LLC Domestication by State: Which States Let You Move an LLC In, and What They Call It

By Registered Agent Guides · Sep 6, 2026 · Updated Sep 7, 2026 · 11 min read

You formed the LLC in Wyoming, Delaware or Nevada because someone told you to, and you live and work somewhere else. Now you are paying two annual reports, two registered agents and two sets of deadlines for a company that does business in one state. Moving the LLC to the state you are in fixes that, and the filing that does it is called domestication. Or conversion. Or, in one state, a transfer. The word depends on where you are going, and picking the wrong one is how people conclude their state does not allow it.

This guide answers the two questions that decide whether you can do this at all: does the state you are moving TO accept an LLC formed elsewhere, and what does it charge. We checked every one of the 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. 42 accept the move and publish a filing for it. Three allow it in law and publish no filing. Seven do not allow it at all. The table further down has every state, its own word for the filing, and the fee.

What domestication does

An LLC exists under the law of the state that formed it. Domestication is a filing that changes which state that is. After it, the company is a Texas LLC instead of a Wyoming LLC, with the same bank accounts, the same contracts, the same name unless the new state has already given it to someone else, and the same EIN unless its owners or its federal tax classification change with the move. Nothing is sold and nothing is transferred, because there is only ever one company. That is the whole point, and it is the thing that separates domestication from the alternative of forming a new LLC and closing the old one, which creates a second company and makes you move everything across.

The fear owners have is that leaving a state means dissolving the company there. It does not. California's statute says so in terms.

The company that filed it owes no separate cancellation. Two more things do change. Your registered agent changes, because the new state requires one inside its borders and the old one no longer needs one. One exception: Wyoming's transfer form requires the company to keep an agent for service of process in Wyoming for a year after the transfer. And if you keep doing business in the old state after you leave it, you owe that state a foreign registration, exactly as if you had formed elsewhere in the first place. That second cost is often larger than the filing that moved the company, and the section on costs below comes back to it.

The same word means the opposite thing in different states

This is the finding that explains why every published list of "states that allow domestication" gives a different number. Among the jurisdictions with a route in law, 22 call an LLC moving in from another state a conversion and 23 call it a domestication. That alone would only be a vocabulary problem. The real problem is that most states use both words, for different transactions, and they do not agree on which is which.

In one group of states, led by Delaware, "domestication" is the section for companies formed outside the United States, and an LLC from another state uses "conversion." Delaware's own definition puts it in one sentence: a non-United States entity means a foreign limited liability company "other than 1 formed under the laws of a state." Search the Delaware code for domestication, land on that section, and you will conclude a Texas LLC cannot domesticate into Delaware. It can. It just files a certificate of conversion. Florida, Wisconsin and Puerto Rico work the same way.

In a second group, "conversion" means changing what kind of entity you are, an LLC becoming a corporation, and "domestication" means changing which state you are in. Alaska, Idaho, Connecticut, Indiana, Kansas, North Dakota, South Dakota, Vermont, Utah and Minnesota all read this way. Vermont's conversion section goes out of its way to exclude out-of-state LLCs, in so many words, and sends them to the domestication section instead. Read only the conversion section and Vermont looks closed. It is open.

Wyoming uses a third word. Its Secretary of State treats both continuance and domestication as filings for companies coming in, so an LLC leaving Wyoming files an application for a certificate of transfer. A search for either of the usual words finds nothing on the way out.

So a publisher who counts only states with a domestication statute lands near 23. One who counts any statutory route lands near 42. Both are counting honestly. They are counting different things, and neither count tells you whether your state is on the list. The table does.

The state you are moving to decides

Every state that refuses to let an LLC in also refuses to let one out. The reverse does not always hold: Puerto Rico accepts an LLC moving in and does not let one leave. That pattern means the receiving state's rule is the one that matters: if it accepts the move, your departure is almost certainly permitted, and if it does not, nothing you file at home will get you there.

The seven that do not accept an LLC moving in are Kentucky, Massachusetts, Missouri, New Mexico, New York, South Carolina and West Virginia. All seven have a conversion statute that names which entities may use it, and an out-of-state LLC is not on any of the lists. New York and West Virginia admit only partnerships. Kentucky, Massachusetts, Missouri and New Mexico admit more, and still not a foreign LLC; New Mexico will convert a foreign corporation into a New Mexico LLC and will not do the same for a foreign LLC. Massachusetts is the clearest case that this is deliberate: its merger section defines the eligible entities and adds "a foreign limited liability company" by name, and its conversion section, defining the same phrase, leaves it out.

