Pennsylvania Department of State
Pennsylvania Business Entity Search
Last updated . Register data is refreshed nightly.
Check whether a business name is already on file with the Pennsylvania Department of State. Free, no account, all entity types.
Pennsylvania Business Entity Search
Search the state's official business records.
Pennsylvania's register is at file.dos.pa.gov, run by the Department of State. Free, no account.
It has the cheapest recurring filing in the country, and it only started charging it last year.
The annual report is new
Until 2025, most Pennsylvania entities filed nothing annually. The state replaced a decennial report (once every ten years) with an annual report due 30 September, at $7.
Two things follow from that.
Seven dollars is the cheapest recurring state filing we have measured, below New York's $9 biennial statement and a fraction of Massachusetts's $500.
A lot of Pennsylvania companies are not in the habit. The requirement is new enough that the first cycles will catch people who have never filed anything annually, and a company showing as delinquent may simply not have noticed the law changed.
It tells you how far behind it is
Pennsylvania publishes a processed-through date. On 10 September it had handled everything received through 8 September, a two-day lag, which is among the tightest of the states that publish the figure at all.
New Mexico runs a week behind. Michigan three days. Tennessee's moved forward during a single working morning.
So a company formed this week may not be here yet, and Pennsylvania tells you exactly how recent the gap is rather than leaving you to guess.
Switch the filter
The search filter is set to Starts with. A name sitting inside a longer registered name will not appear until you change it to Contains.
That is the same trap Michigan sets, on the same software. The two portals share a vendor, with an identical layout, an identical Advanced toggle and an identical processed-through banner. North Dakota, Idaho, Montana and New Mexico run it too, each configured differently. Do not carry a habit from one to another.
Beyond the filter you get filing type, status and a filing date range. Trademarks, UCC filings and CROP registrations each sit on their own tab.
Reading a result
The name with its filing number, the initial filing date, the status, the entity type, where it was formed, and the address.
Open a record and you get the same core detail plus buttons to request a certificate, view the filing history, and request access.
Who decides
What is on the register is what was filed. What the Commonwealth will accept is decided by the Department of State on examination, under 15 Pa. Cons. Stat. Chapter 88, the Pennsylvania limited liability company provisions.
Before you rely on it
Change Starts with to Contains before concluding a name is free.
Read the processed-through date if the company you are looking for is recent.
Do not assume the annual report has always existed. A gap in filings before 2025 means nothing.
Pennsylvania filing facts
| Filing | Fee |
|---|---|
| Certificate of Organization | $125.00 |
| Annual report, due 30 September | $7.00 |
Pennsylvania waives the formation fee entirely for veterans and reservists who provide proof of status. Only West Virginia does the same among the states verified here.
At $125 to form, Pennsylvania sits mid-table: more than Iowa's $50, less than Alaska's $250. On the recurring side it is the cheapest in the country: $7 a year, against Massachusetts's $500, Delaware's $400 tax, and Rhode Island's real $450.
Over ten years a Pennsylvania LLC pays $70 in annual filings. A Massachusetts one pays $5,000.
169,330 applications arrived over the 52 weeks to 26 September 2026, 677 a business day, up 11.7% and 11th of 51 by volume.
What the register will not tell you
Pennsylvania has 95,289 live registered marks, and the crowded words are a single sector:
| word | live marks | times more common than nationally |
|---|---|---|
| philadelphia | 810 | 33x |
| penn | 653 | 30x |
| medical | 729 | 3x |
| institute | 789 | 3x |
| center | 1,195 | 2x |
| system | 786 | 2x |
| health | 1,636 | 2x |
Health appears in 1,636 marks, more than any other word in the state, with center at 1,195, medical at 729 and system at 786 behind it. That is a healthcare economy showing up wholesale in its brands, and institute at 789 belongs to the same cluster.
Only philadelphia at 33x and penn at 30x are genuinely concentrated. The health words sit at two or three times normal, which is ordinary in lift terms but very large in volume: there are more Pennsylvania marks containing health than there are marks of any kind in Alaska.
The practical reading: if you are naming a Pennsylvania health business, the ground is crowded even though the multiplier does not look alarming. Volume matters as much as lift when the question is whether somebody got there first.
Philadelphia files 15.4% of the state's marks, Pittsburgh 10.6%.
What the Pennsylvania portal looks like
Captured from the live register. Personal names and addresses are blacked out; everything else is as the state publishes it.
Pennsylvania Department of State business services
Business registrations in Pennsylvania are held by the Pennsylvania Department 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 | file.dos.pa.gov/search/business |
|---|---|
| Phone | (717) 787-1057 |
| Address | Bureau of Corporations and Charitable Organizations, 401 North Street, Room 206, Harrisburg, PA 17120 |
| Office hours | 8:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. |
| LLC filing fee | $125 |
| Processing | 7-10 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 Pennsylvania business entity searches
How do I check if an LLC exists in Pennsylvania?
Search the name on this page or on the state's own portal. What Pennsylvania does by default is worth knowing before you read the result: starts with. 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 Pennsylvania?
Search the name, then open the record rather than reading the results line. You get the initial filing date, its status, where it was formed, the filing type and buttons to request a certificate, view history and request access. 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 Pennsylvania business name is approved?
Not on its own. A no-match result means the name is not on the Pennsylvania register today, which is a preliminary answer rather than approval: Pennsylvania Department of State decides when it reviews the filing. Worth knowing about Pennsylvania in particular: the filter is set to Starts with. A name sitting inside a longer registered name will not appear until you switch it to Contains.
Can I look up who owns a business in Pennsylvania?
The Pennsylvania 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 Pennsylvania?
Pennsylvania Department of State charges $125 to file the Certificate of Organization, which is the document that forms the company, and currently takes 7-10 business days to process. Reserving a name beforehand is a separate and smaller fee. Confirm the figure with the state before you file: schedules move.
Sources
- Pennsylvania business entity search, the official register this page queries.
- Filing fees and processing times: Pennsylvania Department of State: Annual Reports page and Pennsylvania Limited Liability Company page, verified 2026-09-10. Current schedules are published by the Pennsylvania Department 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.
- Register copy: bulk data published by data.pa.gov, last checked October 7, 2026.
- Office contact details: compiled from published directories and not yet confirmed against the contact page published by the Pennsylvania Department of State. Telephone the office before relying on an address.
- Naming and reporting rules: Pennsylvania Department of State: Annual Reports page and Pennsylvania Limited Liability Company page.
- Naming statute: 15 Pa. C.S. 204, published by the state.
- State seal: public domain image via Wikimedia Commons.