Dataset current to 16 Sep 2026

Points Architect

Formation

Non-Resident Company Formation

Five providers that will form a US LLC for a founder living outside the United States, compared on what the company costs to start and what it costs every year to keep standing.

Disclosure Links to providers on this page earn this site nothing. They go to the provider’s own site unmodified, with no tracking parameters. Affiliate relationships are planned from June 2027, and this notice changes on the day that does. Full disclosure.

01

The comparison

5 providers. Sort any column; the sorted or filtered view has its own address and can be linked to.

How the fee is charged
Registered agent
State of formation

3 of 5 providers · Clear

date checked against the provider’s own pagecalculated; oldest date among its inputspast its recheck window

Segments show the tier reached, not the score:BasicStandardStrongExcellent

Two totals, two horizons. Year-one total is what leaves the account to get the company registered: the provider's fee, the registered agent for the first year, and the state's own filing fee. Annual thereafter is what recurs from year two: the provider's fee only where it is a subscription, plus the agent renewal, plus the state's annual charge. The rubric weights the recurring figure higher because it repeats — a company held five years pays it four more times than the setup cost.

Scoring weights

rubric 2026.1

  • Year-one total cost40%
  • Annual cost thereafter60%

Set once per vertical and versioned. Changing a weight is a logged version bump, not routine upkeep — methodology.

Verification state

Dated fields in this table
40
Oldest check
16 Sep 2026
Most recent check
16 Sep 2026
Recheck window
90 days
Past that window
0

02

Ranked for a specific question

The same verified data, ordered by the figure that answers one decision rather than by the overall score.

03

Scope

What the figures cover, and what is deliberately absent — an omission a reader cannot see looks like an oversight.

What this table covers

  • Provider fees are read off each provider's own pricing page. State fees are read off the relevant Secretary of State's own fee schedule, not repeated from the provider.
  • Priced for a single-member LLC formed in Wyoming — the state most commonly used by non-resident founders who do not specifically need Delaware, and one that publishes both of its fees plainly.
  • Stripe Atlas forms Delaware entities only, so its state figures are Delaware's rather than Wyoming's. The states-available column makes that visible instead of burying it inside a total.

What it leaves out, and why

  • Whether a provider will obtain an EIN for an applicant with no Social Security Number. No provider states its policy on a pricing page, so it is not an attribute and forms no part of any score.
  • Filing turnaround times. These are published as marketing claims rather than commitments, and are not verifiable against a source.
  • Whether a US bank account application will actually be approved. That is not something a formation provider publishes, or controls.

Every figure above is dated to the last time it was checked against the provider’s own pricing page, not to when this page was published. See methodology for how scores are calculated from those figures.