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Trade License in Dubai
Every legal business in the UAE needs a license before it earns its first dirham, and the price difference between the cheapest and the most expensive route is enormous.
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UAE Trade License
What Is a Trade License?
A trade license is the government permit that makes your business legal in the UAE. It is issued by the Department of Economy and Tourism (DET) for Dubai mainland companies, or by a free zone authority for free zone companies. The license states your company name, your legal form and the exact activities you are allowed to carry out. Nothing else is permitted under it.
You need a valid license before you can sign contracts, invoice customers, open a business bank account, rent premises or sponsor visas. It is valid for one year and must be renewed annually. Operating without one carries a fine of AED 5,000, and unlicensed activity cannot be banked or insured.
1 Year
License validity, renewable annually
In short: the license is not paperwork after the fact. It is the legal foundation everything else in your business stands on.
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AED 5,000
Fine for operating unlicensed
- Who issues licenses
- The Department of Economy and Tourism (DET) for Dubai mainland, individual free zone authorities for free zones.
- Typical timeline
- 3 to 4 weeks for a mainland company, 2 to 5 working days for straightforward free zone setups.
- Core documents
- Passport copies, visa or entry stamp, trade name reservation, initial approval, Memorandum of Association and Ejari lease for mainland.
- After the license
- Corporate tax registration with the FTA is mandatory for every new company.
What Bestax Offers
We handle the entire licensing process from first question to active company, then stay on as your accountants. One team, one fee sheet, no handoffs.
Free consultation and cost sheet.
We confirm the right activity, jurisdiction and legal form, then give you a written line-by-line budget for year one and year two before you pay anything.
Complete license processing.
Trade name reservation, initial approval, documentation, Memorandum of Association and license issuance, for mainland, free zone or offshore companies.
Visas and establishment card.
Investor and employee visas, medical tests and Emirates ID coordination.
Bank account opening support.
We prepare the file banks actually ask for, which shortens approval times.
Corporate tax and VAT registration.
As FTA registered tax agents, we register your new company on time, so the AED 10,000 late registration penalty never touches you.
Accounting and renewal management.
Compliant bookkeeping from month one and license renewal handled before the deadline, every year.
Fee Breakdown
Dubai Trade License Cost
Most quotes you see online show only the license issuance fee. The full picture for a mainland company licensed by Dubai's Department of Economy and Tourism (DET) includes every step below.
| Step | Fee (AED) | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Trade name reservation | 620 | Name held for 180 days |
| Initial approval | 120 | Confirms DET has no objection |
| Memorandum of Association notarisation | 900 to 2,000 | LLCs and partnerships only |
| License issuance | 10,000 to 25,000+ | Varies by license type and activities |
| Knowledge and innovation fees | 20 | AED 10 each per transaction |
| Ejari (tenancy registration) | 220 | Mandatory for mainland offices |
| Market fee | 5% of annual rent | Collected with the license, 20% for warehouses |
| Establishment card | 500 to 750 | Needed before hiring or sponsoring visas |
| Residence visa | 3,000 to 7,000 per person | Investor or employee |
Your final Dubai trade license cost depends mostly on three decisions: which activities you put on the license, whether you need physical premises, and how many visas you sponsor. Get those three right and you control the budget. Get them wrong and you pay for permissions you never use.
Planning a mainland company? Our business setup team in Dubai prepares a line-by-line cost sheet for your specific activity before you spend anything.
Mainland, Free Zone or Offshore: Which Jurisdiction Fits Your Budget
The UAE gives you three legal homes for a company, and they solve different problems.
| Factor | Mainland | Free zone | Offshore |
|---|---|---|---|
| Typical first-year cost | AED 15,000 to 35,000+ | AED 5,500 to 25,000 | From AED 5,500 |
| Trade directly with UAE mainland customers | Yes, unrestricted | Restricted, approvals needed | No |
| UAE residence visas | Yes | Yes, package dependent | No |
| Physical office required | Yes, with Ejari | Flexi desk usually enough | No |
| Best for | UAE-facing businesses, government contracts, retail | International services, e-commerce, startups | Holding assets, international invoicing |
Types of Business Licenses in Dubai
DET issues four main license categories, and your business activity decides which one you need.
Commercial license.
For buying and selling goods, import and export, retail and general trading. This is the license for any business whose revenue comes from products.
Professional license.
For services delivered through skill or knowledge: consulting, IT, marketing, design, training, repairs. It can be held as a sole establishment with 100 percent foreign ownership.