South Carolina deserves a paragraph rather than a row. Its LLC act has no domestication section and its conversion section admits only partnerships; the domestication chapter in its code is for corporations. Bills to give LLCs a route have been introduced and have died in every legislative session since at least 2015. Its closed status is a policy the legislature keeps declining to change, not an oversight waiting for a drafter.

Iowa, Louisiana and Montana sit in between. Their statutes permit the move and their agencies publish no form and no fee for it. Montana's legislature created the route in 2025 and left the fee to a Secretary of State rule that has not been updated; its online portal offers the filing to corporations and not to LLCs. For a reader, "in law only" means one phone call before any plan.

What it really costs

There are two filings, one in each state, and the receiving state's is usually the larger. On the 35 states where both parts of the receiving fee are confirmed, the filing plus the new articles of organization runs from $17 to $600, Utah at the bottom and Texas at the top. The table's last column is that figure, and it is the number to plan around.

The filing fee alone understates it in most states, and that is the trap in most published price lists. Alaska charges $25 for the statement of domestication and requires articles of organization with it; the landed cost is $275. Delaware charges $220 for the certificate and requires a certificate of formation filed at the same time; landed, $330. Texas is $300 for the certificate of conversion and $600 landed. In a handful of states the state will not say whether the attached articles are charged separately, and the table marks those rather than guessing.

The exit filing is usually the smaller half and the one people forget to budget. Leaving Delaware is $220, Nevada $350, Wyoming $60. Then the cost nobody's table includes: if the company keeps doing business in the state it left, it owes that state a foreign registration on the way out the door. A company that moves from Delaware to Texas but keeps a Delaware office pays Delaware's foreign registration, $200, on top of the $220 it paid to leave. If you are moving because the old state was doing nothing for you, this does not apply. If you are moving for a better home state while the business stays put, it does, and it usually makes the move pointless.

Two states price the receiving filing in ways a flat table cannot show. Tennessee's articles of organization are priced per member, so the table shows its minimum. Nevada's figure is the conversion plus the articles, and a new Nevada LLC also owes its initial list and state business licence at the same time; the formation figures on the Nevada guide price both.

How to do it

Common questions

Does domestication change my EIN? Normally no. The company continues, so it stays the same taxpayer as long as its owners and its federal tax classification do not change with the move. If either changes at the same time, ask the IRS or your accountant whether a new number is needed. You update the address and responsible party with Form 8822-B and carry on.

Do I have to dissolve the LLC in the old state? No, and in most states you must not. The exit filing ends the company's existence as an LLC of that state without dissolving it; California's statute says the conversion filing has the effect of a cancellation and no separate one is required. Filing a dissolution instead would end the company, which is the opposite of what you want.

Which state do I file in first? It depends on the pair. Some old states want proof that the new state accepted the company; Arkansas and Louisiana let you file the exit first and send proof within thirty days. Read both states' instructions, and a service that does this regularly knows.

Can I domesticate a single-member LLC? Yes. The member approval in step 3 is one signature. Nothing about the filing depends on how many members there are, except Tennessee's per-member fee for the articles.

Why does my state's website say it does not allow domestication? Check which word it uses. In Delaware, Florida and Wisconsin the domestication section is only for companies formed outside the United States, and an LLC from another state uses the conversion section instead. In Vermont and the other states that use the words the other way round, the conversion section is for changing entity type and the domestication section takes an LLC that stays an LLC. The table's third column is the word your new state uses.

Does moving the LLC get rid of the old state's fees I have not paid? No. Delaware refuses the exit filing until the company is current, Texas requires a tax clearance or a statement that the company remains liable, and every state can pursue what was owed while the company was formed there. Bring the old state current first.

Bottom line

Look up the state you are moving to, not the one you are leaving. If it takes an LLC in, learn which word it uses, budget the last column of the table plus the exit fee, and add the old state's foreign registration only if the business stays there. If you formed in Wyoming, Delaware or Nevada and the business has always been somewhere else, our Wyoming and Delaware LLC guide covers whether the move is worth making at all. The short answer at the top has the three cases in one place.

Related reading: operating a Delaware LLC in another state, what foreign qualification is for the company that stays where it was formed, and what each state charges when a company operates there without registering.