A free UAE free zone tax checker for whether your company likely pays 0% corporate tax as a qualifying free zone person, from the law's own tests.
5.0(1 rating)Say where your company is, what it does and who pays it, to check whether it likely counts as a qualifying free zone person and pays 0% corporate tax, or falls under the standard rules.
Where is the company?
What does it mainly do?
Who pays it, and how much a year?
Which conditions does it meet?
Your answer
This free UAE free zone tax checker shows whether your free zone company likely counts as a qualifying free zone person and pays 0% corporate tax, or falls under the standard rules.
It follows the law's own tests: what the company does, who pays it, how much of its revenue doesn't qualify, and the conditions it has to keep.
0% is still possible in a free zone, depending on how you're set up and how much you earn. But it isn't as simple as it was, and the accounting rules are new.
What is a qualifying free zone person?
A qualifying free zone person is a company in a UAE free zone that meets every condition of the Corporate Tax Law. It pays 0% on its qualifying income and 9% on the rest of its taxable income.
It's not the same as having a free zone license. Every free zone company starts as a free zone person, and only the ones that pass every test get the 0%.
The conditions
A free zone company has to meet all of these, every tax period:
- Real substance – its core work happens in the free zone, with enough staff, assets and spending there
- Qualifying income – most of its revenue comes from the right activities and the right clients
- The de minimis limit – other revenue stays under the lower of 5% of revenue and AED 5 million
- Audited accounts – audited financial statements every year
- Transfer pricing – market prices and records for deals with related parties
- No election – it hasn't chosen to be taxed at the standard rate
What counts as qualifying income
Who pays you decides most of it:
- Other free zone companies – their payments count, as long as they use what you sell themselves and your activity isn't excluded
- Mainland companies and companies abroad – their payments count only when your activity is on the qualifying list
- People – their payments almost never count, because the law excludes transactions with individuals
The qualifying list is short: manufacturing, processing, trading qualifying commodities, holding shares, regulated fund and wealth management, headquarter and treasury services to your own group, distribution from a Designated Zone, logistics, shipping, reinsurance and aircraft leasing.
Income from qualifying intellectual property, meaning patents and copyrighted software, can also count under its own formula, but trademarks don't.
Why most creators and consultants don't qualify
Consulting, marketing, media, courses and coaching aren't on the qualifying list. So a creator's or a consultant's income only counts when the client is another free zone company that uses the work itself.
Sales to people count against the limit, and the limit is small. The Federal Tax Authority's own guide has the example of a new company that sells an office chair to an employee for AED 100: with no other revenue that year, it fails the test and loses the 0% for 5 tax periods.
So for most creators and consultants, 0% comes from the standard rules instead: 0% on taxable income up to AED 375,000, or small business relief.
Small business relief instead
With revenue of AED 3 million or less in this and every earlier tax period, a company can elect small business relief and be treated as having no taxable income, for tax periods ending by December 31, 2029.
A qualifying free zone person can't use it. So a small free zone company that doesn't qualify often pays nothing anyway, with simpler books.
What happens if you stop qualifying
A company that fails any condition, at any point in a tax period, loses the free zone 0% from the start of that period and for the next 4. Then it pays under the standard rules.
How to use the UAE free zone tax checker
Your answers stay in this browser.
Who is the UAE free zone tax checker for?
It's for founders with a UAE free zone company, or thinking of one, and each of them has a next step:
- UAE company setup cost calculator – anyone working out what a free zone company costs and the tax on their profit
- Company formation compared – anyone still choosing between the UAE, a US LLC, the UK and more than 30 other places
- Tax rates by country – anyone comparing corporate tax, income tax and VAT
- US LLC for non-residents checker – anyone adding a US LLC for payments
More money tools are on the free finance tools page. Or browse all my free tools.
UAE Free Zone Tax Checker FAQs
Questions about the UAE free zone 0% rate? Here's what to know.
A qualifying free zone person is a UAE free zone company that meets every condition of the Corporate Tax Law.
It pays 0% on its qualifying income and 9% on the rest of its taxable income.
No: only a qualifying free zone person pays 0%, and only on its qualifying income.
Other free zone companies pay under the standard rules: 0% up to AED 375,000 and 9% above.
They count only when the client is another free zone company that uses the work itself.
They aren't on the qualifying list, so payments from mainland companies, companies abroad and people count against the limit.
Revenue that doesn't qualify must stay under the lower of 5% of total revenue and AED 5 million.
Over that, the company isn't a qualifying free zone person for that tax period and the next 4.
It can, but the income doesn't count as qualifying, except for shipping, regulated fund and wealth management, and aircraft leasing.
Those sales count against the de minimis limit.
Yes: it must prepare audited financial statements every year, under Ministerial Decision No. 84 of 2025.
No: small business relief isn't open to a qualifying free zone person.
A free zone company that doesn't qualify can elect it when its revenue is AED 3 million or less in this and every earlier tax period.
It loses the free zone 0% from the start of that tax period and for the next 4.
Then it pays under the standard rules.
I did. I'm Navid Moazzez, and the UAE free zone tax checker is one of my free tools on navid.me.
Read about me, or see my creator profile.
Navid Moazzez
AI business strategist & AI OS builder
Navid Moazzez helps creators and founders master AI and build their own AI Operating System (AI OS) to automate their business and life.
Navid.me is reader-supported. When you buy through links on this site, I may earn an affiliate commission. Learn more.
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