Industrial license.
For manufacturing, processing and assembly. It requires physical industrial premises and typically involves additional approvals before issue.
Tourism license.
For travel agencies, tour operators, holiday homes and hospitality activities, with extra oversight from DET's tourism arm.
Documents You Need, Stage by Stage
This is the paperwork that actually gets requested, organised by when you need it. Gather it early and the process moves fast.
Stage 1: Initial approval (individual shareholders)
- Passport copy for every shareholder
- UAE entry stamp, visit visa or residence visa copy for non-GCC nationals
- Emirates ID copy for UAE residents
- Proposed trade name reservation confirmation
Stage 1: Initial approval (corporate shareholders)
- Current trade license of the parent company
- Memorandum and Articles of Association of the parent
- Board resolution authorising the new establishment and naming the authorised signatory
- Passport or Emirates ID of the authorised signatory
For foreign parent companies opening a branch, every corporate document must be attested through the full chain: notarised in the home country, attested by the UAE Embassy there, counter-attested by the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and legally translated into Arabic. This chain takes weeks, so it is the first thing to start, not the last.
Stage 2: Between initial approval and license issue
- Notarised Memorandum of Association in Arabic (for LLCs and partnerships)
- Signed tenancy contract registered on Ejari (mainland companies)
- External approvals or NOCs where your activity requires them
Stage 3: Final submission
- Initial approval receipt (valid for six months, so do not let it lapse)
- Specimen signatures of the authorised signatories
- Complete document file including any sector NOCs
Free zone applications are lighter: typically passport copies, photos, an application form and, for some activities, a short business plan. Selling online? Confirm your activity wording against our guide to e-commerce license types in the UAE before you apply, because marketplaces and payment gateways check it when you onboard.
Your Checklist
Send us your passport copy and one paragraph about your business, and we will reply with your exact document checklist for the route you choose.
The Process, Step by Step
Here is the real sequence for a Dubai mainland company, with typical timings when documents are complete.
End to end, a clean mainland setup runs about 3 to 4 weeks. Straightforward free zone licenses are issued in 2 to 5 working days. Investor visa processing afterwards typically adds 7 to 14 working days. The step-by-step paperwork detail is in our guide to getting a UAE trade license.
1 to 2 working days
Choose activities and reserve your trade name
Activities are selected from DET's approved list and the name is reserved through DET's channels. The name must follow UAE naming rules, which is a two-minute check for us and a common rejection for DIY applicants.
2 to 3 working days
Obtain initial approval
DET confirms it has no objection to your activity, legal form and ownership. Initial approval is valid for six months.
3 to 5 working days
Sign the MOA and register your lease
The Memorandum of Association is notarised in Arabic, and your office lease is registered on Ejari. Free zone companies skip Ejari and use the zone's own facilities.
Timing varies
Clear external approvals where required
Most activities need none. Regulated ones do, and this is the step that decides your real timeline (see the next section).
1 to 2 working days
Pay and receive the license
DET issues the electronic license once the complete file is submitted.
External Approvals: Which Activities Need Extra Clearance
Most service and trading activities go straight through DET. Some need a second authority to say yes first, and knowing this in advance protects your timeline.
Healthcare activities
Dubai Health Authority (DHA)
Education and training
Knowledge and Human Development Authority (KHDA)
Restaurants and food businesses
Dubai Municipality food safety approvals
Engineering, transport, security and similar regulated fields
Their respective sector regulators, plus Civil Defence clearance where premises safety applies
Financial activities
Additional regulatory oversight, and several are excluded from free zone qualifying benefits
If your activity is on a regulated list, budget extra weeks and let us run the approval file in parallel with the license file. That parallel handling is often the difference between opening this quarter and opening next quarter.
Trade Name
Trade Name Rules: Get the Name Approved First Time
Name rejections waste days, and the rules are stricter than most founders expect. Before you fall in love with a name, check it against these requirements.
- The name must not have been registered before and must not conflict with existing trademarks.
- It cannot offend public morals or public order, and it cannot reference religions or governing authorities.
- If you name the business after a person, it must be the owner's full name, not a first name or surname on its own.
- The legal form abbreviation (LLC, EST and so on) appears with the name on the license.
- The name should make sense against your licensed activity. A name that promises one industry while the license says another invites questions from DET and from banks.
- Foreign language names are allowed, and reservation is confirmed before you proceed to initial approval.
We run the availability and compliance check before submission, reserve the name, and keep the reservation aligned with the six-month initial approval window so nothing expires mid-process.
