Trade License Renewal
Mainland renewal handled end to end — Ejari, approvals, fines and the filing itself.
Renewing a Dubai mainland license
Renewal is the one licence job with a date attached to it, and the date is not the expiry date. The duty in Law No. (13) of 2011 is to act before then: “A Business must renew its Licence within the last month prior to its expiry” (Article 8(b)). The licence itself runs a year at a time — “valid for a term of one (1) year renewable for the same period” (Article 8(a)) — so the window comes round every twelve months whether or not anyone is watching it.
Most of the renewals that go wrong do not go wrong at the filing. They go wrong because the tenancy registration lapsed, or an establishment card expired, or a fine was sitting unpaid, or there was a remark on the licence that nobody had looked at since last year. We check those first and tell you what the file is missing before quoting, which is the whole reason a renewal usually turns into a two-day job rather than a two-week one.
This page is the mainland renewal service. If you want the longer explainer — the online routes, the fee components, what each step actually does — the guide linked at the foot of this page covers it.
What the renewal covers
- Checking the licence, the tenancy registration and the establishment card against each other before anything is filed
- Clearing what blocks a renewal: unpaid charges, a lapsed Ejari, an establishment card that needs doing first
- The renewal filing itself with the department, and the follow-up until it is through
- Any external approval your activity needs as part of the renewal
- Ejari renewal through the Dubai Land Department where the tenancy is the thing holding you up
- The e-Trader renewal, which runs on its own track
- The next expiry date recorded and watched, so the following year is a reminder rather than a scramble
Get this quoted
Itemised in writing, government charges shown separately, before anything is filed.
Which one do you need?
Who this page is for
- Holders of a Dubai mainland commercial, professional or industrial licence
- Sole establishments, civil companies, LLCs and LLC single-owner companies
- Mainland branches renewing alongside a parent licence
- e-Trader holders — see the e-Trader section below, the process differs
- Anyone whose licence has already expired, including by a long way. This is routine work; it is not a reason to avoid dealing with it
- Owners abroad who need the renewal run from here
What we need from you
For a standard mainland renewal, this is the whole list:
- Trade licence copy — always
- Ejari copy — if you hold your own physical office
- Establishment card copy — if the company has one
For an e-Trader renewal: the e-Trader licence copy, a photograph of it is fine. That is genuinely it to open the file. Anything further depends on what the check turns up, and we ask for it then rather than demanding a folder up front.
Why the tenancy document matters: the Law requires an applicant to "specify the premises in the Emirate through which its Economic Activities will be conducted" (Law No. (13) of 2011, Article 17), and the UAE Government portal states that "All businesses in the UAE must have a physical address to operate" and that "In Dubai, the agreement must be registered with Ejari" (u.ae, 8 April 2026). How much validity an authority wants left on that registration at renewal is not something any authority publishes, so we check your case rather than quote a rule.
The renewal, step by step
- Send the licence number. Nothing else, at this stage. We look at the licence as the department holds it, not as the PDF in your inbox shows it.
- We report what is in the way. Expiry position, fines accrued, tenancy status, establishment card status, and whether there is a remark. You get this before you get a price.
- Written quote. The department's charges and our fee, itemised separately.
- Clearing first, filing second. Whatever has to be settled or re-registered is done in the order the department needs it, not in the order it was discovered.
- Renewed licence to you, with the new expiry date, and a note of anything that now falls due behind it — an establishment card and a tenancy rarely expire on the same day as the licence.
Turnaround and fees
- Fees: quote on request. Renewal charges move with your activity, legal form and premises. Itemised in writing before anything is filed.
- Our typical turnaround: about two working days once the file is clean. The word doing the work in that sentence is *clean* — a lapsed tenancy or an unpaid charge is what turns two days into two weeks, which is why step 2 exists.
- A licence that expired some time ago takes longer, and how much longer depends on what accrued in the meantime rather than on the renewal itself.
