What happens if I file my California LLC annual report late?

California's Statement of Information (Form LLC-12) costs $20, and filing late brings a $250 penalty. That penalty is assessed by the Franchise Tax Board on the Secretary of State's behalf and is billed separately, so it is not something you pay to the Secretary of State along with the LLC-12. Only the Secretary of State can waive it, through its Statement of Information penalty waiver request process, so it is worth asking if you have grounds. The other consequence is suspension or forfeiture of your LLC's powers, rights and privileges. A suspended LLC cannot exercise those rights in California while the suspension lasts, which reaches ordinary business activity such as enforcing its contracts in court, and it has to be revived with the Secretary of State and the Franchise Tax Board before it can act again. The deadline owners miss most often is the first one. The initial Statement of Information is due within 90 days of the Articles of Organization being filed. After that the statement is biennial, and the filing period runs from the calendar month your Articles were filed back through the five preceding calendar months. File through the Secretary of State at https://www.sos.ca.gov/business-programs/business-entities. Note that the $800 annual franchise tax California LLCs owe the Franchise Tax Board is a separate obligation with its own deadline.

How do I file my California LLC annual report?

California LLCs file Form LLC-12, the Statement of Information, with the California Secretary of State. It is due within 90 days of the Articles of Organization being filed and every two years after that, not annually. You have two options: submit it electronically through the Secretary of State's online filing system, or mail the completed form to the Secretary of State's office in Sacramento. Online filing gives you confirmation as soon as the filing is processed, while mail submissions sit in the Secretary of State's processing queue, which the office reports as a rolling date rather than a fixed turnaround. The fee is $20 either way. For the biennial filings, the filing period is the calendar month in which your Articles were filed plus the five calendar months immediately before it, so an LLC formed in July files between February 1 and July 31 of its filing year. Miss the window and the Franchise Tax Board bills a $250 penalty on the Secretary of State's behalf, and the LLC's powers, rights and privileges can be suspended or forfeited. Start at https://www.sos.ca.gov/business-programs/business-entities and open the Statement of Information filing to submit yours.

How much does it cost to file a California LLC annual report?

The California LLC report, officially the Statement of Information (Form LLC-12), costs $20 to file with the California Secretary of State. The $20 is the same whether you submit online or by mail. Because the LLC filing is biennial rather than annual, that works out to about $10 a year. There is no fee to change the information; the $20 is the filing fee itself. Miss the deadline and the Franchise Tax Board assesses a $250 penalty on the Secretary of State's behalf, billed separately from the LLC-12, and the LLC's powers, rights and privileges can be suspended or forfeited. Only the Secretary of State can waive that penalty. The $20 is not California's main LLC cost. The Franchise Tax Board's $800 annual LLC tax applies every year, including the first, and an LLC with $250,000 or more of total California income owes an additional income-based LLC fee starting at $900. File the Statement of Information and its $20 fee through the Secretary of State at https://www.sos.ca.gov/business-programs/business-entities.

When is my California LLC annual report due?

Your first California Statement of Information (Form LLC-12) is due within 90 days of the date the Secretary of State filed your Articles of Organization. That first deadline is the one owners most often miss, because it arrives long before any anniversary. After that, an LLC files the statement every two years rather than every year. The filing period runs from the calendar month in which your Articles were filed back through the five calendar months immediately before it, and it ends on the last day of that anniversary month. An LLC whose Articles were filed in July, for example, can file at any point from February 1 through July 31 of its filing year. There is no particular day within the window that you must hit. The fee is $20. Filing after the period closes brings a $250 penalty assessed by the Franchise Tax Board on the Secretary of State's behalf and billed separately, and can lead to suspension or forfeiture of the LLC's powers, rights and privileges. File through the California Secretary of State at https://www.sos.ca.gov/business-programs/business-entities.

Are there any exemptions for California LLC annual report filing?

No. Every active California LLC files the Statement of Information (Form LLC-12), and there are no exemptions based on revenue, size, or activity level. An LLC that did no business at all still files to keep its powers, rights and privileges intact. The obligation ends only when the LLC is formally cancelled with the Secretary of State. What does change by entity is the schedule. For an LLC the statement is due within 90 days of registration and then every two years, during the period made up of the calendar month your Articles were filed plus the five preceding months. California corporations file every year instead. The fee is $20 for the LLC filing. Skip it and the Franchise Tax Board bills a $250 penalty on the Secretary of State's behalf, and the LLC can be suspended or forfeited. File Form LLC-12 through the California Secretary of State at https://www.sos.ca.gov/business-programs/business-entities.

California LLC Statement of Information: $20 Every 2 Years

California's LLC report is the Statement of Information (Form LLC-12), it costs $20, and it is biennial rather than annual. The first one is due within 90 days of registration, which is the deadline owners miss most often.

By Edmond Hui · Last updated: August 2026

California LLC biennial reports are due in the anniversary month plus the five preceding months and cost $20 to file. See details below.

