Arkansas Secretary of State
Arkansas Business Entity Search
Last updated . Register data is refreshed nightly.
Check whether a business name is already on file with the Arkansas Secretary of State. Free, no account, all entity types.
Arkansas Business Entity Search
Search the state's official business records.
Arkansas keeps its register at sos.arkansas.gov, run by Business and Commercial Services. Free, no account.
It will hand you the results as a spreadsheet, which almost no state will.
There is a Download CSV button
On the results page.
Alongside it, a separate bulk data service for larger extracts.
Most registers make you read results on screen and copy them out by hand. Delaware and Maine explicitly forbid automated collection; Illinois restricts you to individual searches. Arkansas puts an export button on the page.
If your question involves more than one company (mapping an industry, checking a list of names, seeing what an agent represents), that button saves the work everywhere else costs you.
Name and fictitious name are separate boxes
And it is one or the other.
A trading name will not surface from the company name box. So checking whether a name is free takes two searches here, not one. It is the same arrangement North Carolina uses, and the same trap.
Search both before you decide anything.
Reading a result
The name, the city, the state, and the status. Filters cover corporation type and the registered agent's state, both showing everything until you narrow them.
The agent-state filter is unusual and quietly useful: it lets you separate companies represented in Arkansas from those using an out-of-state agent.
The record
Corporation name, any fictitious names, the filing number, the filing type, the act it was filed under, status, principal address and registered agent.
Citing the act on the record is a habit only a handful of states have: Minnesota prints an MN Statute field, Iowa cites the statute against every fee. It tells you which rules govern the entity in front of you before you start reasoning about it.
Who decides
Filings are recorded; acceptance is judged by Business and Commercial Services on examination, under the Arkansas Uniform Limited Liability Company Act, Ark. Code Title 4, Chapter 38.
Before you rely on it
Search both boxes. Company name and fictitious name are separate.
Use the CSV export if your question covers more than one company.
Check the act cited on the record to know which rules apply.
Arkansas filing facts
| Filing | Online | On paper | Form |
|---|---|---|---|
| Certificate of Organization | $45.00 | $50.00 | LL-01 |
| Fictitious name | $22.50 | $25.00 | DN-18 |
| Name reservation | $22.50 | $25.00 | RN-06 |
| Name transfer | $22.50 | $25.00 | TRN-06 |
| Dissolution | $45.00 | $50.00 | LL-04 |
| Franchise tax registration with formation | no fee | ||
| Final franchise tax report on dissolution | $150.00 |
Arkansas charges less online than on paper, the opposite of most states, and the opposite of Minnesota, which adds $20 to go online. The discount is modest (10%) but it is the right way round.
At $45 to form, Arkansas is among the cheapest in the country, behind Kentucky's $40 and Montana's $35.
Two things to watch. Registering for franchise tax at formation is free, so there is no hidden second fee at the start. But dissolving requires a final franchise tax report at $150, more than three times what it cost to form. As in Louisiana, closing costs more than opening, and by a wider margin.
We are not quoting an annual franchise tax figure or a name reservation period. A flat $150 due 1 May and a 120-day reservation both circulate; the $150 on the page we read is the dissolution report, not an annual charge, and we could not confirm the rest.
The cheap online rate is doing work. 46,570 applications came through in the 52 weeks to 26 September 2026: 186 a business day, up 24.8%, 35th of 51 by volume.
What the register will not tell you
Arkansas has 9,752 live registered marks, and the largest company in the world sits at the top of them:
| word | live marks | times more common than nationally |
|---|---|---|
| walmart | 235 | 440x |
| arkansas | 293 | 363x |
| ozark | 193 | 227x |
| parent | 175 | 93x |
| mark | 207 | 22x |
| choice | 207 | 9x |
Walmart at 440 times the national rate edges out the state's own name. The company is headquartered in Bentonville, and Bentonville files 15.0% of Arkansas's marks, against Little Rock's 17.6%. A town of fifty thousand files nearly as many trademarks as the state capital.
That is the single-company pattern seen in Kansas (coleman), North Dakota (bobcat) and Rhode Island (CVS), taken to its limit.
Ozark at 227x is the landscape, and parent at 93x is an oddity we have no sourced explanation for, so we are not offering one.
The practical reading: Walmart, Arkansas and Ozark are occupied. Beyond them the register is small and open.
What the Arkansas portal looks like
Captured from the live register. Personal names and addresses are blacked out; everything else is as the state publishes it.
Arkansas Secretary of State business services
Business registrations in Arkansas are held by the Arkansas Secretary of State, which maintains the public register this page searches, accepts new filings, and issues the certificates a bank or a counterparty may ask you for. Contact them directly for anything that has to be official.
| Business entity search | sos-corp-search.ark.org/corps |
|---|---|
| Phone | (501) 682-3409 |
| Address | Victory Building, 1401 W. Capitol Avenue, Suite 250, Little Rock, AR 72201 |
| Office hours | 8:00 a.m.-4:00 p.m. |
| LLC filing fee | $45 |
| Processing | 3-5 business days |
The office handles registration, not disputes. If a name is already taken, they will tell you it is unavailable but not who holds it beyond what the public record shows, and they will not advise on whether your name infringes someone’s mark.
Common questions about Arkansas business entity searches
How do I check if an LLC exists in Arkansas?
Search the name on this page or on the state's own portal. What Arkansas does by default is worth knowing before you read the result: no match toggle offered. A match means the entity is on file, and its status line tells you whether it is still active.
How do I verify a company is registered in Arkansas?
Search the name, then open the record rather than reading the results line. You get corporation name, any fictitious names, filing number, filing type and the act it was filed under. The status on the record is the one to trust: a dissolved company still appears in a search and still holds its name.
Does a clear search mean my Arkansas business name is approved?
Not on its own. A no-match result means the name is not on the Arkansas register today, which is a preliminary answer rather than approval: Arkansas Secretary of State decides when it reviews the filing. Worth knowing about Arkansas in particular: name and fictitious name are separate boxes and it is one or the other. A trading name will not surface from the company name box, so check both before deciding a name is unused.
Can I look up who owns a business in Arkansas?
The Arkansas register shows the registered agent and, depending on the filing type, officers or organizers. It does not list members or shareholders for every entity, so the register identifies who accepts legal service rather than who owns the company.
How much does it cost to register a business name in Arkansas?
Forming an LLC in Arkansas costs $45 in state filing fees, and currently takes 3-5 business days to process. Reserving a name before filing is a separate, smaller fee. Current schedules are set by Arkansas Secretary of State and change from time to time, so confirm them on the state's own site before you file.
Sources
- Arkansas business entity search, the official register this page queries.
- Filing fees and processing times: Arkansas Secretary of State, LLC Forms/Fees/Record Requests, verified 2026-09-10.
- Formation activity: Census Bureau Business Formation Statistics, retrieved via FRED at the Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis.
- Federal trademark data: United States Patent and Trademark Office, 3,374,058 live registrations cross-referenced against the state registers. Live excludes both abandoned applications and cancelled registrations.
- Office contact details: Arkansas Secretary of State, confirmed against the office’s own contact page.
- Naming and reporting rules: Arkansas Secretary of State, LLC Forms/Fees/Record Requests.
- Naming statute: Ark. Code 4-38-112, full text via Justia.
- State seal: public domain image via Wikimedia Commons.