Franchise Registration States: Rules, Fees and 2026 Changes in All 50 States and DC

Franchise registration states: the 2026 status map

The franchise registration states form a band along the coasts and the upper Midwest. The FTC and NASAA count 14 of them, a list GAO repeated in April 2023 (GAO-23-105338). We opened the statute or regulator page for every state and the District of Columbia on October 7, 2026. The registry below records what each jurisdiction requires, the date of the current rule, and how strong the evidence is.

Evidence levels: Primary means we read the statute (and, where marked, the regulator’s own page). Corroborated means the state is absent from the FTC/NASAA lists and a statute screen found no franchise registration or business opportunity filing; for Georgia it means a secondary source, because the official code text could not be opened. Broker licensing is a separate question covered in our franchise broker registration tracker.

Review, notice and filing: how the 14 registration states differ

Registration states differ in what happens after a franchisor files. In 9 states the filing takes effect only after review or a waiting period. California, Maryland and Rhode Island register at the 30th business day, Washington at the 15th business day (RCW 19.100.060), Illinois on the 21st day, New York answers within 30 days with an acceptance letter or a deficiency notice, Minnesota registers by order, North Dakota by entry in its register, and Virginia when the Commission makes its findings.

In the other 5, the filing itself does the work. Indiana and Wisconsin call it registration by notification and make it effective on receipt (Wis. Stat. 553.26). Michigan requires an annual notice, effective on filing (MCL 445.1507a). South Dakota’s notice filing law dates from 2008 and treats a complete filing as effective on receipt (SDCL 37-5B-5). Hawaii requires the offering circular to be filed at least 7 days before a sale (HRS 482E-3). Regulators in these states can still stop sales, but none of the statutes we read makes effectiveness wait for a review, although South Dakota’s director can delay a filing by asking for more information.

That split explains why published counts disagree. Franchise Law Solutions lists 13 registration states and leaves out South Dakota (page modified July 2026); IFPG also lists 13 (undated). North Dakota’s own regulator page says it is one of 15 (ND Securities Division) without naming them. The GAO list of 14 is the federal reference, and every state on it has a live registration or notice statute.

Franchise registration fees and renewal costs by state

Franchise registration fees are set in statute in most of the 14 states, and they are small next to legal and audit costs, with one exception. California charges $1,865 to register and $1,245 to renew (Corp. Code 31500). The median initial fee across the 14 is $500 and the median renewal fee is $250, so California’s initial fee is 3.7 times the median.

A franchisor that registered in all 14 states and renewed four times would pay $23,595 in state fees over five years: $7,615 in initial fees and $3,995 a year in renewals. California is 29.0% of that total. The figure is a simple sum for illustration. It leaves out NASAA filing-system charges, amendment fees, late fees, attorney time and audited financial statements, and several states renew on a fiscal-year cycle rather than exactly every 12 months. For what buyers pay, see our franchise cost guide.

Franchise filing states and business opportunity laws

Outside the 14, the main source of state filings is business opportunity law. These laws define business opportunities around vending machines, buy-back promises and marketing programs, and most exclude franchises, either outright or if the franchisor files a short notice. Six states require that notice. Texas charges $25 once, with no expiration (Texas Secretary of State). Florida and Utah require an annual notice with fees capped at $100 (Fla. Stat. 559.802). Nebraska charges $100 (Neb. Rev. Stat. 59-1722). Kentucky requires written notice with no fee stated (KRS 367.807), and Connecticut asks for a copy of the federal trademark certificate (Connecticut Department of Banking).

Ten more states have business opportunity laws that exclude franchises with no filing at all, usually when the franchise uses a registered trademark or follows the FTC Rule: Alaska, Georgia, Iowa, Louisiana, Maine, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma and South Carolina. Some guides call Connecticut, Maine, North Carolina and South Carolina registration states for franchisors without a federally registered mark. That follows from the trademark wording in their statutes, but it is a condition of the exclusion, not a franchise registration law. Oregon has a franchise disclosure and antifraud law without registration (ORS 650).

Escrow, deferral and surety: conditions registration states can impose

Registration lets a regulator set conditions before sales start. Thirteen of the 14 statutes provide for escrow or impound of franchise fees, in most by order of the regulator; Hawaii’s sections we read contain no such provision. Illinois (815 ILCS 705/15), Minnesota (Minn. Stat. 80C.05) and Virginia (Va. Code 13.1-561) name fee deferral in the statute, and Washington’s regulator says it accepts deferral, a parent guarantee or a surety bond in place of an impound (DFI franchise FAQs). In Michigan and Wisconsin, escrow applies only when a franchisee asks for it.

