Your Ohio LLC Is Doing Business in Another State
The short answer. You keep one LLC. It stays registered in Ohio, which charges no recurring state filing fee, though the LLC keeps whatever obligations Ohio attaches to it, 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, 41 cost more in year-one registration than Ohio's own first-year total of $99, and 6 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 Ohio
Every Ohio fee behind these figures is broken out on what an LLC costs in Ohio.
What a second state adds
These are the states closest to Ohio’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 ($99) |
|---|---|---|---|
| South Dakota | $750 | $55/yr | $651 more |
| Texas | $750 | None | $651 more |
| Massachusetts | $500 | $520/yr | $401 more |
| Colorado | $100 | $25/yr | $1 more |
| Iowa | $100 | $15/yr | $1 more |
| Idaho | $100 | None | $1 more |
| Maryland | $100 | $300/yr | $1 more |
| Nebraska | $100 | $12.50/yr | $1 more |
| New Hampshire | $100 | $100/yr | $1 more |
| New Mexico | $100 | None | $1 more |
| Virginia | $100 | $50/yr | $1 more |
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 Ohio's own costs
Our notes, from Ohio's published fee schedules and statutes.
Ohio charges $99 to file Articles of Organization (Form 533A) under ORC 111.16(F), and the same $99 to register a foreign LLC. There is no annual or biennial report for an Ohio LLC, so the recurring Secretary of State cost is $0. Expedited service is priced by rule at $100 for two business days, $200 for one business day and $300 for four business hours, charged on top of the $99 filing fee, and certification requests such as good standing certificates cannot be expedited. Name reservation is $39 and affixing the seal to a good standing certificate is $5, while copies are charged at up to $1 per page plus the $5 seal fee.
No annual report, but the Commercial Activity Tax can still reach you. Ohio LLCs file no periodic report, yet the CAT applies at 0.26% on taxable gross receipts above a $6 million annual exclusion for 2025 and later. Cross that line and you must reactivate a CAT account and file quarterly - annual CAT filing no longer exists.
Expedited service costs more than the filing itself. Ohio's expedite fees are $100, $200 and $300 depending on tier and are charged above and beyond the $99 filing fee, so a one-business-day formation costs $299. Certifications such as good standing certificates are not filings and cannot be expedited at any price.
Good standing certificates are cheap but copies are metered. ORC 111.16(K)(1) charges just $5 to create and affix the seal to a good standing certificate, but copies of filed documents are billed at up to $1 per page plus that $5 seal fee, so a certified copy of a long filing has no single flat price.
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.