Your Iowa LLC Is Doing Business in Another State
The short answer. You keep one LLC. It stays registered in Iowa, which charges $15 a year to keep it in good standing, and a state that finds you are doing business there adds its own registration and its own filings on top. Whether your activity counts is decided by that state's own rule, not by this page. Of the 47 other states that have one figure to compare, 44 cost more in year-one registration than Iowa's own first-year total of $65, and 3 cost less. Tennessee and Washington are outside those figures: Tennessee's fee scales with member count from $300, and Washington's $180 is before back fees, so neither has one figure to compare.
What you keep paying in Iowa
When the Biennial Report is due. Between January 1 and April 1 of each odd-numbered calendar year
Every Iowa fee behind these figures is broken out on what an LLC costs in Iowa.
What a second state adds
These are the states closest to Iowa’s own cost line, plus the three dearest to enter. Each figure is that state’s first-year registration cost for an out-of-state LLC, beside what it charges every year after. Whether your activity counts as doing business there depends on the facts, and each state defines it differently.
| State | Year one to register | State charges, each year after | Against your year one ($65) |
|---|---|---|---|
| South Dakota | $750 | $55/yr | $685 more |
| Texas | $750 | None | $685 more |
| Massachusetts | $500 | $520/yr | $435 more |
| Colorado | $100 | $25/yr | $35 more |
| Ohio | $99 | None | $34 more |
| Kentucky | $90 | from $190/yr | $25 more |
| California | $70 | $810/yr | $5 more |
| Montana | $70 | None | $5 more |
| Utah | $59 | $18/yr | $6 less |
| Hawaii | $50 | $12.50/yr | $15 less |
| Michigan | $50 | $25/yr | $15 less |
A state charge of None is not a tax of none. The column is the recurring charge our fee dataset records, and a state that asks for no recurring filing may still levy an entity-level tax that sits outside it.
What we verified about Iowa's own costs
Our notes, from Iowa's published fee schedules and statutes.
Iowa is one of the cheapest states to keep an LLC alive: $50 for the certificate of organization (Iowa Code 489.122(1)(c)) and then only a biennial report, $30 filed electronically through Fast Track Filing or $45 on paper (Iowa Admin. Code 721 to 40.7(2)). LLCs file in odd-numbered years only, between January 1 and April 1, so the recurring cost averages $15/year online. Iowa charges $100 for a foreign LLC's application for certificate of registration, and just $5 for a certificate of existence or for reinstatement after administrative dissolution.
Paper filing costs 50% more. Iowa's LLC biennial report is $30 through the Secretary of State's electronic system but $45 on paper (Iowa Admin. Code 721 to 40.7(2)), and the paper fee is the only one payable by check.
Odd-year-only filing window is easy to miss. The report can only be filed between January 1 and April 1 of an odd-numbered year, and an LLC formed in an even year does not file until the following odd year, a two-year gap that leads owners to forget the deadline entirely.
Dissolution clock starts 60 days after April 1. Iowa Code 489.708(2) lets the secretary of state begin administrative dissolution once the biennial report is 60 days late, roughly the end of May in a filing year, even though there is no dollar penalty for filing late.
Frequently Asked Questions
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.