OH registered agent
Ohio registered agent service, $5 a year
Ohio requires every corporation and LLC on its books to keep a registered agent at a real address in the state. Here is what Ohio law says about who that agent has to be and where it has to be.
What Ohio requires of a registered agent
The requirement
In the words of the Ohio code:
Every corporation shall have and maintain an agent, sometimes ...
Source: state statute, via incFACTS: Ohio Rev. Code § 1701.07(A), (C)(2); § 1706.09(A); § 1703.041(A)
How we comply
We don't.
What Ohio does to your company when we don't
Here is what the state does to an entity that has no agent, or whose agent is us.
Administrative dissolution
Upon the failure of a corporation to appoint another agent or to file a statement of change of address of an agent, the secretary of state shall give notice thereof...
Source: state statute, via incFACTS: Ohio Rev. Code § 1701.07(M); § 1706.09(L)
Revocation (foreign entities)
...or has failed, after the death or resignation of its designated ...
Source: state statute, via incFACTS: Ohio Rev. Code § 1703.15
No access to the courts
...no foreign corporation that should have obtained such license shall maintain any action in any court until it has obtained such license. ...
Source: state statute, via incFACTS: Ohio Rev. Code § 1703.29(A), (C)
Civil penalty
Any foreign corporation required to be licensed under sections ...
Source: state statute, via incFACTS: Ohio Rev. Code § 1703.28
The bill to come back
Reinstatement fee
A corporation whose articles have been canceled may be reinstated ...
Source: state statute, via incFACTS: Ohio Rev. Code § 1701.07(M); § 1706.09(L); § 1703.15
What happens to the lawsuit you never saw
Substituted service
If (1) the agent cannot be found, or (2) the agent no longer has that address, or (3) the corporation has failed to maintain an agent as required by this section, and if...
Source: state statute, via incFACTS: Ohio Rev. Code § 1701.07(H); § 1706.09(H)(2); § 1703.19
One more thing to skip: the Ohio annual report
We couldn't be bothered to look this up. incFACTS carries no human-verified annual report fee for Ohio, and neither do we.
Statutory text as captured by incFACTS (retrieved 2026-08-01, verified word-for-word against the state code 2026-08-10). Laws change. The statute governs; this page does not.