Standard renewal: commercial, professional and industrial
One track covers the premises-based mainland licences. The legal form changes what a *change* to the licence involves, but it does not change the shape of a renewal: the licence, the tenancy registration and the establishment card have to line up, anything outstanding has to be settled, and then it is filed. Where it gets interesting is the order. An establishment card cannot be sorted out after a renewal it depended on, and a tenancy registration that lapsed has to be back in place before the renewal goes in rather than after. Getting that order wrong is the single most common reason a renewal stalls for a week.
What we check before quoting
- Where the licence actually sits against its expiry, and what has accrued
- Whether the tenancy registration is current
- Whether the establishment card needs doing first, or at all
- Whether your activity needs an approval from the authority that regulates it
- Whether anything is sitting on the licence as a remark
Renewing an e-Trader licence
The e-Trader licence is the mainland route for selling online without premises, and the UAE Government portal lists the "eTrader licence" among Invest in Dubai's services (u.ae, eCommerce, last updated 28 September 2026). The same page is worth reading before you renew, for two rules that catch people out: a mainland online seller needs "a commercial licence that includes eCommerce activity", and "All eCommerce licences require the approval of Telecommunications and Digital Government Regulatory Authority (TDRA) also". For the renewal itself we need one thing to start: a copy of the e-Trader licence. A photograph of it is fine. Because there are no premises on this licence, the tenancy question that drives a standard renewal does not arise in the same way. That makes the e-Trader renewal the quickest job on this page and the one most often left too late, on the assumption that something so small cannot carry a consequence. A full e-Trader page — eligibility, the activity list, what the licence does not allow, when you have to move up to a full licence — is coming. Until then the WhatsApp button on the e-Trader card on the hub reaches us directly.
Renewing and changing the licence together
A renewal is the moment most owners notice that something on the licence is out of date: a partner who left, an activity the business has quietly been doing for a year, an address that moved. Doing both at once is normal and often sensible, because you are in front of the department anyway. Two honest points about it. First, it is two pieces of work, not one: a change carries its own approvals and its own charges, so bundling it with a renewal saves time and trips, not money. Second, the Law treats the change as the serious half — no modification to the licence may be made "without first obtaining the approval of the DED and Competent Entities" (Law No. (13) of 2011, Article 10(a)) — so the change is what sets the timeline, not the renewal. If you know what you want to change, the modification page sets out each type and the papers it needs.
A late renewal, and the one official figure
If the date has gone past, the position is straightforward and it is better to know it than to guess. The published fine is "AED 200.00 per month (a part of a month will be rounded up to a full month)" — Executive Council Resolution No. (13) of 2011 approving the fees and fines of the Department of Economic Development, Schedule (2) item 6. Item 5 of the same schedule sets AED 250 for failing to renew within the prescribed period. Note how item 6 is worded: part of a month counts as a whole one, so there is no benefit in waiting until the end of a month to act. We checked whether a later Executive Council resolution has replaced that schedule and could not find one; the Dubai Legislation Portal entry carries no amendment note, and Law No. (20) of 2021 keeps legislation from the department's earlier era in force "until new superseding legislation is issued" (Article 18(b)). So the figure is cited as the published legal one, attributed, and not as today's counter price. If the business stopped trading, Article 13(b) of the Law is the provision to look at: a business is not subject to licensing fees or non-renewal fines where the licence expired and it ceased conducting economic activities, or where it applied for cessation. Whether it reaches your file is a question of fact and of what the department holds. If you let it run on indefinitely, Article 30(a)(1) is the other end of the same story: closure or revocation after a newspaper notice and two weeks without objection.
When there is a remark on the licence
A remark is a restriction the authority has placed on the licence, and its practical effect is that the licence work you came for cannot go through until it is lifted. Owners usually meet one for the first time at a renewal, which is the worst moment to meet it. We are deliberately not publishing a list of what a remark blocks or why one is placed, because no authority publishes that and we are not going to invent it. What is published is the approval requirement that sits over any change to a licence — "without first obtaining the approval of the DED and Competent Entities" (Law No. (13) of 2011, Article 10(a)) — and the department's power to order closure or revocation in the circumstances set out in Article 30. What we can do is find out. Send the licence number and we will establish what is actually recorded against it, which authority placed it, and what that authority wants in order to lift it. That is the first step in every one of these files, and it is usually cheaper and less dramatic than the owner feared.
