Verify New Jersey businesses

How New Jersey's business registry works

Miss two consecutive annual reports in New Jersey and what happens next depends entirely on your entity type. A corporation's certificate of incorporation is revoked by proclamation of the State Treasurer, its powers inoperative and void under N.J.S.A. 14A:4-5. An LLC, under N.J.S.A. 42:2C-26, is only moved to an inactive list: its name is released for any other LLC to claim, but the LLC itself keeps existing, with member and manager liability protection intact. So a New Jersey LLC that reads something other than Active is not the same fact as a corporation that does — one entity was shut down, the other is alive and merely lost its name. KYB code that collapses both into "not in good standing" will misread the LLC.

The register is run by the Division of Revenue and Enterprise Services (DORES), inside the Department of the Treasury. Every entity — for-profit and non-profit corporations, LLCs, LPs, LLPs — gets a 10-digit Entity ID with no letters or prefixes, assigned at formation. That Entity ID is the stable key: it's separate from the federal EIN and the state tax ID, and it's what you reconcile on, because an LLC's name isn't permanent once it goes delinquent.

New Jersey splits the public surface in two. The free Business Name Search returns the name, entity type, Entity ID, formation date, and current status — enough to confirm an entity exists and reads Active. Formal status reports, standing certificates, and certified copies live in the paid Business Records Service. A second split matters: forming the entity is separate from registering for tax via NJ-REG, which issues a Business Registration Certificate (BRC) — so an entity can be legally formed and still not hold a valid BRC.

BizVerify ships quick checks for New Jersey today — name, entity type, Entity ID, and status — on the hot path.

What New Jersey specifically charges and requires

Formation

A New Jersey LLC files a Certificate of Formation for $125; a for-profit corporation files a Certificate of Incorporation for the same $125. A non-profit corporation pays $75. Standard processing is included; expedited turnaround is priced per document on top of the base fee — $500 for 2-hour and $1,000 for 1-hour service.

Annual obligations

Every for-profit corporation and LLC files an annual report for $75 ($30 for non-profits), plus a small payment processing fee, filed online. The due date isn't a fixed statewide date — it's the last day of the month the entity was formed, every year. Miss it two years running and the split from above kicks in: a corporation's charter is revoked by proclamation; an LLC drops to the inactive list. Reinstating a revoked corporation runs a $75 reinstatement fee plus a $20 tax clearance fee, the current annual report fee, and every delinquent annual report fee — with a tax clearance certification from the Division of Taxation where required.

Pulling records

The Business Name Search is free. Formal documents carry per-document fees in the Business Records Service.

Common ways developers use New Jersey verification

Verify-before-act in AI agents

An AI vendor-onboarding agent reads a New Jersey LLC name off a contract. Before it provisions access, it calls verify_business({ entity_name, jurisdiction: "us-nj" }) through the BizVerify MCP server. A Revoked result halts the run; an LLC that's dropped to the inactive list — its name now claimable by someone else — routes to a human instead of auto-approving. The same tool call runs from Claude Code or an OpenAI Agents loop.

Marketplace seller onboarding

New Jersey has a dense base of small operators — contractors, agencies, e-commerce sellers. A marketplace verifying a new seller's stated LLC confirms it exists and reads Active before enabling payouts, and catches the case where the name on file now belongs to a different LLC than the one the seller formed. Drop the check into a Zapier signup flow so it runs without a backend change.

Counterparty checks before contracts

New Jersey is where a counterparty on a lease, a SAFE, or a supply agreement is often incorporated. A quick check confirms the entity is Active and not Revoked before signature — catching a corporation whose charter lapsed two annual reports ago. Run it in an n8n contract-intake flow so the gate fires before the document goes out.

Reconciling on the Entity ID

Vendor-management tools keyed on company name break in New Jersey, where a delinquent LLC's name can be released and re-registered by an unrelated entity. A quick check returns the 10-digit Entity ID alongside the status, so a pipeline can key on the stable identifier instead of a name that may have changed hands. The KYB pipeline guide walks through reconciling on the Entity ID.

Frequently asked questions

What happens to a New Jersey LLC versus a corporation that stops filing annual reports?

They diverge. After two consecutive years of unfiled annual reports, a corporation's certificate of incorporation is revoked by proclamation of the State Treasurer — its powers go void. A domestic LLC instead moves to an inactive list: its name is freed for any other LLC to take, but the LLC keeps existing and its members and managers stay protected. Don't read an LLC's lost name as a wound-down entity.

What status values does a New Jersey quick check return?

The primary signal is Active — in good standing, current on filings and fees. Beyond that you'll see Revoked (charter or foreign authority revoked for two years of unfiled reports or unpaid taxes), Dissolved (formally wound down), and Merged (combined into another entity, separate existence ended). There's no graduated delinquency ladder of partial statuses.

Does an Active status mean the business holds a valid Business Registration Certificate?

No. New Jersey separates entity formation from tax registration. Active means the entity is formed and current on its annual reports with DORES. The Business Registration Certificate comes from a separate NJ-REG filing for tax and employer purposes, so an entity can read Active on the register and still not hold a current BRC. The BRC is a distinct artifact a quick check doesn't assert.

Which identifier do you return for a New Jersey entity?

The jurisdiction_id is the 10-digit Entity ID that DORES assigns each entity at formation — numeric, no letters or prefixes. It's the stable key, separate from the federal EIN and the state tax ID. Reconcile on the Entity ID rather than the name: a delinquent New Jersey LLC can lose its name to another entity, so names aren't a durable key here.

When is the New Jersey annual report due, and does a late one change the status?

The annual report is due on the last day of the month the entity was formed — its anniversary month — every year, not a fixed statewide date. A single late report doesn't flip the status on its own. It takes two consecutive missed years to revoke a corporation's charter or move an LLC to the inactive list, so one missed filing is a softer signal than a Revoked status.

How current is New Jersey entity data?

Status reflects the DORES record as it stands when the check runs — there's no nightly snapshot sitting between the source and your response. New Jersey notes its own database typically reflects filings within one to two business days of processing, so a very recent filing may not have posted yet. The trade-off is that p95 latency tracks the Division's responsiveness.

Do I get charged for a New Jersey entity that doesn't exist?

A confirmed "no match" still counts as a quick check (1 credit, ~$0.08 on public pricing) — the verification ran and proved the entity isn't on the New Jersey register. Hard errors from the registry side (timeouts, 5xx) don't consume credits.