How to Get a Business License (Federal, State, and Local)

There is no single business license in the US. What you need comes down to two things: what your business does, and where it does it. This video covers how to know whether you need a license, what you'll run into at the federal, state, and local level, the six steps to apply for the right ones, and how to keep them valid once you have them. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ GET YOUR EXACT LICENSE LIST We research every federal, state, county, and city license your specific business needs and send it back as one list with direct application links and plain-language instructions. $500 one time, delivered in 3 business days, with 30 days of email support after. → https://staterequirement.com/business... FORM YOUR BUSINESS FIRST (STEP 1) Northwest Registered Agent, $29 plus the state fee: → https://go.truic.com/46c0Cdg GET YOUR EIN (FREE, STRAIGHT FROM THE IRS) → https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-... The IRS never charges for an EIN. If a site asks you to pay for one, close the tab. LOOK UP YOUR STATE'S FEES AND REQUIREMENTS Our main guide has a fee table covering all 50 states plus DC, and a dedicated page for each state. → https://staterequirement.com/how-to-g... CHECK WHETHER YOU NEED A FEDERAL LICENSE (STEP 5) The SBA lists every federally regulated activity and the agency that issues the permit, from alcohol and firearms to aviation, broadcasting, and commercial fishing. → https://www.sba.gov/business-guide/la... ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ CHAPTERS 0:00 The business license myth 0:29 Do you actually need one? 2:07 Step 1: Form your business and get an EIN 3:27 Step 2: Write down what you do and where 3:56 Step 3: State licenses 4:49 Step 4: Local licenses 5:39 Step 5: Federal licenses 6:21 Step 6: Keeping everything valid 6:59 FAQ: How much does a business license cost? 7:33 FAQ: Is there one national business license? 7:52 FAQ: Is an EIN the same as a business license? 8:19 FAQ: What if I operate without one? 8:37 Recap ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ THE SIX STEPS 1. Form your business and get an EIN. Most license applications ask for your business details and tax ID. Apply as a sole proprietor now and form an LLC later, and you will redo a good chunk of it. 2. Write down what you do and where you do it. Those two details decide everything that follows. 3. Sort out state licenses. Seller's permit if you sell physical products, professional license if your field has a state board, industry licensing for food, alcohol, childcare, and used car sales, environmental permits if you affect the environment. 4. Handle local licenses. Local business license or tax receipt, certificate of occupancy, zoning approval, and possibly a sign permit, fire department permit, or health permit. 5. Check federal licenses. Only applies to highly regulated industries: alcohol, firearms, aviation, agriculture, commercial fishing, broadcasting. Most of these are also regulated at the state level. 6. Keep everything valid. Most licenses renew every one to two years. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ QUICK ANSWERS Is there one national business license? No. There is no single federal or national business license. Licensing is handled at the federal, state, and local level based on what you do and where you do it. Is an EIN the same as a business license? No. An EIN is your federal tax ID and identifies your business to the IRS. A business license is permission to do a certain activity or operate in a certain place. You will usually want both. What does a business license cost? It depends on your state and on which licenses apply, and you are often paying for more than one. Most state and government fees are published on the relevant agency website. Our state pages list them. What happens if I operate without one? Fines, forced closure, trouble enforcing your own contracts, and in some industries jail time. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ A NOTE ON RENEWALS: Most licenses renew every one to two years, though some (a seller's permit in many states, for example) do not expire. Put the renewal date in your calendar the day a license is approved, set a reminder a month or two ahead, and keep all your documents in one place. Miss a deadline and you are looking at late fees, or losing the right to operate. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ DISCLOSURE Some of the links above are affiliate links. If you use one, we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. DISCLAIMER This video is general information, not legal or tax advice. Every state, county, and city writes its own rules. Confirm your requirements with your local authority before you start operating. #BusinessLicense #SmallBusiness #StartABusiness