Registered Agents Inc charges $200 a year. That is the highest published registered agent price I have verified in this category, and reading it that way would be a mistake.
The fee includes your annual report filing. Every other service I checked sells that as a separate paid add-on on top of the agent fee. So the number that looks like the most expensive option is a bundle, and whether it is expensive depends entirely on whether you were going to buy the other half anyway.
Here is what is published, what is not, and the arithmetic that decides it. I run Ecommerce Paradise, and I have spent the last stretch verifying registered agent prices across this whole category at the vendors’ own pages, because the figures circulating in comparison articles go stale faster than anyone updates them.
What Is Published
| Service | Price | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Registered agent | $200 per year, per state | Annual, recurring |
| Annual report filing | Included in the $200 | Stated as no extra cost |
| Online account access | Included | Document delivery and service management |
| LLC formation | Not published on the site | Shown during the order process |
The company’s wording on the agent page is direct: the service costs $200 a year, and with it you get registered agent service in your selected states, annual report or equivalent filing at no extra cost, and online account access.
Two caveats before anyone builds a budget on that. The $200 is per state, so a two-state footprint is $400. And “at no extra cost” refers to the service fee for preparing and filing the report. Your state’s own filing fee is a separate charge paid to the state, exactly as it is with every other provider and with doing it yourself.
What Is Not Published
Formation pricing does not appear on the website. There is no package table, no starting-at figure for filing an LLC. You proceed through an order process and the cost is shown there.
That is not unusual in this category and it is not sinister, but it does mean you cannot compare Registered Agents Inc against a formation competitor on a spreadsheet before you engage. If the formation fee is what you are shopping on, you will have to start an order to find out.
Worth noting the contrast, since it is the reason this article exists in the shape it does. The agent price, which is the recurring cost and the one that matters over years, is published plainly. The formation fee, which happens once, is not. That is the opposite of how most of this industry does it, and on balance it is the better way round.
One fee, agent and annual report together
$200 a year per state, with annual report filing included rather than sold as an add-on. State filing fees are separate, as they are everywhere.
The Agent-Only Comparison, Verified
These are the figures I checked directly on each company’s own page rather than taking from anybody’s comparison table, including my own older ones. Every one of these is an agent fee only, with annual report service sold separately unless stated.
| Service | Registered agent, per year | Annual report filing |
|---|---|---|
| Harbor Compliance | $99 first year, $149 renewal; $297 for three years holds $99 | Sold separately |
| MyCompanyWorks | From $119 | Sold separately |
| Northwest Registered Agent | $125 single state, $100 per state at five or more | Sold separately |
| Bizee | $149 standalone, free first year with formation | Sold separately |
| BusinessAnywhere | From $147 | Sold separately |
| ZenBusiness | $199 | Sold separately |
| Registered Agents Inc | $200 per state | Included |
| MyCorporation | $249, after $120 for the initial term | Sold separately |
On the agent line alone, Registered Agents Inc is second from the top. If all you want is somebody to accept service of process and forward it, you are paying $75 a year more than Northwest and $51 more than Harbor’s renewal rate, and there is no version of the arithmetic where that is a bargain.
Where the Bundle Changes the Answer
Now add the annual report back in, because most people filing an LLC do need it filed every year and a fair number of them pay somebody to do it.
I could not retrieve current annual report service prices from Harbor Compliance’s or Northwest’s own pages while writing this, so I am not going to quote figures I have not verified. What I can tell you is the structure, which is consistent across every provider I checked: the annual report is a separate line item with its own service fee, charged per state, per year, on top of the agent fee.
So the honest instruction is a subtraction rather than a table. Take whichever agent you are considering, find its annual report service fee, and add it to the agent fee. Then compare that total against $200. If the add-on costs more than the gap between your candidate’s agent price and $200, the bundle wins. If it costs less, or if you file the annual report yourself, it does not.
For a lot of readers of this site, filing it yourself is the right answer and worth saying plainly. An annual report is usually a short online form confirming details that have not changed, and in most states it takes about fifteen minutes once a year. Paying a service fee to have someone type your own address back into your state’s website is a convenience, not a necessity, and buying an agent bundle to get it included makes sense only if you were genuinely going to outsource it.
