With Shark Tank's Mark Cuban as their spokesperson, ZenBusiness has grown in popularity recently. ZenBusiness is a highly rated business formation service, and we think it’s a great option for forming your business. It’s not our recommended tool because of its price. With ZenBusiness, it will cost you more to file your business and to maintain it (with Registered Agent services) than other tools (including our recommended tool Bizee (Incfile)). However, we don’t think ZenBusiness is a bad option and beats many of the other filing services including LegalZoom which has worse reviews and will end up costing you more to form your business.
Read our full guide on: Business Formation Services ⚖️
ZenBusiness is a business filing service for forming LLCs, S-corps, and C-corps.
After a successful exit selling his previous startup HomeAway to Expedia for $3.9 billion, serial entrepreneur Ross Buhrdorf took some time off but was lured back into startups by two entrepreneurs who wanted him to look at their business. Buhrdorf came on as CEO, invested in the company, and assembled a new founding team including some colleagues from HomeAway. They pivoted the existing business, which had focused on formations for law offices, into a direct to consumer business formation and management platform for small businesses and solopreneurs called ZenBusiness. The goal was to disrupt the incumbent player LegalZoom by delivering more value than asked at a better price point. Today, ZenBusiness has helped over 500,000 businesses form.
Typically, we put less emphasis on public review sites, but for this category, many of the options have thousands of reviews on TrustPilot, and the process for incorporating is typically very standardized. This increased our trust in their ratings, and the ‘wisdom of the crowd’, so we’ve taken them into account in our recommendations, but with one big caveat. As we dug into the TrustPilot scores, we noticed some discrepancies. One tool had one 5-star review, but their Trustpilot rating was 3.7. How could this be? We found that the TrustPilot score takes other factors into account like the age of the company and responding to negative reviews. We’ve calculated the TrustPilot score based on a simple weighted average and not taken the headline TrustPilot score. As with all our guides, we’ve tried to be guided by the data.
As you can see in the chart below, ZenBusiness has a TrustPilot score of 4.7 (with over 14k reviews). It is tied with Bizee (Incfile) and Doola which all have a similarly high 4.7 stars. We take this as a sign that ZenBusiness’ core offering is very strong.
Comparing pricing between business formation services is a difficult task. Many companies will charge high add-on fees for things that other companies will include standard.
When it comes to comparing prices, you should be aware of two aspects: the cost to file your business, and the cost to maintain your business (Registered Agent fees). This section will focus on the cost to file your company and the next section will focus on the cost to maintain your company.
When filing your company, we view a couple of elements in addition to the core filing as essential: an Operating Agreement, EIN, and the first year’s Registered Agent service. The charts below compare the total price of filing across each of the major filing services including these essential elements.
ZenBusiness offers great pricing relative to many competitors. However, it will be slightly more expensive to file and maintain your business than our recommended tool Bizee (Incfile).
The major ongoing service related to your business filing is Registered Agent services. Many companies include the first year of Registered Agent services for free in their offerings and then charge steep fees after year one. This is an easy way for these companies to make additional money because it’s very easy to fall back on the business you filed your company with for ongoing Registered Agent services.
For ZenBusiness, it will cost $199 to use their Registered Agent services after year one. This is a good price relative to many competitors, but again it falls short of our recommended tool Bizee (Incfile).
When comparing processing times, there are two elements to consider. The first is how long it takes the service to file with the State for you once you have provided the necessary information. Then there will be the time that it takes for the State governments to process your business filing paperwork. This typically takes 1-2 weeks but depends on the State where you are filing. The government processing time will be the same no matter which service you use.
The typical turnaround time for ZenBusiness is 2-4 business days, but ZenBusiness will prioritize those who choose the Pro and Premium plans. This is a great turnaround time and among the quickest in the industry.
ZenBusiness offers phone support which is available Monday to Friday from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. CST or Sunday, 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. CST in addition to email support.
We’ve generally had positive experiences with their customer service. However, we’ve heard complaints of ZenBusiness' support in customer interviews. These issues typically arise in two cases. The first is when the founder is trying to incorporate something other than a plain vanilla LLC or S corp. We recommend those founders instead use a lawyer for the incorporation process. The second case for complaints typically arises from people who make mistakes when entering the company info and are forced to remedy post filing. Our advice is to triple check everything before submitting it to avoid these situations.
We love ZenBusiness’ money back guarantee. They offer a 60-day money back guarantee that will give you all of your money back (less state filing fees) without any additional fees or charges. This is the best money back guarantee in the industry.
Like many filing services, ZenBusiness offers three pricing tiers: Starter, Pro, and Premium.
Starter plan
The Starter plan is ZenBusiness’ most affordable offering. It will cost $0 to file, but you will be required to pay State filing fees (which typically range from $50 to $200 and depend on the State where you are filing).
The starter plan includes:
Typical turnaround time: 2-3 weeks
This is the most basic package and you will need to pay for additional things we view as essential like an Operating Agreement and EIN from the IRS.
👉 Try ZenBusiness Starter here
Pro plan
The next tier up called the Pro package includes the state filing plus an operating agreement and an EIN from the IRS. We view these as essential so recommend those that go with ZenBusiness to choose this tier. The Pro plan costs $199 per year plus state filing fees.
The Pro plan includes:
Typical turnaround time: 1-5 business days
Premium plan
The final tier is called the Premium package and costs $349 per year includes everything in the Pro package in addition to business documents (25 templates for things like contracts and service agreements), a website builder, a domain name, and a business email address. We think most people are better off with point solutions for these things.
The Premium plan includes:
Typical turnaround time: 1-3 business days
👉 Try ZenBusiness Premium here
ZenBusiness also offers a business bank account for $5 per month. They offer business banking through a partnership with Thread bank. However, we don’t recommend this for most businesses. You can read our full guide on business bank accounts, but the TLDR is that we recommend Mercury. They don’t charge a monthly fee, have higher FDIC insurance amounts, and better integrations than the ZenBusiness offering.
Is ZenBusiness LLC legit?
Yes, ZenBusiness has helped over 250,000 companies incorporate and has a 4.7 star rating on Trust Pilot and over 11,000 5-star reviews on Trustpilot.
Is ZenBusiness better than LegalZoom?
We think ZenBusiness is better than LegalZoom for filing your business. ZenBusiness has better Trustpilot reviews (4.7 stars vs 4.4 stars) and will be cheaper than LegalZoom.
Why not use ZenBusiness?
We think the primary reason not to use ZenBusiness is its price. The cost for its Pro package which we recommend is more expensive than key competitors.
Does ZenBusiness give you an EIN?
Yes, if you use ZenBusiness’ Pro package you will receive an EIN. However, an EIN is not included in their Starter package.
Where is Zenbusiness located?
ZenBusiness is headquartered in Austin, Texas.
Is ZenBusiness Pro worth the money?
We think it is worth the money because it includes an Operating Agreement and EIN which we view as essential in incorporating your business.
How many employees does ZenBusiness have?
ZenBusiness has 363 employees listed on Linkedin.
Which ZenBusiness package is best?
We recommend the ZenBusiness Pro package. It has everything you need to incorporate your business including:
What is ZenBusiness’ cancellation policy?
They offer a 60-day money back guarantee that will give you all of your money back (less state filing fees) without any additional fees or charges.
What are the credentials of ZenBusiness?
ZenBusiness has helped over 250,000 companies incorporate and has a 4.7 star rating on Trust Pilot and over 11,000 5-star reviews on Trustpilot.
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