Do I need to be resident in Serbia to open a company?

No, and this is the point. The company can be formed first and then used as the basis for the residence application.

What is the minimum share capital for a DOO?

A nominal amount that is symbolic rather than a real capitalisation requirement. It is not a practical obstacle.

How long does it take to register a company in Serbia?

The registration decision is issued quickly. Being operational (with a bank account and the ability to receive payment) takes considerably longer, and the bank is the constraint.

What is corporate tax in Serbia?

Serbia levies corporate income tax at a flat rate, with separate treatment for distributed dividends. Confirm current rates with an accountant before modelling anything.

Serbia Company Formation | DOO Cost and Timeline

What a DOO is, and when to choose it over a sole proprietorship

A društvo s ograničenom odgovornošću is Serbia's limited liability company. The defining feature against a sole proprietorship is exactly what the name says: liability is limited to the company, and your personal assets sit outside it.

Choose it where there is more than one owner, where you will hire, where a client or supplier will not contract with an individual, or where the activity carries genuine risk. Choose a sole proprietorship where none of those apply and you want lower cost and lighter administration.

Registration at the Business Registers Agency

Registration is centralised through the Business Registers Agency, and the decision is issued quickly once the file is correct. The founding act must be properly executed, and signatures are certified.

A foreign founder needs a Serbian identification number for foreigners before the company can be registered to them. This is an ordinary administrative step, but it is a prerequisite and it is the thing most often missing when a registration stalls.

Share capital, activity codes and the founding act

Minimum share capital for a DOO is nominal (a symbolic amount rather than a real capitalisation requirement) so it is not a barrier. What matters more is the activity code, which determines your registered scope and can affect licensing.

The founding act sets out ownership, management and how decisions get made. For a single-owner company this is largely standard. For two or more owners it is worth taking seriously at the outset, because the cheapest time to agree what happens in a dispute is before there is one.

After registration: the sequence that actually takes the time

Registration is the fast part. What follows is a chain where each step depends on the previous one, and skipping ahead simply means waiting later.

1
Tax authority registration
The company is registered for tax and receives its obligations.
2
Company bank account
Compliance review for a foreign-owned company takes real time. Start it immediately.
3
Appoint an accountant
A DOO requires proper double-entry bookkeeping from the first month, not from first revenue.
4
Director's status
The director must be regularised. This is where company formation connects to your residence application.
5
Apply for residence
With the company existing and operating, the business ground for residence is documented.

Documents required

Founder's passport
Serbian identification number for foreigners
Founding act with certified signatures
Decision appointing the director
Registered business address in Serbia
Proof of paid registration fee

What it costs

DOO registration	€350
Digital signature certificateEvery director needs one to file anything	€150
Registered business addressThe APR seat, monthly	€33 / month
Virtual officeCorrespondence address and meeting rooms, not an APR seat	from €22.50 / month
Company bank account opening	€250
Monthly accountingRequired from month one	from €70 / month

Filing guarantee: if an application is returned or refused because of an error on our side, we correct it and refile without charging our fee again. Approval is the authority's decision, and no honest firm can guarantee it.

Government fees

What the state charges for this, on top of our fee. You pay it yourself, or we pay it for you at cost, with the receipts.

Company (DOO) registrationPaid to the APR	8,000 RSD≈ €68
Minimum share capitalNot a fee: it is paid into the company and stays there	100 RSD≈ €1
Application feeWith every residence or unified permit application, paid on the government portal	430 RSD≈ €4
Temporary residenceTariff no. 37, for the approval	23,450 RSD≈ €200
Residence cardTariff no. 37, for issuing the card	2,190 RSD≈ €19
Card productionMinistry of the Interior, for producing the card, since 12 September 2026	2,028 RSD≈ €17
Registration and temporary residence, in total	36,098 RSD≈ €309

Checked against the tariff on 11 October 2026. The state re-indexes these amounts every July. Euro figures are approximate, at 117 dinars to the euro. Citizens of North Macedonia, Mongolia, Cyprus and Belarus pay only the application fee for residence, under bilateral agreements.

Frequently asked questions

Yes. There is no local shareholding requirement for a DOO, and full foreign ownership is ordinary.

No, and the difference costs people a registration. A registered address is the company's seat at the Business Registers Agency, which is what appears on the register and where the state serves documents. A virtual office is a correspondence address with mail handling and meeting rooms. A virtual office provider will say so in their own terms, and the good ones say it prominently. Budget for both if you want both: €22.50 a month for the virtual office on a twelve-month term, €30 on three months, and €33 a month for the registered seat.

When this is not the right route for you

You want a company with no real activity purely as a residence device. Business-ground applications are assessed on whether the business is genuine.
You are not prepared for monthly accounting costs from the first month, before any revenue.
You need the company operational and banked within two weeks.