Abu Dhabi's common-law financial centre and DIFC's direct competitor — English law applied wholesale and a respected regulator (FSRA). The 2025 fee revision cut the non-financial commercial licence to USD 5,000/yr and set the tech-startup licence at USD 1,500/yr (≈AED 5,500) — still undercutting Dubai equivalents.
LAST VERIFIED: 21 JUL 2026 · Tariff verified against the official schedule.
ADGM is Abu Dhabi's common-law financial centre on Al Maryah Island, with jurisdiction now extended across Al Reem Island. It is built for regulated finance — asset and fund managers, brokers, and fintech firms testing inside the FSRA's RegLab sandbox — and for family offices, holding companies and SPVs that want English law applied directly and a court that hears disputes in English.
It is not built for a founder who simply needs a cheap trade licence to invoice clients. An e-commerce or general-trading shell pays ADGM's prestige positioning for prestige it will never use; a Dubai zone like IFZA or a mainland licence does that job for far less. The headline from AED 18,400/yr (≈USD 5,000) buys a non-financial commercial licence that suits advisory and professional-services firms — not the cheapest-possible setup.
The AED 18,400 figure is the non-financial commercial licence. A dedicated tech-startup licence runs about USD 1,500/yr (≈AED 5,500), materially undercutting Dubai equivalents. But the licence is not the running cost — several lines sit on top of it, and for a regulated entity the regulatory track dwarfs everything else.
| Cost line | Note |
|---|---|
| Non-financial commercial licence | from AED 18,400/yr |
| Tech-startup licence | ≈USD 1,500/yr (≈AED 5,500) |
| Registered office / desk | mandatory, priced by size |
| Establishment card + visas | per headcount |
| FSRA fees (regulated firms) | separate: application + annual supervision |
Budget the full stack before comparing headlines — our setup-cost calculator models it line by line.
ADGM requires a real registered office inside the jurisdiction; there is no address-only shortcut. Visa allocation is not a fixed number — it scales with the office space you hold, so an SPV on a small desk supports a handful of visas while a licensed manager on a full floor supports many. That is genuine substance, which is what makes ADGM credible for corporate-tax positioning and for opening a bank account.
As a free-zone person an ADGM company can qualify for 0% corporate tax on qualifying income and 9% otherwise — the mechanics are set out on our corporate tax page, and the choice of activity determines which side you land on.
The honest comparison is DIFC. Both are common-law, English-language financial centres with their own independent courts; ADGM's regulator is the FSRA, DIFC's is the DFSA. DIFC is older and larger, with a deeper cluster of banks, funds and law firms — often the default. ADGM competes on cost (its post-2025 fees undercut Dubai) and on proximity to Abu Dhabi's sovereign capital, which pulls funds and family offices.
Pick licensed activities and reserve a trade name. Activity choice drives approvals, banking and whether your income can be QFZP-qualifying.
Passports, application forms and a clean source-of-funds story. No local sponsor is needed — free zone companies are 100% foreign-owned.
The zone issues your licence (typically 14–30 business days), then the immigration establishment card that unlocks visa processing.
Entry permit, medical, Emirates ID for each visa holder; corporate account opening runs in parallel — this is usually the slowest step.
We reply with numbers — a line-by-line setup estimate for your case. Not a call script, not a brochure.