West Virginia Secretary of State
West Virginia Business Entity Search
Last updated . Register data is refreshed nightly.
Check whether a business name is already on file with the West Virginia Secretary of State. Free, no account, all entity types.
West Virginia Business Entity Search
Search the state's official business records.
West Virginia's register is at apps.sos.wv.gov, free and without an account. It is the only state in the country that tells you its wildcard character.
The percent sign
Put a % where the unknown part of a name goes.
Searching %Fraternal%1234% finds Fraternal Order Eagles 1234 ABCD, IBPOE Fraternal Order 1234 and anything else with those two fragments in that order, whatever sits between them.
Every register does something like this internally. West Virginia is the only one that documents it on the page and hands you the control. If you know two pieces of a name and not the middle, or you are looking for a lodge or a chapter number buried in a longer title, it is the most precise tool any state offers.
Four result sets, not one
This is the mistake to avoid here.
A search for Acme returns 144 matching records split across four types, and the view you land on is not the only one. The registrations and reservations view is where reserved names live: names somebody has claimed but not yet built a company around.
Read only the first list and you will conclude a name is free when it is reserved. Check all four before you decide anything.
What the results carry
Organization name, org ID, type, effective date, established date, termination date, the reason it was terminated, the charter, and the class.
The reason-for-termination column is unusual and useful. Most registers tell you a company is gone; West Virginia tells you why it went, and a company terminated for an administrative lapse is a different proposition from one dissolved on purpose.
The record
Organization type, class, and whether it is domestic or foreign. Effective, established and filing dates. The charter. Termination date and the reason for it. The business purpose in prose.
Then the agent and officers.
Who decides
Four result views and a wildcard will show you everything on file. Whether your own filing is accepted is decided under the West Virginia Uniform Limited Liability Company Act, W. Va. Code Chapter 31B.
Before you rely on it
Use the percent sign. It is the only wildcard any state gives you and it is documented on the page.
Check all four result views, especially registrations and reservations.
Read the termination reason, not just the termination date.
West Virginia filing facts
| Filing | Fee |
|---|---|
| Articles of Organization | $100.00 |
| Annual report | $25.00 |
| Name reservation | $25.00 new registration, $10.00 otherwise |
West Virginia waives the formation fee entirely for veteran-owned organizations. Only Pennsylvania does the same among the states verified so far. If that applies to you, it is worth knowing before you pay.
The annual report has an unusual window: it must be filed between 1 January and 30 June of each year following the calendar year in which the business was registered. Not a rolling anniversary like New Jersey, not a fixed deadline like Mississippi's 15 April. A six-month window that opens on New Year's Day.
At $100 to form and $25 a year, West Virginia is cheap on both counts. The $25 annual is a quarter of New Hampshire's and a sixth of the District's effective rate.
19,430 applications arrived over the 52 weeks to 26 September 2026, up 22.1%, 78 a business day, and 43rd of 51 by volume.
What the register will not tell you
West Virginia has 3,276 live registered marks, one of the smallest pools in the country, and its crowded words are not generic at all:
| word | live marks | times more common than nationally |
|---|---|---|
| greenbrier | 208 | 1,325x |
| hatfield | 83 | 929x |
| mccoy | 74 | 419x |
| virginia | 116 | 83x |
| west | 119 | 25x |
| mountain | 87 | 15x |
| health | 90 | 4x |
Greenbrier at 1,325 times the national rate is the second-steepest single word we have measured, behind only Alaska's own name. The Greenbrier is a resort in White Sulphur Springs, and 208 marks in a register of three thousand carry the word.
Hatfield at 929x and McCoy at 419x are the feud: two surnames that in any other state would be ordinary, and here are among the most heavily marked words in the register.
That is a naming landscape shaped almost entirely by three proper nouns. Outside them, West Virginia is open country: mountain at 15x is the only other word above ordinary, and health at 4x is nothing.
If your name uses Greenbrier, Hatfield or McCoy, check the federal register first. Almost anything else is clear.
Filing spreads across the state rather than concentrating: Morgantown 14.1%, Charleston 9.2%, Wheeling 6.9%.
What the West Virginia portal looks like
Captured from the live register. Personal names and addresses are blacked out; everything else is as the state publishes it.
West Virginia Secretary of State business services
Business registrations in West Virginia are held by the West Virginia 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 | apps.sos.wv.gov/business/corporations |
|---|---|
| Phone | (304) 558-8000 |
| Address | Office of the Secretary of State, State Capitol Building, Charleston, WV 25305 |
| Office hours | 8:30 a.m.-5:00 p.m. |
| LLC filing fee | $100 |
| Processing | 5-7 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 West Virginia business entity searches
How do I check if an LLC exists in West Virginia?
Search the name on this page or on the state's own portal. What West Virginia does by default is worth knowing before you read the result: keyword based, with % as an explicit wildcard (documented on the page, 10 Sep). 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 West Virginia?
Search the name, then open the record rather than reading the results line. You get organisation type, class and whether it is domestic or foreign, effective, established and filing dates, the charter, termination date and the reason for it and business purpose and charter county. 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 West Virginia business name is approved?
Not on its own. A no-match result means the name is not on the West Virginia register today, which is a preliminary answer rather than approval: West Virginia Secretary of State decides when it reviews the filing. Worth knowing about West Virginia in particular: reading only the first list is the mistake here. A search for Acme returns 144 matching records split across four types, and the registrations and reservations view is where you find names somebody has put a hold on without forming anything. The state also notes it makes no representation as to the correctness or completeness of what you are looking at.
Can I look up who owns a business in West Virginia?
The West Virginia 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 West Virginia?
West Virginia Secretary of State charges $100 to file the Articles of Organization, which is the document that forms the company, and currently takes 5-7 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
- West Virginia business entity search, the official register this page queries.
- Filing fees and processing times: West Virginia Secretary of State: annual reports page and business form fee schedule, verified 2026-09-10. Current schedules are published by the West Virginia 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: compiled from published directories and not yet confirmed against the contact page published by the West Virginia Secretary of State. Telephone the office before relying on an address.
- Naming and reporting rules: West Virginia Secretary of State: annual reports page and business form fee schedule.
- Naming statute: W. Va. Code 31B-1-105, published by the state.
- State seal: public domain image via Wikimedia Commons.