. FirstStop issues it.
• $20 to close it properly - Dissolution is its own filing. Walk away instead and the LLC sits in Not Good Standing. The state typically terminates it 6 to 12 months later. Pay the $20.
• $10 Consent to Use Business Name - Your first choice of name may already be taken. A signed consent from the holder, filed with your registration, costs $10. No refiling needed.
• $10 to change your registered agent - Swapping agents is its own filing with the Secretary of State. The fee is $10. Where the agent is a noncommercial one the state charges it per entity, so a founder holding four LLCs pays it four times.