Georgia Secretary of State
Georgia Business Entity Search
Last updated . Register data is refreshed nightly.
Check whether a business name is already on file with the Georgia Secretary of State. Free, no account, all entity types.
Georgia Business Entity Search
Search the state's official business records.
Georgia's register is at ecorp.sos.ga.gov, run by the Corporations Division of the Secretary of State. Free, no account.
It is one of very few states that tells you outright not to rely on it.
The state says this is not a name availability search
Printed on the page: this search is not intended to serve as a name availability search.
Nebraska says something similar and gives you an address to write to. Georgia simply tells you the tool is not built for the question and points you at the Corporations Division.
That is worth taking at face value. Treat a clear result here as a starting point, not an answer, and confirm with the Division before you commit to anything: printing, signage, a domain.
It ignores spaces and punctuation
Search Acme and you get A & C Meats, A C Meters LLC and A. C. Mechanic Equipment Company alongside the actual Acmes.
That looks like the search misfiring and it is the state showing you how it reads names. Spaces are not a difference; nor are full stops or ampersands. Ohio, Massachusetts, South Carolina, Idaho and New Hampshire all do some version of the same thing.
So a result that looks like your name said out loud is a conflict, whatever the typography, and that is precisely the standard the Division will apply to your filing.
Contains is already selected
A rare good default. Georgia offers Starts With, Contains and Exact Match, and starts you on Contains.
Separate tabs search trademarks and service of process, so a mark check is one click rather than a different website.
Reading a result
The business name, the control number, the business type, the principal office address, the registered or designated agent, and the status.
Both the address and the agent are in the grid, which puts Georgia with Washington, New Hampshire and Indiana in the group where you can scan a page of results without opening anything.
The record adds the business purpose, the date of formation or registration, the state of formation, and the last year an annual registration was filed.
Who decides
The register records what was filed, and the state has already told you the search is not the availability question. That is decided by the Corporations Division on examination, under the Georgia Limited Liability Company Act, O.C.G.A. Title 14, Chapter 11.
Before you rely on it
Believe the disclaimer. Georgia says this is not a name availability search.
Read the fragments as conflicts. A & C Meats came back for a reason.
Use the trademark tab while you are there.
Georgia filing facts
| Filing | Fee | Made up of |
|---|---|---|
| Articles of Organization | $110.00 | $100.00 + $10.00 service charge |
| Certificate of Authority (foreign) | $235.00 | $225.00 + $10.00 service charge |
| Annual registration | $60.00 | $50.00 + $10.00 service charge |
| Annual registration, amended | $30.00 | |
| Late penalty | $25.00 |
Georgia adds a $10 service charge to every filing, and prints the fee, the charge and the total as three separate lines. A source quoting "$100 to form in Georgia" has read the first line and stopped.
The real numbers are $110 and $60.
Expediting is priced steeply at $1,200 for one hour, but there is a detail worth knowing: annual registrations filed online are processed immediately with no expedite fee at all. If your urgency is about a registration rather than a formation, you do not need to pay for speed.
At $110 to form and $60 a year Georgia sits mid-table: dearer than Montana's $35 and Utah's $59, well below Massachusetts's $500.
The state that answers the name question outright fields 281,330 applications over the 52 weeks to 26 September 2026: 1,125 a business day, up 14.8%, 5th of 51 by volume.
What the register will not tell you
Georgia has 80,589 live registered marks, and the state and its capital sit level at the top:
| word | live marks | times more common than nationally |
|---|---|---|
| atlanta | 1,386 | 37x |
| georgia | 1,587 | 37x |
| southern | 748 | 6x |
| black | 1,047 | 2x |
| get | 627 | 2x |
| collection | 513 | 2x |
Atlanta and Georgia both run at 37 times the national rate, which is unusual, since in most states the state name leads clearly. Here they are indistinguishable, and Atlanta files 35.6% of the state's marks against Alpharetta's 6.1%.
Below the two place names and southern at 6x, nothing is contested. Black, get and collection sit at twice normal, which is ordinary.
So Georgia's naming landscape is narrow and shallow: two crowded words, one mild regional one, and open country after that.
What the Georgia portal looks like
Captured from the live register. Personal names and addresses are blacked out; everything else is as the state publishes it.
Georgia Secretary of State business services
Business registrations in Georgia are held by the Georgia 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 | ecorp.sos.ga.gov/BusinessSearch |
|---|---|
| Phone | (404) 656-2817 |
| Address | Corporations Division, 2 MLK Jr. Dr. S.E., Suite 315, Floyd W. Tower, Atlanta, GA 30334 |
| Office hours | 8:00 A.M. to 4:00 P.M. |
| LLC filing fee | $110 |
| Processing | 7 to 10 business days online, 15 business days paper |
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 Georgia business entity searches
How do I check if an LLC exists in Georgia?
Search the name on this page or on the state's own portal. What Georgia does by default is worth knowing before you read the result: contains. 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 Georgia?
Search the name, then open the record rather than reading the results line. You get control number, business type and status, business purpose, principal office address and date of formation or registration. 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 Georgia business name is approved?
Not on its own. A no-match result means the name is not on the Georgia register today, which is a preliminary answer rather than approval: Georgia Secretary of State decides when it reviews the filing. Worth knowing about Georgia in particular: it says on the page that this search is not intended to serve as a name availability search. Treat a clear result as a starting point and confirm with the Corporations Division before you file.
Can I look up who owns a business in Georgia?
The Georgia 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 Georgia?
Georgia Secretary of State charges $110 to file the Articles of Organization, which is the document that forms the company, and currently takes 7 to 10 business days online, 15 business days paper to process. Reserving a name beforehand is a separate and smaller fee. Confirm the figure with the state before you file: schedules move.
Sources
- Georgia business entity search, the official register this page queries.
- Filing fees and processing times: Georgia Secretary of State, Corporations Division Filing Fees, effective 6 September 2025, verified 2026-09-10. Current schedules are published by the Georgia Secretary of State.
- 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: Georgia Secretary of State, confirmed against the office’s own contact page.
- Naming and reporting rules: Georgia Secretary of State, Corporations Division Filing Fees, effective 6 September 2025.
- Naming statute: O.C.G.A. 14-11-207, full text via Justia.
- State seal: public domain image via Wikimedia Commons.