Minnesota is the one state where these conditions can be counted from public records. In 2025 its CARDS database shows 16 surety bond documents and 1 escrow agreement, against 203 new registration orders, or 8.4 bond and escrow documents per 100 new registrations. No document is typed as a deferral in any year. That does not mean deferral is never imposed: conditions can be written into the registration order itself, which CARDS does not classify separately.

Exemptions from franchise registration

Most registration states exempt large or experienced franchisors, but the thresholds differ. Illinois sets the bar at $15 million of net worth, North Dakota and Rhode Island at $10 million, and California, Indiana, New York and Washington at $5 million, each with extra conditions. Several states require a notice and fee to use the exemption. Wisconsin exempts sales to experienced buyers paying at least $100,000 in cash, and South Dakota exempts investments of $1 million or more. The FTC Rule’s own exemptions start at $735 of payments and $1,469,600 of investment (89 FR 57077). The table lists only exemptions stated in the statute or rule we read; regulations add others.

What changed for franchise registration, 2024 to 2026

Between 2024 and 2026 no state added or dropped franchise registration. The changes were in fees, procedure and the terms registration states will accept. California’s AB 137 raised filing fees by 176.3% for registration and 176.7% for renewal; DFPI says the new fees applied from July 1, 2025, while the statute note says June 30, 2025 (DFPI). Maryland’s Franchise Reform Act took effect October 1, 2026 (Ch. 414). It indexes the regulatory net equity exemption to inflation, adds a renewal fast-track pilot, and gives the Commissioner 5 years instead of 3 to act on a violation.

Virginia’s 2026 Acts ch. 553 bars post-term non-competes in franchise agreements and requires Virginia law from July 1, 2026 (Acts 2026, ch. 553). NASAA’s franchise project group updated its advisory on post-term non-competes on February 27, 2026 (NASAA advisory). For how these clauses appear in contracts, see our franchise agreement terms study.

Registration activity: Minnesota, Maryland and the FTC count

Registration produces a steady flow of renewals. Minnesota issued orders on 1,327 renewals received in 2025, about 6.5 for every new registration, plus 359 amendment orders and 274 cancellations. Cancellation counts swing from 37 in 2024 to 274 in 2025; we could not tell whether that reflects how Commerce typed documents or a real change. Maryland’s Attorney General processed 916 renewals in fiscal 2025 (fiscal note), and the office reports that 65% of 2024 applications arrived between March and May, the spring renewal season that the new pilot program targets.

Nationally, the FTC estimates about 4,000 franchisors are covered by its rule, with about 240 new ones a year, distributing about 400,000 disclosure documents annually (91 FR 24235). Minnesota’s 2025 renewal orders equal 33.2% of that franchisor estimate. The two figures measure different things, but the comparison shows that one mid-sized registration state sees a large share of active franchise systems. State-level franchise counts are in our franchise statistics by state.

What franchise registration states mean for buyers

For buyers, the registration states are where the paperwork is public. FTC staff report that California, Indiana, Minnesota and Wisconsin make FDDs available in regulator databases (FTC Issue Spotlight). Minnesota’s CARDS search needs no login; Wisconsin offers a franchise registration search on its DFI franchising page. An FDD filed in one of these states is often the fastest way to read a brand’s Item 7 investment table and Item 19 before talking to a seller.

Registration is not approval. Maryland’s and Minnesota’s statutes require the disclosure to say so in bold type. A registration means the regulator received the filing and, in review states, did not object before the effective date. It does not verify the numbers. Read the financial performance section with care (see our Item 19 study), and if a seller says a franchise is approved by the state, treat that as a warning sign covered in our franchise fraud report. Our buying a franchise guide walks through the rest of the review.

How we checked all 50 states and DC

For each of the 14 registration states we read the statute sections on registration, effectiveness, fees, escrow and exemptions on the official legislature site, and the regulator’s fee or filing page where one exists. For the other 37 jurisdictions we ran two searches each against a state-code mirror (one for franchise registration terms, one for business opportunity laws), opened every lead on an official site, and checked the result against the FTC/NASAA list of 14 and NASAA’s list of 21 agencies with franchise or business opportunity authority. Sites that block non-US traffic were read through a US proxy; Four pages were read through the Wayback Machine: DFPI’s 2025 fee notice (capture of May 15, 2026), DFPI’s 2024 fee table, Connecticut’s statute chapter (March 9, 2026) and Oklahoma’s Act page (December 6, 2025). The registry is checked monthly.