LegalZoom

Plans and pricing

The dividing line is narrow. If you do not know what articles of organization are, paying someone to walk you through them is a legitimate use of money. If you are comfortable reading a two-page state form, you are paying a few hundred dollars for something you could have done yourself.

This review is part of our resources directory. Our team checked every price on LegalZoom's own pages, we used AI to help organize what needed covering, and every opinion here is ours.

All prices from LegalZoom's LLC pricing page, checked September 2026. The state filing fee is separate at every tier. Not hidden, it says so under each price, but it changes the math.

• Basic: $0 plus state filing fees. Articles of organization filed with the state, a business name check, and a tax consult from 1-800Accountant. That is the whole list. No operating agreement, no EIN.

• Pro: $249 plus state filing fees. Everything in Basic, plus an operating agreement, an EIN, unlimited 30-minute attorney consults on new legal topics for 30 days, 150 or more legal document templates for a year, unlimited eSignatures for a year, and a customizable Wix website. That attorney access is a subscription: after the included 30 days it auto-renews at $49 a month unless you cancel.

• Premium: $299 plus state filing fees. Everything in Pro, plus bookkeeping tools with six months included, unlimited proposals and invoices, income and expense tracking, and automatic mileage capture. The bookkeeping auto-renews at $9.99 a month after those six months.

In Illinois, articles of organization cost $150, per the Secretary of State's Form LLC-5.5. So the real day-one numbers here are $150, $399, and $449. Every Illinois LLC also owes a $75 annual report to the state every year after that, per Form LLC-50.1. No package covers that one. It is yours forever.

Sold separately, which is where the bill grows.

• Registered agent: $249 a year. The registered agent page says it auto-renews at the purchase rate each year until you cancel, and that the renewal rate is subject to change. You get mail alerts, scanned documents in cloud storage, and annual report reminders through their Compliance Calendar. Not included in any formation package.

• Compliance Filings: $199 a year, auto-renewing, per the compliance page. It auto-files annual reports and amendments, handles business taxes through independent tax professionals, and sends compliance alerts. Adding Licenses and Permits makes it $299 a year. Full-service Business Manager is quote-only, by phone.

• EIN on its own: $79, per the EIN page, which tells you outright that the IRS will issue one at no cost.

• Operating agreement on its own: $99 standard or $199 rush, per the operating agreement page.

• Business Attorney Plan: $49 a month. Per the attorney plans page, six months prepaid is $259 ($43.17 a month) and twelve months is $469 ($39.09 a month). It renews automatically at the purchase rate each term. You get unlimited 30-minute consults on new matters, document review with the first 10 pages included (then $69 for 11 to 15 pages, $149 for 16 to 25), and 25% off your attorney's hourly rate if you want them to do the actual work.

Run that forward for an owner who says yes to the sensible-sounding options. Pro at $249 plus the $150 state fee is $399. Add the registered agent and year one is $648. Let the attorney plan renew and you are near $1,200. Nobody lied at any point. The subscriptions just kept saying yes for you.

One correction to our own resources card: the compliance reminders are not part of the formation flow. They come with the registered agent subscription or with Compliance Filings. The operating agreement and EIN are.

Why consider it

You do not know what you are filing. The real reason, and a good one. The Illinois form asks for a registered agent, a registered office, a purpose, and a management structure. If those words mean nothing to you, a flow that explains each field as you go is worth paying for.

One flow instead of four errands. Formation, operating agreement, EIN, and a place to keep the documents come out of one login. Piecemeal means a state website, the IRS website, a template you found somewhere, and a folder you will lose.

Attorney time without a retainer. A 30-minute consult on a commercial lease has real value if the alternative is signing it blind. For a Chicago business taking a first storefront, that is the piece of this catalog that most often earns its keep.

Where it falls short

The reviews split hard, and the split is the story. Trustpilot shows 4.6 out of 5 across 32,720 reviews. The Better Business Bureau's customer reviews show 2.75 out of 5 across 939. Weight those by review count and you land near 4.5. Give each platform an equal vote and you get about 3.7. Same data, two very different headlines.

The gap is structural, not scandalous. Trustpilot reviews are largely solicited, invited right after a purchase went fine. Nobody solicits a BBB complaint. People go there when something went wrong and they want it on the record. So read Trustpilot for what the service is like when it works, and read a dozen BBB complaints for the failure mode. Our read of that record is that it clusters around billing and subscription renewals, which is what you would predict from a catalog holding four auto-renewing products.