Where it stops being a fifteen-minute job is at volume. Five entities across four states is twenty deadlines a year, each with a different form, a different due date and a different penalty for missing it. That is administration, and administration is what this bundle is actually priced for.
If you only want an agent, pay agent prices
$125 a year for a single state, published openly, with a business address and mail scanning listed as included. That is the number if the annual report is not part of your problem.
The Multi-State Arithmetic Is Where This Gets Serious
Per-state pricing sounds mild until you multiply it, and this is the decision this product is really built around.
At $200 per state, three states is $600 a year and five is $1,000. Those are real numbers for a small operation, and they are the ones to model before you register anywhere new rather than after.
Two things push against that. The first is the annual report inclusion, which scales with you: at five states you are getting five annual report filings included rather than one, and if you would otherwise pay a per-state service fee for each, the gap narrows considerably. The second is that some competitors discount at volume, Northwest publishing $100 per state at five or more states being the clearest example I verified, so the cheaper option gets cheaper too.
The thing nobody tells you until it is too late is that you may not need the extra states at all. Registering as a foreign entity in a state is triggered by doing business there, and what counts varies by state. A dropshipping store shipping into a state is not automatically doing business in it. Before you pay any agent for a second state, work out whether the registration is genuinely required, because the agent fee is the small part of that decision. The state’s own registration cost, annual obligation and tax exposure are the large part.
Who This Suits
Multi-entity operators who want one predictable number. If you run several LLCs, a single per-state fee that covers both the agent and the annual report is administratively simpler than assembling two line items per entity per state. Simplicity has value at volume that it does not have at one entity.
Anyone who has ever missed an annual report. Falling out of good standing is one of those failures you discover at the worst possible moment, usually when a supplier or a bank runs a check during an application. If you have done it once, paying for it to be handled is a rational response.
People who want the recurring price up front. The agent fee is published plainly with no introductory rate and no renewal step-up, which is more than several better-known competitors manage. There is something to be said for a number that is the same in year two as in year one.
Who Should Look Elsewhere
A single-member LLC in one state who files their own annual report. You are paying $200 for a service you could get for $125 from Northwest or $99 a year from Harbor on a three-year prepay. The bundle is not doing anything for you.
Anyone shopping on formation price. It is not published, so you cannot compare without starting an order. If the filing fee is your decision criterion, the services that publish theirs are easier to shop.
Anyone who needs a business address as well. A registered agent address exists to accept service of process. It is not automatically an address you can put on a website, an invoice or a supplier dealer application. Northwest lists a business address and mail scanning inside its agent fee, which is a different bundle aimed at a different problem, and I have priced the standalone virtual mailbox route in my BusinessAnywhere pricing breakdown.
Non-US residents with no US presence. The sequence you need starts earlier than a registered agent and includes an EIN without a Social Security number, banking access and a US address. That is a different product category.
Questions Worth Asking First
Does the annual report inclusion cover every state I am registered in? The wording says annual report or equivalent filing. States call this different things and a few have no annual report at all, so confirm what applies in yours.
Is the state’s filing fee genuinely separate? Assume yes, because it is paid to the state rather than the provider, but get it confirmed so there is no surprise.
What happens in a state with a franchise tax rather than a report? California, Delaware and a few others have obligations that are not a simple report. Ask specifically whether those are covered or excluded.
Is there a multi-state discount? Several competitors publish one. Ask before you register your third state.
What is the formation fee? Since it is not on the site, ask for it in writing before you start an order rather than discovering it at checkout.
What the Price Does Not Cover
State filing fees and annual state fees. Separate everywhere, paid to the state, and far more variable than any service fee. The recurring state obligation matters more to your three-year cost than which agent you pick.
Your EIN. If you have a Social Security number you can apply directly through the IRS at no cost. Never pay a service fee for this.
Tax classification. How the entity is treated federally is set out in the IRS guidance on LLCs. No agent makes that decision for you.
