Updated August 10, 2026. Quick answer. Forming an LLC in South Carolina costs $110 to file, and no periodic report is required. Five-year total: At least $110 over five years — one or more components (commonly the franchise/minimum tax) is unverified, so treat this as a floor, not a total.
What it actually costs
| Item | Amount |
|---|---|
| Formation filing fee | $110 |
| Annual/biennial report | none — no Secretary of State annual report for LLCs |
| Franchise / minimum tax | Not verified — see notes |
| Publication requirement | No newspaper publication requirement was found. |
Five-year cost of ownership: At least $110 over five years — one or more components (commonly the franchise/minimum tax) is unverified, so treat this as a floor, not a total. Publication cost is excluded from this figure — it’s county-driven where it applies, not state-driven, so a single number would be wrong for most filers.
The trap worth knowing before you file
scstatehouse.gov serves the entire chapter as one page and read reliably; the fee section § 33-44-1204 sits at the very end under Article 12 ‘Miscellaneous Provisions’, which is why a targeted read of the front of the chapter misses it. The South Carolina Secretary of State does NOT publish a business fee schedule on its website, so the statute is the only locus for these numbers — no agency-vs-statute comparison is possible for this state.
Source
S.C. Code Ann. § 33-44-1204 (fees); S.C. Code Ann. tit. 33, ch. 44 (Uniform Limited Liability Company Act); § 33-44-809 (administrative dissolution). Read 2026-08-06 from statute. Formation-service sites were not used as a source for this figure.
Once the LLC exists, an operating agreement is what actually runs it
This is free to browse and there is no obligation to buy anything — LawDepot builds a state-specific LLC operating agreement through a question-and-answer form.
Build an operating agreement at LawDepot
LawDepot pays us a commission if you buy through this link — it costs you nothing extra. We are not a law firm and this is not legal advice. Affiliate Disclosure.
If the LLC already exists somewhere else
Everything above prices forming a new South Carolina LLC. A company that already exists in another state cannot become a South Carolina one: South Carolina is one of the eight jurisdictions with no jurisdiction-change route in either direction, and the article that would carry it does not reach an LLC by its own terms (S.C. Code Ann. §§ 33-44-901 to 33-44-914). The substitute is a merger — form a South Carolina LLC, then merge the older company into it, under S.C. Code Ann. § 33-44-904. A merger produces a surviving entity rather than a continuation, so it is genuinely not the same thing as domestication, but it keeps far more alive than dissolving and re-forming does.
You Cannot Move an LLC to South Carolina — Here Is the Merger Route · LLC Domestication by State: All 51 Jurisdictions, With the Statute
What letting it lapse costs in South Carolina. The catch-up bill is only half the story — in South Carolina a hard two-year cutoff for LLCs — while the corporation section next door has no deadline at all, which is what most search results describe. The figures, and the statute they come from, are on reinstating a South Carolina LLC.
Electing S-corp status for this LLC changes the tax picture too. South Carolina’s corporate License Fee applies to an S-corp; an LLC not taxed as a corporation is named exempt. See what South Carolina charges at the entity level.
Looking for the annual-report due date and fee instead? See South Carolina LLC annual report.
Related: South Carolina’s registered agent requirements, including who can serve and what happens if you don’t have one.
Related: South Carolina’s LLC Certificate of Good Standing cost, including who issues it and how fast you can get one.