From filing a commercial lawsuit to registering a trademark or documenting a lease, government fees in Saudi Arabia are now published and computable through unified digital platforms. This guide compiles the full fee baseline for judicial, corporate, and consumer services as of July 2026 — fees change by subsequent decisions — organized by authority, with worked examples, within the business guides on Hala Law.
1. Judicial costs — the Judicial Costs Law (M/16)
The Judicial Costs Law, enacted by Royal Decree M/16 with its Executive Regulations, imposes tiered costs on financial claims, borne by default by the losing party. The percentage decreases as the claim value rises:
| Claim value bracket (SAR) | Applied rate | Cap |
|---|---|---|
| Below 100,000 | 5% | — |
| 100,000 to 499,999 | 4% | — |
| 500,000 to 999,999 | 3% | — |
| 1,000,000 and above | 2% | SAR 1,000,000 |
For claims of unquantifiable value the Regulation's schedule sets fixed costs: SAR 10,000 for private criminal actions, 5,000 before the commercial courts and circuits, 3,000 before the general courts and for urgent claims, and 2,000 for labor claims by non-exempt parties. Requests and appeals carry their own fees, and Article 7 of the Judicial Costs Law makes the ten-thousand ceiling per request, not cumulative: reconsideration 10,000, cassation 7,000, appeal 5,000, and incidental requests 1,000.
Execution requests for monetary claims are assessed at 2% of the amount under execution, with a SAR 500 minimum and a SAR 10,000 maximum; execution disputes carry a fixed SAR 3,000.
Statutory exemptions cover: workers under the Labor Law, those exempted from it, and their beneficiaries in their employment claims; personal status cases before their courts (except cassation and reconsideration); prisoners and detainees in non-criminal financial cases; government bodies; and proceedings under the Bankruptcy Law. The law also rewards settlement: settling before the first hearing cancels the costs entirely, and settling after it but before judgment reduces them to 25%.
To price a specific claim, see the judicial costs calculator, and for the digital court tracks, the Najiz guide.
2. Company registration — Ministry of Commerce
Commercial-register fees are set by trader class under Annex (1) of the Executive Regulation: registration is charged once, then the annual data confirmation falls due at the same amounts — and the schedule contains no separate publication fee:
| Service | Trader class | Fee (SAR) |
|---|---|---|
| Registration in the commercial register | Sole proprietorship | 500 |
| General / simple limited partnership | 1,000 | |
| Limited liability company (LLC) | 1,200 | |
| Joint stock / simplified joint stock / foreign-company branch | 1,600 | |
| Annual data confirmation | same amounts by class | 500 / 1,000 / 1,200 / 1,600 |
| Updating the commercial register | all traders | 100 per update |
| Detailed extract of the registration | all traders | 100 |
The Chamber of Commerce subscription does not fall due in the first three years: Article 30 of the Chambers of Commerce Law provides that the fee becomes payable only after three years have passed from the date of registration in the commercial register. After that it falls due at the amount the Regulation sets for each subscriber category (Article 30), and each chamber publishes its own grades table — there is no unified national schedule, so we state no figures for one. During those three years the establishment still pays for any services it requests from the chamber (Article 31), and a single subscription covers however many branches the establishment has within that chamber's jurisdiction (Article 29).
Registration and the annual confirmation are two separate services, not one: registration is charged once at sign-up, then the annual data confirmation falls due on the anniversary of registration at the same amount. The fee schedule contains no separate publication fee for the commercial register. The issuance path is detailed in the Commercial Registration guide.
Worked example — forming an LLC: SAR 1,200 to register in the commercial register under the Executive Regulation's schedule, then a further SAR 1,200 at the annual data confirmation a year later, and SAR 100 for each update to the registered data — excluding the variable Chamber subscription. The Companies Law provides no gazette publication of the articles of association — it attaches registration and publicising at the commercial register to incorporation — so no publication fee enters the calculation.
3. Foreign investment — MISA
Under the Investment Law and its Executive Regulations, MISA's foreign-investment "license" is now an investment registration — still the foreign investor's gateway to up to 100% ownership in eligible sectors. The Ministry does not publish a flat fee schedule for it: per MISA's current Investor Guide (13th Edition, 02-2026), the registration fee is determined by the Ministry upon approval of the application and must be paid within fifteen business days of the payment notification, otherwise the registration is void. The annual registration update is priced the same way, while several related services — such as registering a non-Saudi company for the purpose of real-estate ownership — carry no fees at all.
Figures still widely quoted from the old licensing model — the standard-license fees and the tiered Entrepreneur License schedule — are a historical baseline that no longer appears in MISA's official guide; with no standing official source for them, we do not restate them.
