How to Form a Corporation in Texas
By Edmond Hui · Facts verified July 29, 2026 against primary state sources
Edmond Hui · Founder, MyStateLLC
Edmond Hui is a software engineer and serial entrepreneur based in New York who has founded multiple online businesses across e-commerce, media, and information publishing. Before transitioning into tech, he spent years as a commercial real estate professional closing deals totaling over 100,000 square feet, giving him firsthand experience with business formation and entity structuring. He built MyStateLLC to provide the free, state-specific LLC guidance he wished existed when forming his own companies.
What you file in Texas
Incorporation filing
| Document | Certificate of Formation for a For-Profit Corporation (Form 201) |
| Fee | $300 |
| Recurring report | Public Information Report (Form 05-102) filed with the Comptroller alongside the annual Franchise Tax Report. (Entities managed by owners rather than officers/directors file the Ownership Information Report, Form 05-167.) — every year, $0 |
| First report due | May 15 each year (franchise tax report + Public Information Report; if May 15 falls on a weekend/holiday, the next business day). Texas has no separate Secretary of State annual report. |
This page covers the state filing and the charges that follow it. For the procedural side — name availability, registered agent, bylaws and the federal EIN — see the formation guide and how to get an EIN, both of which apply to corporations as well as LLCs.
What it costs to incorporate and stay filed
State filing charges only. Corporate income tax and franchise tax are excluded — both depend on income or net worth, so no flat figure would be true for every corporation.
| Charge | Amount | How often |
|---|---|---|
| Certificate of Formation for a For-Profit Corporation (Form 201) | $300 | One time |
| Public Information Report (Form 05-102) filed with the Comptroller alongside the annual Franchise Tax Report. (Entities managed by owners rather than officers/directors file the Ownership Information Report, Form 05-167.) | $0 | Every year |
| First-year state filing charges | $300 | — |
| Five-year state filing charges | $300 | — |
Texas has the highest incorporation filing fee of the 49 states ranked. Nationally the fee runs from $35 in Montana to $300 in Texas, averaging $113.06. It is a one-off charge, so over five years it is usually outweighed by the recurring report fee and any annual franchise or minimum tax.
States that are cheaper to incorporate in
A cheaper filing fee elsewhere rarely saves money if you actually operate in Texas. Every state sets its own threshold for what counts as transacting business, and where that threshold is met an out-of-state corporation is generally required to register as a foreign corporation — which would mean fees in both states rather than one. Whether it applies to you depends on facts this page cannot see, so check foreign qualification in Texas before incorporating elsewhere to save on the filing fee.
Texas corporation vs Texas LLC
State filing charges only. Corporate income tax and franchise tax are excluded because both depend on income or net worth, so no flat figure exists for either entity.
| Corporation | LLC | |
|---|---|---|
| Formation filing fee | $300 | $300 |
| Report cadence | Every year | Every year |
| Report fee | $0 | $0 |
| Entity-level tax on the LLC side | — | Franchise Tax |
Both entities cost $300 to file in Texas, so the filing fee is not a reason to pick one over the other.
Full Texas LLC cost breakdown · LLC vs C-corp explained · LLC vs S-corp explained
State taxes a Texas corporation pays
Corporate income tax
| Applies | No corporate income tax |
| Rate | None — Texas imposes no corporate income tax. Instead a franchise (margin) tax applies (see franchise_tax_note). |
Franchise or gross-receipts tax
Texas imposes a franchise (margin) tax on taxable entities in lieu of a corporate income tax. No-tax-due total revenue threshold: $2,470,000 for report years 2024-2025 and $2,650,000 for report years 2026-2027 (entities at or below the threshold owe no tax but must still file a Public Information Report or Ownership Information Report). Rates: 0.375% for entities primarily engaged in retail or wholesale trade, 0.75% for all other taxable entities; the optional EZ computation rate is 0.331% (available up to $20M annualized revenue). The franchise tax applies regardless of a federal S-corporation election.
What these totals leave out: the filing-charge figures on this page are what you pay the business filing office. They exclude corporate income tax and any franchise or gross-receipts tax, because both depend on income, net worth or receipts. The section above sets out what Texaslevies — or that it levies neither. Where a state's franchise tax carries a flat minimum, that minimum is an unavoidable annual cost these totals do not include, and over five years it can be the larger number.
C-corp return: No corporate income tax return exists. All taxable entities (C corp or S corp) file the annual Texas Franchise Tax Report — Long Form (Form 05-158-A/05-158-B) or EZ Computation Report (Form 05-169) — plus the Public Information Report (Form 05-102), with the Comptroller.
Electing S-corporation status in Texas
Texas has no corporate income tax, so there is no state S election to make. Full Texas S-corporation election guide.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where these numbers come from
This page covers the state filing required to incorporate in Texas and the charges that follow it. Every figure was checked against Texas's own published sources on July 29, 2026— the state business filing agency's fee schedule, the governing statute, and where a state tax applies, the state Department of Revenue. Commercial formation-service pages were used as leads only and are never cited. Anything the review could not confirm from an official source is left blank on this page rather than filled with an estimate.
Corporate income tax and franchise tax are quoted as the state publishes them, as rate schedules and thresholds, and are excluded from every dollar total here. They depend on income or net worth, so there is no flat figure that would be true for every corporation.