Company registration in China
Setup WFOE company in China.
A WFOE is a Chinese company you own with no local partner. We set one up in seven cities, and we tell you which city and which structure before you pay for either.
- Registration from $400 USD
- You own 100 percent
- Seven cities covered
Which entity you need
A WFOE is usually the answer, but not always.
The structure you register decides what your business can legally do in China, so it is the first decision and the most expensive one to get wrong, because changing it later is a fresh filing rather than an edit. A WFOE, a wholly foreign-owned enterprise, is a Chinese limited liability company owned entirely by foreign shareholders. It can invoice customers, export goods, hire staff and hold its own bank account, which is why the large majority of foreign businesses that intend to earn revenue in China register one. The acronym is jargon, but the thing itself is simple: a company you own outright, run by you, taxed in China.
The alternatives each exist for a specific reason rather than as a general choice. A Joint Venture shares ownership with a Chinese party and is used mainly where the sector is still restricted on the Foreign Investment Negative List, which is the published list of activities not fully open to foreign ownership. A Representative Office cannot invoice or trade at all; it can only market and liaise, which suits a company that wants a presence before it wants revenue. A branch extends an entity that already exists in China. A domestic LLC is not a foreign-ownership route at all, and if an agent proposes putting the company in a Chinese national's name to move faster, treat that as the warning it is.
WFOE
Wholly Foreign-Owned EnterpriseSuits: most revenue-earning foreign businesses.
Joint Venture
Suits: sectors still restricted on the negative list.
Representative Office
Suits: marketing and liaison, no trading.
Branch
Suits: extending an existing China entity.
Domestic LLC
Suits: not a foreign ownership route.
Which WFOE you register also matters, because the scope is not interchangeable. A trading WFOE is built to buy and sell goods, a consulting WFOE to provide services, a manufacturing WFOE to produce them, and the business scope you file has to match what you will actually invoice for. This is where a generic setup goes wrong, and it is why the right first question is not how much and how fast, but what will this company actually do.
Which one are you
Two kinds of foreign business come to China, and they need different things.
You source from a market and ship home.
You buy from a wholesale market and export. You want export rights, a work permit so the visa runs stop, and residence for your family. You think in annual all-in cost, and you have been quoted something suspiciously cheap. Yiwu is built for you, and its 1039 trade mode is why.
Start with YiwuYou need a China entity for a parent company.
You have a parent abroad and need a WFOE for revenue recognition, IP control and hiring. You are not price sensitive, you are time and compliance sensitive, and you need to pick the right zone before you file. Shanghai and its zones are where that decision is made.
Start with ShanghaiSeven cities
Where we register companies, and who each city suits.
Everything after registration
The eight things every company needs, and where we cover them.
Registration is the start. These eight are the life of the company afterward. Each routes to the city where that audience is served: the trader's version in Yiwu, the corporate version in Shanghai.
The process
The licence is the fast part. Banking is the step that breaks the timeline.
Registration runs in a sequence: reserve the name, draft the business scope, file with the local market regulator for the business licence, carve the company chops, then open the bank account and complete tax and foreign-exchange registration. On paper the licence can arrive quickly. In practice the entity is not working until the bank account opens, and for a foreign shareholder that is the step that slips.
Anyone who quotes you a single confident timeline is usually quoting the licence, not the working company. We quote both, and we tell you what makes the bank stage longer, because that is the honest number.
Registration sequence
Name reservation
Reserve the company name.
Business scope
Draft the scope you will actually invoice for.
Business licence
File with the local market regulator.
Company chops
Carve the official company seals.
Bank account
The step that sets your real start date.
Tax and forex
Complete tax and foreign-exchange registration.
Why the cost spread is so wide
The quotes differ by what they leave out, not by quality.
Published all-in setup figures across this market run from roughly USD 3,000 at the low end to USD 12,000 for a service or trading WFOE, and USD 18,000 to 30,000 for a manufacturing one. That is close to a tenfold spread, and almost none of it is a quality difference. A service fee alone and a genuine all-in figure often describe the same engagement quoted two ways, which is where most of the gap comes from.
A manufacturing WFOE really does cost several times a consulting one, because of the environmental assessment and the zoning, so comparing those two is comparing different products rather than different prices. The city matters too, and Yiwu sits at the cheaper end while Shanghai does not. The way to make any two quotes comparable is to force each provider to name what sits outside the number: registered capital, government fees, apostille and certified translation, office rent and the annual audit are the usual omissions. Naming them is the whole difference between a quote you can trust and one you cannot, and it costs a provider nothing to be honest about them except the sale it was hoping the silence would win.
One tax route belongs here rather than on any city page, because it does not follow the city. The reduced 15% corporate income tax rates that pull people toward Nansha, Lin-gang and Hainan are zone incentives: you qualify by registering inside a defined area and meeting its conditions. High and New Technology Enterprise status, usually shortened to HNTE, reaches the same 15% rate through what the company does rather than where it sits. It applies nationwide, in renewable three-year windows, and it does not care which of the seven cities you registered in.
The bar is real. You need to own the core intellectual property rather than license it, keep research staff at a meaningful share of headcount, spend a defined proportion of revenue on research and development, and earn most of your revenue from one of the designated high-technology fields. Accreditation is a months-long application, not a filing. For a trading company it is the wrong plan. For a technology, engineering or biomedical company it is the question worth asking before you pick a city on tax grounds, because the answer may make the city choice a logistics decision instead of a tax one.
Common questions
What foreign founders actually ask first.
Do I need a Chinese partner to register a company in China?
No. A WFOE is wholly foreign owned, so you keep full control with no local partner. A Chinese partner is only required in the sectors still restricted on the Foreign Investment Negative List. Most trading, consulting and service activities are off that list and open to full foreign ownership.
Why do WFOE setup quotes vary so much?
Most of the spread is what the quote includes, not quality. A service fee alone and an all-in figure can describe the same engagement. A manufacturing WFOE genuinely costs several times a consulting one because of the environmental assessment and zoning. Ask every provider what is excluded: registered capital, government fees, apostille and translation, office rent and audit are the usual omissions.
How long does it take to register a WFOE in China?
The company licence is often the fast part. The step that sets the real timeline is opening a corporate bank account, which for a foreign shareholder can take weeks after the licence is issued. Anyone quoting a single confident number is usually quoting the licence and not the working entity.
Can I use a virtual address to register a WFOE?
Sometimes, and it depends on the city, the district and your industry. Some parks accept a registered-only address. The bank and the work permit application both scrutinise it, and a zone incentive usually needs real premises. The honest answer is conditional, which is the opposite of what an agent selling one will tell you.
What is the difference between a WFOE, a JV and a Representative Office?
A WFOE is a Chinese limited company you own outright and can invoice and hire through. A Joint Venture shares ownership with a Chinese party and is used where the sector requires it. A Representative Office cannot invoice or trade, only market and liaise, so it suits a presence, not revenue.
Which Chinese city should I register in?
It follows what you do. Traders sourcing from a market and shipping home suit Yiwu, where the 1039 trade mode is built for consolidated small-supplier exports. A parent company needing revenue recognition, IP control and hiring suits Shanghai and its zone choices. The city decides your bureau, your bank landscape and your tax treatment, so it is a first decision, not a last one.
Start with the city, and we will tell you the rest.
Pick the path that sounds like you and read that city's page, or book a call and describe what you are trying to do. We will tell you the structure, the realistic timeline and what a year actually costs, before you commit to anything.
Last reviewed: 18 July 2026General information, not legal or tax advice for a specific case. Outcomes depend on facts you have not yet given us, and on the bureaus and banks that decide them.