California calls the LLC's periodic report the Statement of Information. Filing for a corporation instead? See the California corporation annual report.

Ready to file?

Go directly to the California Secretary of State website.

File with the California Secretary of State →

When is the California LLC annual report due, and what does it cost?

Due Date	Biennial, in the anniversary month plus the five preceding months
Fee	$20 (biennial)
Filing Method	Online or by mail
Late Penalty	$250, billed by the Franchise Tax Board on the Secretary of State's behalf. Only the SOS can waive it. Continued failure risks suspension or forfeiture of the LLC's powers
Official state page	www.sos.ca.gov

Step diagram for filing the California LLC annual report, $20 (biennial) filing fee, due Biennial, in the anniversary month plus…. — Filing the California annual report, with the state's own fee and deadline. Source: California Secretary of State.

How do you file the California LLC annual report?

1
Gather Required Information
Collect your LLC's current information including registered agent name and address, principal office address, member or manager details, and a description of your business activities. Have your California LLC entity number ready from your Articles of Organization, and check your filing date: the first Statement of Information is due within 90 days of the Articles of Organization being filed.
2
Access the California Secretary of State Portal
Visit the California Secretary of State's business entities pages at https://www.sos.ca.gov/business-programs/business-entities and open the online filing system. Look for 'Statement of Information', which is California's version of the annual report. For LLCs it is filed within 90 days of registration and every two years after that, not every year.
3
Complete the Statement of Information Form
Fill out all required fields on Form LLC-12 including the LLC name, California entity number, registered agent information, principal office address, and current member or manager details. Confirm every address is current, because the Secretary of State sends notices to the address on file.
4
Review and Pay Filing Fee
Review your completed form for accuracy, then submit payment of the $20 filing fee, which is the same online or by mail. If a $250 late penalty applies, it is assessed by the Franchise Tax Board on the Secretary of State's behalf and billed separately, so it is not paid here with the LLC-12.
5
Submit and Keep Confirmation
Submit your completed Statement of Information and save the confirmation receipt. Keep it with your business records, and note the month your Articles were filed so you know when your next biennial filing period opens.

Do You Need a Paid Service to File?

No. You can file this report yourself, using the filing method in the table above, and pay only the state's own fee shown there, with no service fee on top.

Hiring a registered agent service is a separate choice, and it is optional too. Every LLC must keep a registered agent, but in most states the LLC's owner, or another individual who qualifies, may serve as its registered agent themselves, generally subject to that state's rules on keeping a street address in the state and being available there during normal business hours. The California registered agent requirements set out what California itself asks.

Registered agent services for California LLCs

Affiliate disclosure: Northwest Registered Agent, Bizee, ZenBusiness and LegalZoom pay us a commission if you sign up through our link, at no extra cost to you. We list only the registered agent services we have an affiliate relationship with, so this is not a survey of the whole market.

This list is not scored. The four are listed cheapest annual renewal first, and every claim below is about the services listed here rather than the whole market.

Northwest Registered Agent$125/yr renewal
Best for: Privacy-focused owners and anyone who just needs an agent, not a formation bundle
Bizee$149/yr renewal
Best for: A free first year (some visitors are being shown shorter free periods, so confirm at checkout), renewing at $149/yr, if you're comfortable with the BBB caveat
ZenBusiness$199/yr renewal
Best for: First-time founders forming a new LLC who want phone, email and chat support
LegalZoom$249/yr renewal
Best for: Complex structures that want attorney consultations, which come with LegalZoom's $299 formation plan (and, in one version of its plans, the $249 plan) rather than this renewal price

Note: Bizee holds a C rating from the BBB and is not accredited. BBB's profile carries a live alert describing a pattern of complaints about unexpected charges, difficulty canceling and filing delays, and Bizee has posted a response to it. We flag this so you can make an informed choice.

Annual renewal is each provider's own standard published rate. Check the current terms at each provider before you buy. The scored ranking, and the formula behind it, is in our full formation services review →

This guide is general information, not legal or tax advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. It reports what each state publishes about filing deadlines, fees, and the consequences of missing them, with the sources this page cites. It cannot tell you what your own company owes: the date turns on when and where you formed, states change these rules between our reviews, and in several states an entity-level tax falls due in a year when no report does. Confirm your own dates with the filing office named on this page before you rely on one here, because missing a deadline can cost the company its good standing or, in many states, its existence.