Avoidable Delays
Common Mistakes That Delay Applications
After a decade of setups, the same handful of errors causes almost every delay we see. All of them are avoidable.
Choosing the wrong activity code.
The most common one. It causes rejected applications, rejected bank onboarding and rejected marketplace accounts. Fix: shortlist codes against what the business will actually invoice.
Letting initial approval expire.
It lasts six months. Founders who pause to negotiate an office sometimes overrun it and pay to restart.
Signing a lease before approvals are certain.
Rent starts running while a regulated activity waits for its NOC. Sequence the lease after the approvals are mapped.
Skipping the attestation chain.
Foreign corporate documents need embassy and ministry attestation plus Arabic translation. Starting this late adds weeks at the worst moment.
Ignoring the tax clock.
The company exists the day the license is issued, and corporate tax registration obligations start then, not when trading begins.
Buying the cheapest package without reading it.
No visa allocation, restricted activities and a steep renewal are the usual surprises. Read year two before paying for year one.
A thirty-minute planning call eliminates all six. That is the cheapest insurance in this entire process.
After the License: Registrations Every New Company Must Complete
The license starts your legal obligations rather than ending them, and this is where an accounting firm earns its keep over a setup-only agent.
Corporate tax registration is mandatory for every company, free zone included, profitable or not. Registering late costs AED 10,000, though the FTA currently waives the penalty if your first return is filed within seven months of your first tax period ending. The tax is 0 percent on taxable income up to AED 375,000 and 9 percent above it. Our corporate tax registration service completes this on EmaraTax as part of setup.
VAT registration becomes mandatory once taxable supplies pass AED 375,000 in 12 months, voluntary from AED 187,500. Approaching the threshold without registering is one of the most expensive mistakes a new business can make. See our VAT registration service.
Books and records must be kept from day one: seven years for corporate tax, five for VAT. Our accounting and bookkeeping team sets this up compliantly from your first invoice.
E-invoicing is coming: mandatory from 1 January 2027 for businesses with revenue of AED 50 million or more, and from 1 July 2027 for the rest. Companies formed now should pick invoicing software accordingly.
Frequently Asked Questions
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If your question is not here, ask it directly.
As of August 2026, published free zone packages start at about AED 5,500 to 5,750 in the northern emirates, with SHAMS in Sharjah at AED 5,750 among the most reliable low-cost options. Inside Dubai, the e-Trader permit at AED 1,070 per year is cheaper still, but it is a home-business permit with restrictions, not a full company license.
Budget AED 12,000 to 25,000 for DET licensing and registration fees for a commercial license, plus premises costs, a market fee of 5 percent of annual rent, and AED 3,000 to 7,000 per residence visa. Professional licenses start lower, around AED 10,000 to 15,000.
Free zone entry prices are lower, especially outside Dubai. But mainland licenses allow unrestricted trade across the UAE market, so the right answer depends on where your customers are. Compare two-year totals and market access together, not price alone.
Yes. Free zone packages include a registered address without a physical office, and the e-Trader permit runs from home. Mainland companies generally need an Ejari-registered premises.
Simple free zone licenses are often issued within two to five working days once documents are complete. Mainland licenses take longer when activities need external approvals.
No. Visa costs are broadly similar across zones, roughly AED 4,500 to 6,500 all-in per person once medical tests and Emirates ID are counted. A zone's license price says nothing about its visa price, so ask for both.
You must register for corporate tax straight away, but you only pay once taxable profit passes AED 375,000, and 0 percent applies below that. VAT registration only becomes mandatory at AED 375,000 of taxable supplies in 12 months. Registering on time costs nothing. Registering late costs AED 10,000.
A single license can carry multiple related activities, which is usually the cleaner solution. Where activities cannot legally sit together, or where you want mainland and free zone presence at the same time, the answer is a second license or a branch. We map this out before setup so you are not paying for two companies where one would do.
Much of the process can run remotely with a power of attorney, and many free zones complete licensing without a visit. Plan to be present for biometrics when your residence visa and Emirates ID are processed, and some banks ask to meet the signatory in person. We sequence the remote and in-person steps so one short trip covers everything that genuinely needs you here.
Marketplaces require a valid UAE license with an e-commerce or trading activity that matches what you sell. Free zone e-commerce licenses are the common route, and both marketplaces accept them. Get the activity wording checked before applying, because mismatched activities are a frequent cause of rejected seller accounts.