Whether to form at all, or where. The Small Business Administration guidance on business structures is a reasonable free starting point.
Legal advice. Not a law firm. For anything with real money attached, that is a different conversation and worth paying for.
Common Questions
Is $200 a year expensive for a registered agent? On the agent function alone, yes. Northwest publishes $125 and Harbor Compliance $99 on a three-year prepay. The case for $200 rests entirely on the annual report filing being included.
Is the $200 per entity or per state? Per state. Multiply by the number of states you are registered in, not the number of LLCs, and confirm how they count it if you have several entities in one state.
Does the price go up after the first year? The published figure is a flat annual price with no introductory rate attached, which is the opposite of the pattern elsewhere in this category. Confirm it in writing anyway.
Can I switch to them from another agent? Yes. Changing registered agent is a state filing, usually with a modest fee, and it is routine. Nothing about your current provider locks you in.
Why is formation pricing hidden when the agent price is not? I do not know, and I am not going to speculate. What I would say is that of the two, the agent price is the one you pay repeatedly, so if a company is only going to publish one number, that is the more useful one to publish.
Do I actually need to pay anyone to file my annual report? Usually not, if you have one entity in one state. It is generally a short online form. The calculus changes with entity count and state count, which is exactly the buyer this product is shaped for.
Related Reading
For the cheapest verified agent in the category, see my Harbor Compliance pricing breakdown, which covers the prepay option that holds the introductory rate.
For the agent-plus-business-address bundle, my Northwest Registered Agent pricing breakdown covers the flat formation fee and what the agent fee includes.
For the most expensive agent renewal I found, and why the package you pick around it barely matters, see my MyCorporation pricing guide.
For the opposite end of the disclosure spectrum, my Inc Authority pricing guide covers a service that gives the first year free and does not publish the renewal at all.
If you are choosing an agent from scratch rather than comparing two, my roundup of the best registered agent services covers the field.
For the mechanics of the entity itself, how to form an LLC walks the sequence in order. Once it exists, business formation for high-ticket dropshipping covers what a supplier will ask you to produce.
Built for people running more than one entity
A flat $200 a year per state with the annual report filing inside it, and no introductory rate that steps up in year two.
Checked at each company’s own pages in September 2026. Registered Agents Inc’s $200 per year per state, its inclusion of annual report or equivalent filing at no extra cost, and the absence of published formation pricing on its site are from its registered agent page and homepage. The comparison figures are each from the vendor’s own product page: Harbor Compliance $99 first year renewing at $149 with $198 for two years and $297 for three holding $99; MyCompanyWorks from $119; Northwest $125 single state and $100 per state at five or more; Bizee $149 standalone with a free first year alongside formation; BusinessAnywhere from $147, published as “as low as”; ZenBusiness $199; MyCorporation $120 initial term renewing at $249. I was not able to retrieve current annual report service prices from Harbor Compliance or Northwest while writing this, so no figures for those add-ons are quoted here. State filing fees and state annual fees are separate from every figure above and are paid to the state. Disclosure: the links to all eight services on this page are affiliate links, so this page earns a commission whichever you choose. Confirm all current pricing directly before you buy.
Trevor Fenner is an ecommerce entrepreneur and the founder of Ecommerce Paradise, a platform focused on helping entrepreneurs build and scale profitable high-ticket ecommerce and dropshipping businesses. With over a decade of hands-on experience, Trevor specializes in high-ticket dropshipping strategy, niche and product selection, supplier recruiting and onboarding, Google & Bing Shopping ads, ecommerce SEO, and systems-driven automation and scaling. Through Ecommerce Paradise, he provides free education via in-depth guides like How to Start High-Ticket Dropshipping, advanced training through the High-Ticket Dropshipping Masterclass, and fully done-for-you turnkey ecommerce services for entrepreneurs who want a faster, more hands-off path to growth. Trevor is known for emphasizing sustainable, real-world ecommerce models over hype-driven tactics, helping store owners build scalable, sellable, and location-independent brands.
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