Read this guide for another state:

Frequently Asked Questions

: California's Statement of Information (Form LLC-12) costs $20, and filing late brings a $250 penalty. That penalty is assessed by the Franchise Tax Board on the Secretary of State's behalf and is billed separately, so it is not something you pay to the Secretary of State along with the LLC-12. Only the Secretary of State can waive it, through its Statement of Information penalty waiver request process, so it is worth asking if you have grounds. The other consequence is suspension or forfeiture of your LLC's powers, rights and privileges. A suspended LLC cannot exercise those rights in California while the suspension lasts, which reaches ordinary business activity such as enforcing its contracts in court, and it has to be revived with the Secretary of State and the Franchise Tax Board before it can act again. The deadline owners miss most often is the first one. The initial Statement of Information is due within 90 days of the Articles of Organization being filed. After that the statement is biennial, and the filing period runs from the calendar month your Articles were filed back through the five preceding calendar months. File through the Secretary of State at https://www.sos.ca.gov/business-programs/business-entities. Note that the $800 annual franchise tax California LLCs owe the Franchise Tax Board is a separate obligation with its own deadline.
: California LLCs file Form LLC-12, the Statement of Information, with the California Secretary of State. It is due within 90 days of the Articles of Organization being filed and every two years after that, not annually. You have two options: submit it electronically through the Secretary of State's online filing system, or mail the completed form to the Secretary of State's office in Sacramento. Online filing gives you confirmation as soon as the filing is processed, while mail submissions sit in the Secretary of State's processing queue, which the office reports as a rolling date rather than a fixed turnaround. The fee is $20 either way. For the biennial filings, the filing period is the calendar month in which your Articles were filed plus the five calendar months immediately before it, so an LLC formed in July files between February 1 and July 31 of its filing year. Miss the window and the Franchise Tax Board bills a $250 penalty on the Secretary of State's behalf, and the LLC's powers, rights and privileges can be suspended or forfeited. Start at https://www.sos.ca.gov/business-programs/business-entities and open the Statement of Information filing to submit yours.
: The California LLC report, officially the Statement of Information (Form LLC-12), costs $20 to file with the California Secretary of State. The $20 is the same whether you submit online or by mail. Because the LLC filing is biennial rather than annual, that works out to about $10 a year. There is no fee to change the information; the $20 is the filing fee itself. Miss the deadline and the Franchise Tax Board assesses a $250 penalty on the Secretary of State's behalf, billed separately from the LLC-12, and the LLC's powers, rights and privileges can be suspended or forfeited. Only the Secretary of State can waive that penalty. The $20 is not California's main LLC cost. The Franchise Tax Board's $800 annual LLC tax applies every year, including the first, and an LLC with $250,000 or more of total California income owes an additional income-based LLC fee starting at $900. File the Statement of Information and its $20 fee through the Secretary of State at https://www.sos.ca.gov/business-programs/business-entities.
: Your first California Statement of Information (Form LLC-12) is due within 90 days of the date the Secretary of State filed your Articles of Organization. That first deadline is the one owners most often miss, because it arrives long before any anniversary. After that, an LLC files the statement every two years rather than every year. The filing period runs from the calendar month in which your Articles were filed back through the five calendar months immediately before it, and it ends on the last day of that anniversary month. An LLC whose Articles were filed in July, for example, can file at any point from February 1 through July 31 of its filing year. There is no particular day within the window that you must hit. The fee is $20. Filing after the period closes brings a $250 penalty assessed by the Franchise Tax Board on the Secretary of State's behalf and billed separately, and can lead to suspension or forfeiture of the LLC's powers, rights and privileges. File through the California Secretary of State at https://www.sos.ca.gov/business-programs/business-entities.
: No. Every active California LLC files the Statement of Information (Form LLC-12), and there are no exemptions based on revenue, size, or activity level. An LLC that did no business at all still files to keep its powers, rights and privileges intact. The obligation ends only when the LLC is formally cancelled with the Secretary of State. What does change by entity is the schedule. For an LLC the statement is due within 90 days of registration and then every two years, during the period made up of the calendar month your Articles were filed plus the five preceding months. California corporations file every year instead. The fee is $20 for the LLC filing. Skip it and the Franchise Tax Board bills a $250 penalty on the Secretary of State's behalf, and the LLC can be suspended or forfeited. File Form LLC-12 through the California Secretary of State at https://www.sos.ca.gov/business-programs/business-entities.

Sources

5 documents

Each entry below is a document recorded in our verified California sources, and each entry says what the document is. Some statutory text is read from an accurate mirror rather than from the state's own host, and those say so.

sos.ca.gov/business-programs/business-entitiesCalifornia Secretary of State: business entity filings
leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=CORP&sectionNum=17702.09California statute: Statement of Information
sos.ca.gov/business-programs/business-entities/statementsCalifornia Secretary of State: file the Statement of Information
leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=RTC&sectionNum=17941California statute: First-year Annual LLC Tax
ftb.ca.gov/file/business/types/limited-liability-company/index.htmlCalifornia Franchise Tax Board: file the First-year Annual LLC Tax

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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.

How we check facts

When is the California LLC annual report due, and what does it cost?

How do you file the California LLC annual report?

Gather Required Information

Access the California Secretary of State Portal

Complete the Statement of Information Form

Review and Pay Filing Fee

Submit and Keep Confirmation