4. Intellectual property — SAIP
| Service | Fees (SAR) |
|---|---|
| Trademark — one mark in one class (application 1,000 + publication 500 + certificate 5,000) | 6,500 |
| Trademark ten-year renewal | 5,500 within the final protection year, or 6,500 within the 6-month grace period after expiry — plus a 1,000 renewal-publication fee |
| Filing a patent application | 400 individuals / 800 institutions — no figures are stated for the later examination and grant stages, which have no published official source |
| Filing an industrial-design application | 150 individuals / 300 institutions |
| Optional copyright registration of a work | examination + registration by work type and applicant category — for software: 100 + 200 individuals, 200 + 400 institutions |
The deadlines here cost as much as the fees do. SAIP's introductory trademark guide states that publication of an acceptance decision runs 60 days for public notice and to receive oppositions, that reviewing an opposition takes 60 to 90 days, and that a final decision on the application issues within 90 days at most. The one that bites: a registration invoice is valid 30 days from issue, and an unpaid invoice turns the application into an abandoned one — as does failing to answer an opposition within sixty days, or examination deficiencies within ninety. Paying or replying late does not delay the application; it ends it.
The class is set under the Nice Agreement on the international classification of goods and services, and the guide notes it can be amended after the fees are paid and examination has begun.
The fee table attached to the Implementing Regulations of the GCC Trademark Law — the table article 40 of those Regulations refers the fees to — is denominated per mark per class. Its first heading reads "Trademarks and service marks for one mark in one class", with the application, publication and registration fees beneath it. The same restriction repeats in the grievance and opposition heading, "in one class", and in the renewal heading, "Renewal of one trademark in one class". Article 2 of the Regulations provides that a single application is confined to registering a mark in one class, and that covering several classes in one application requires the competent administration's approval. The fees below are therefore for a single class, and a mark protected in more than one class pays the schedule for each.
Worked example — a local coffee shop's trademark, one class: 1,000 + 500 + 5,000 = SAR 6,500 for ten years of protection.
5. Lease registration — the Ejar platform
Registering a contract on Ejar turns it into an executive bond enforceable directly through the Execution Courts; an unregistered lease has no standing before the courts:
| Item | Fees (SAR) |
|---|---|
| Residential contract | 125 per year — partial years counted whole; the platform sets the payer as the landlord or the brokerage office |
| Commercial contract | Variable by service per the service card — details in the commercial lease registration guide |
| Real estate broker commission | 2.5% of first-year rent unless the parties agree otherwise in writing — borne by the party contracting with the broker |
Worked example — a residential lease of two years and one month: partial years count as whole years, so the fee is assessed for three years: 125 × 3 = SAR 375.
6. Notarization and powers of attorney
Issuing, managing, and revoking electronic powers of attorney through the Najiz portal via Nafath is entirely free. Licensed private notaries (the Mwathiq system) are instead governed by statutory limits per instrument type:
| Private notary service | Statutory minimum (SAR) | Statutory maximum (SAR) |
|---|---|---|
| Powers of attorney | 100 | 4,000 |
| Declarations and mortgages | 100 | 4,000 |
| Real estate transfers (title deeds) | 100 | 5,000 |
| Corporate contracts and marriage contracts | 100 | 5,000 |
7. Traffic violations
Filing an objection to a traffic violation is free: the Unified National Platform lists the service at no cost with immediate execution. The law places the objection in the competent court: Article 75 of the Traffic Law — as amended by Royal Decree M/115 — gives the violator thirty days from being notified of the violation, with the clock running from notification rather than issuance, and the court may hear a late objection for an excuse it accepts. The reduction is not an automatic early-payment discount: the article permits reducing a fine by no more than 25% of its minimum value under controls set by the Minister of Interior in agreement with the Minister of Finance, and permits paying a single fine in instalments. Where accumulated fines reach SAR 20,000 or more, or six months pass from notification without payment, the violator is notified to pay within no more than thirty days and is then referred to the competent court. For the fine tiers and the filing steps via Absher, see the traffic fine objection guide.
Worked examples across domains
- A SAR 200,000 commercial claim: falls in the 4% bracket — a judicial cost of SAR 8,000, borne by default by the losing party.
- Executing a SAR 400,000 judgment: 2% of the amount = SAR 8,000, within the 500 minimum and 10,000 maximum.
- Forming an LLC: SAR 1,200 to register in the commercial register, then SAR 1,200 again at the annual data confirmation, as detailed above.
- An expatriate worker claiming SAR 150,000 in end-of-service benefits: the cost to the worker is SAR 0 under the labor exemption.
When do you need a licensed lawyer or advisor?
The tables above are general information on the fee baseline — not an assessment of any specific case. Engaging a licensed lawyer carries practical weight when the cost estimate turns on how a claim is characterized or valued, when planning a multi-license corporate or investment structure, or in intellectual property and lease disputes where the statutory fee interacts with the parties' contractual positions.