Filing directly with Illinois is cheaper and not hard. For a single-member LLC with no partners and no outside money, the DIY path is $150 and an afternoon, and our Illinois LLC guide walks it through. An operating agreement for a one-person LLC is a short document that mostly exists so a bank will open your account. So the counterpoint stands: you are paying for convenience and hand-holding, good value for a first-time owner and poor value for anyone comfortable filing themselves.

The registered agent is the expensive part. At $249 a year on a rate the page says may change, it sits well above the market. Northwest Registered Agent is the name to compare against for straight pricing and a real focus on keeping your home address off public filings.

Disclosure, because this one is ours. Illinois requires a registered office at a street address inside Illinois, and a P.O. Box alone will not satisfy it, per that same Form LLC-5.5. If you want one Chicago street address on your state filing, your mail, and your Google listing, Lobi Space is an Illinois registered agent with a virtual office behind it. Rates are on our pricing page. We are selling you something here, so weigh it accordingly.

A note from Lobi Space management

Management here has been an entrepreneur for more than twenty years. Technology, hiring, remote employees, reception services. It can be overwhelming, and the overwhelm always comes from the same place: no strategy, no goal, no road map.

So start with a plan. Write down every single process your business needs in order to succeed, then match each process to a tool or a person. Do you understand how to file your articles of incorporation? If you do not, hire LegalZoom or someone who can help you understand it. That is not a failure. That is a process you cannot carry yet, handed to someone who can.

The trap runs the other way. People in our community ask each other what they use, then buy whatever a neighbor recommended. Not every business is designed to be the same. Shopping takes a long time and switching later is painful, so buy against your written list, not against a checkout page with three boxes already ticked.

The short version

The packages are $0, $249, and $299, and the state filing fee is separate at every tier. In Illinois that fee is $150, so the real day-one numbers are $150, $399, and $449, plus a $75 annual report to the state every year forever. Basic gets you the filing and nothing else. Pro adds the operating agreement and the EIN. Pro's attorney access auto-renews at $49 a month, Premium's bookkeeping at $9.99 a month, the registered agent at $249 a year, compliance from $199 a year. Trustpilot says 4.6 from 32,720 reviews, the BBB says 2.75 from 939, and the complaints cluster where the subscriptions are.

Pay for this if the paperwork genuinely scares you. Skip it if it does not. And remember that tools and services are all fine, but without a road map, a goal, and a plan you are shooting in the dark or chasing a dream. Make the plan first. Then this decision takes ten minutes.

Blunt questions, straight answers

Is the $0 LLC actually free? The LegalZoom fee is genuinely $0. The state fee is not, and no version of forming an LLC skips it. In Illinois that is $150, which buys the filing, a name check, and a tax consult. No operating agreement, no EIN.

What will renew on me without asking? Four things. Pro and Premium's attorney consults at $49 a month after 30 days. Premium's bookkeeping at $9.99 a month after six months. The registered agent at $249 a year, on a rate its page says may change. Compliance Filings from $199 a year. All say cancel anytime. Set the reminder the day you buy, not the day you get charged.

Should I just file it myself? If you are a single-member Illinois LLC with no partners and no investors, yes, probably. It is $150 and a short form, and our LLC guide covers it. Hire help if there are partners, if money is coming from someone else, or if reading the form makes you want to close the tab. That last reason counts.

Do I need to pay $79 for an EIN? No. The IRS issues them at no charge, and LegalZoom's own EIN page says so. Pay the $79 if you would rather not deal with the application. Do not pay it thinking it is a government fee.

Is a 2.75 on the BBB a reason to walk away? On its own, no. Complaint platforms run low for almost any company selling subscriptions at volume, and 939 reviews is a small sample. Use it as a map, not a verdict. It tells you where this company breaks, which is billing, so nail that down before you hand over a card.

Why it made our list

• The operating agreement and EIN really are in the guided flow at Pro and above, but compliance reminders are not. Those come with the $249 a year registered agent or a separate $199 a year filing product.
• Attorney consults are available as an add-on, which is cheap insurance when your ownership split or contracts are not standard.
• You are paying for convenience and hand-holding. Good value for a first-time owner, less so if you are comfortable filing yourself.