How much does it cost to start an LLC in Hawaii?

Filing Articles of Organization (Form LLC-1) with the Business Registration Division costs $50, plus a $1.00 State Archives fee. Expedited review adds $25. If you will sell goods or services, budget another one-time $20 for the General Excise Tax license.

What is the annual fee for a Hawaii LLC?

Hawaii charges $12.50 to file the annual report online, or $15.00 on paper. It is due by the end of the calendar quarter that contains your LLC's registration date, March 31, June 30, September 30, or December 31.

When is my first Hawaii LLC annual report due?

An entity registered in the same year the report would fall due does not have to file for that year, so your first annual report is due in your registration quarter of the following year. For example, an LLC registered in May 2026 files its first annual report by June 30, 2027.

What happens if I file my Hawaii annual report late?

DCCA assesses a $10.00 late fee for each year you are delinquent, and you can still file the overdue report online. Continued non-filing can lead to administrative termination; reinstating an administratively terminated Hawaii LLC costs $25.

Hawaii LLC Cost (2026)

By Edmond Hui · Fees verified July 29, 2026 against the Hawaii Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, Business Registration Division fee schedule

In Hawaii, the first-year state cost of an LLC is $63.50, before any registered-agent service. Forming an LLC in Hawaii costs $51 to file the Articles of Organization with the state, the Annual Report costs $12.50 every year.

Bar chart of LLC costs in Hawaii: $63.50 in unavoidable state charges in the first year and $12.50 a year after that. Hawaii charges $12.50 for its annual report. — The recurring figure covers the annual report plus any flat state entity tax. Source: Hawaii's published filing fee schedule, verified July 2026.

Articles of Organization$51

Annual Report$12.50

First-year state cost$63.50

Five-year state cost$113.50

How much does it cost to form an LLC in Hawaii?

Hawaii's Articles of Organization (Form LLC-1) cost $50, plus a $1.00 State Archives fee, with optional expedited review for $25. The recurring cost is unusually low: $12.50 to file the annual report online (the paper fee is $15.00), due by the end of the calendar quarter containing the LLC's registration date. The real cost driver is tax, not filings. Hawaii's General Excise Tax runs 4% of gross income (4.5% on Oahu with the county surcharge) and the GET license itself costs a one-time $20.

Which fees does a Hawaii LLC pay, and how often?

Cost	Amount	How often	Charged by
Articles of Organization (Form LLC-1)	$51	One time	Hawaii Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, Business Registration Division
Annual Report	$12.50	Every year	Hawaii Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs
Required state cost, first year	$63.50	N/A	N/A
Registered agent service (optional)	$50 to $300	Every year	Commercial provider
Expedite and special handling fees in our record: Expedited review ($25)	$25	One time	Hawaii Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, Business Registration Division
Name reservation (optional)	$10	One time	Hawaii Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, Business Registration Division
Certificate of good standing (optional)	$5	Per copy	Hawaii Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, Business Registration Division

The $50 filing fee is the same online and by mail; BREG also collects a separate $1.00 State Archives preservation fee on permanent records.

General Excise Tax (GET): Not a flat entity tax: GET is 4% of gross income for most activities (0.5% for wholesaling/manufacturing), plus a 0.5% Oahu county surcharge in effect January 1, 2007 through December 31, 2030. There is a one-time $20 fee to obtain the GET license.

DCCA's domestic LLC registration instructions and fee schedule list no newspaper publication step or fee.

Registered agent is listed separately because it is a commercial service, not a state charge. Commercial registered-agent services, not a state charge. Range and $125 midpoint match the assumption used by /tools/llc-true-cost. Most states let you serve as your own registered agent at no cost if you have a physical in-state address. Run your own numbers in the true-cost calculator. For what formation services charge on top of these state fees, see the best LLC services in Hawaii.

Next steps for an LLC in Hawaii

What does a Hawaii LLC cost over five years?

State charges only in the first column; the second adds a registered-agent service at the $125/yr market midpoint.

Period	State cost only	With registered agent
Year 1 (formation + first filing)	$63.50	$188.50
Each year after	$12.50/yr	$137.50/yr
Five-year total	$113.50	$738.50

First filing timing: An entity registered during the same year in which an annual report would otherwise be due is not required to file a report for that year, so the first annual report is due in the entity's registration quarter of the following year.

Is Hawaii expensive compared with other states?

Hawaii ranks 6th cheapest of 50 states on first-year cost , $168.66 below the $232.16 national average. On ongoing annual cost it ranks 13th.

Cheaper state	First-year cost	You would save
Montana	$35	$28.50
Arizona	$50	$13.50
Missouri	$50	$13.50

A cheaper filing fee elsewhere rarely saves money if you live and operate in Hawaii. Doing business here with an out-of-state LLC generally means registering it as a foreign LLC in Hawaii anyway. Paying both states. See foreign qualification in Hawaii before forming elsewhere to save on fees.

When is the Hawaii filing deadline, and what happens if you miss it?

Annual Report

Frequency	every year
Due	By the end of the calendar quarter in which the LLC's registration date falls: registration date Jan 1, Mar 31 → due March 31; Apr 1, Jun 30 → due June 30; Jul 1, Sep 30 → due September 30; Oct 1, Dec 31 → due December 31, each year
Fee	$12.50
Late penalty	$10

DCCA assesses a $10.00 late fee per year delinquent, payable with the online filing.

An LLC that stops filing can be administratively terminated; BREG's fee schedule lists an 'Application for Reinstatement for Administratively Terminated Limited Liability Company' at $25.00 ($25.00 expedited). The statutory number of missed reports before termination was not confirmed from a primary source in this pass.

Full Hawaii annual report filing guide · Deadline calculator

What cost traps are specific to Hawaii?

GET is charged on gross receipts, not profit

Hawaii's General Excise Tax is 4% of gross income statewide plus a 0.5% Oahu surcharge, so an LLC with revenue but no profit still owes GET. A far bigger annual cost than the $12.50 annual report.

Annual report deadline follows your registration quarter

The report is not due on a single statewide date: an LLC registered in August must file by September 30 every year, and DCCA adds a $10 late fee for each year delinquent.

Frequently Asked Questions

: Filing Articles of Organization (Form LLC-1) with the Business Registration Division costs $50, plus a $1.00 State Archives fee. Expedited review adds $25. If you will sell goods or services, budget another one-time $20 for the General Excise Tax license.
: Hawaii charges $12.50 to file the annual report online, or $15.00 on paper. It is due by the end of the calendar quarter that contains your LLC's registration date, March 31, June 30, September 30, or December 31.
: An entity registered in the same year the report would fall due does not have to file for that year, so your first annual report is due in your registration quarter of the following year. For example, an LLC registered in May 2026 files its first annual report by June 30, 2027.
: DCCA assesses a $10.00 late fee for each year you are delinquent, and you can still file the overdue report online. Continued non-filing can lead to administrative termination; reinstating an administratively terminated Hawaii LLC costs $25.

Where do these numbers come from?

Every fee above was checked against Hawaii's own published sources on July 29, 2026 , the Hawaii Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, Business Registration Division fee schedule, the governing statute, and where a state-level tax applies, the state tax authority. Commercial formation-service pages were not used.

The first-year total is the Articles of Organization fee plus the first year of any recurring state charge. Where a state's first report is not due until the following year, that is noted above. The five-year total is the filing fee plus five years of recurring charges, which avoids the timing question entirely. Registered-agent service is excluded from all state figures.

Sources

8 documents

Each entry below is a document recorded in our verified Hawaii 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. Where we hold the citation but no stable public link, the citation is printed on its own rather than pointed at a guessed address.

cca.hawaii.gov/breg/registration/dllc/
cca.hawaii.gov/breg/registration/dllc/fees/
cca.hawaii.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/Form-Fee-Schedule-12-2022.pdf
cca.hawaii.gov/first-quarter-hawai%CA%BBi-annual-business-reports-due/
tax.hawaii.gov/geninfo/get/
ags.hawaii.gov/archives/preservation-fee-refund/
Hawaii law: Rev. 12/2022 (data confidence)
Hawaii law: HRS ch. 428 (data confidence)

More for Hawaii LLCs

Start and set up

Taxes, money and growth

Stay compliant

Operate in other states

A Hawaii LLC operating elsewhere

Compare structures

By owner type

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