What opens the file
Short, on purpose. We would rather ask for one more thing later than send you hunting through a folder today.
Standard mainland renewal
- Trade licence copy
- Ejari copy, if you hold your own physical office
- Establishment card copy, if the company has one
e-Trader renewal
- e-Trader licence copy; a photograph is fine
Send them to WhatsApp on +971 4 223 6581, or use the form on this page and attach nothing — we will tell you what to send once we have looked at the licence.
Renewal questions, answered from the law
When exactly does a mainland licence have to be renewed?
In the month before it expires. The wording is "A Business must renew its Licence within the last month prior to its expiry" (Law No. (13) of 2011, Article 8(b)). That is a duty to act early, not a deadline on the expiry date.
Is there a grace period after the expiry date?
No authority publishes one. A great many pages online quote a grace period and we are not going to add to them: the published rule is the renewal duty in Article 8(b). What does exist is a fine for being late, and that figure is sourced in the next answer.
What is the fine for renewing late?
"AED 200.00 per month (a part of a month will be rounded up to a full month)", under Executive Council Resolution No. (13) of 2011 approving the fees and fines of the Department of Economic Development, Schedule (2) item 6. Item 5 of the same schedule carries AED 250 for failing to renew within the prescribed period. We checked for a later instrument replacing that resolution and found none; it is cited here as the published legal figure, not as a current price quoted by the department.
Can a licence be renewed for more than one year?
Article 8(a) says the licence is valid for one year "renewable for the same period", and then adds that at the business's request the validity can be extended for up to four years, subject to the department's approval. Worth asking about if annual renewal is a nuisance for you.
Do I need a valid Ejari to renew?
A registered tenancy is part of holding a mainland licence: the Law requires the premises to be specified (Article 17) and the UAE Government portal says the Dubai agreement "must be registered with Ejari". The specific question of how much validity must remain at the moment of renewal is not published by any authority, so we check it against your licence instead of quoting a number at you.
My licence expired a long time ago and the business stopped trading. Am I still accruing fines?
There is a provision for exactly that situation. A business "will not be subject to the licensing fees or the fines resulting from non-renewal of its Licence" where the licence expired and the business ceased conducting economic activities, or where it applied for cessation (Law No. (13) of 2011, Article 13(b)). Whether it applies to you turns on the facts and on what the department has on file, so send the number and we will find out.
Can I renew and change something at the same time?
Yes, and it is common — a partner leaving, an activity being added. In practice it is two pieces of work priced separately rather than one cheaper one, because the change has its own approvals. The section above says what we need for each.
Does the e-Trader licence renew the same way?
No. It is a different filing with a different document set — a copy of the e-Trader licence is all we open the file with — and it does not involve a tenancy registration in the way a premises-based licence does. The section above covers it.
There is a remark on my licence. Can it still be renewed?
Not until the remark is dealt with by the authority that placed it. The Law is explicit that no change may be made to a licence "without first obtaining the approval of the DED and Competent Entities" (Law No. (13) of 2011, Article 10(a)). The practical step is to find out what the remark actually is, which we do from the licence number.
What happens if I simply never renew?
The department has a power to act. Where there is a "failure to renew the Licence and cessation of the activity", it may order closure or revocation after a public notice is published in a daily widely circulated local newspaper and "no objections are raised within two (2) weeks from the date of publication" (Article 30(a)(1)). Letting a licence lapse is a decision with a legal consequence, not a way of avoiding one.
How much will my renewal cost?
Quote on request, in writing, itemised, before anything is filed. A single number on a web page would be wrong for most readers, because the charges follow your activity, legal form and premises.
Can you handle it if I am outside the UAE?
Usually yes for a renewal. Tell us where you are and we will say whether anything needs signing or attesting on your side.
Figures and rules on this page name the instrument they come from and were checked on 7 November 2026. Authority rules, charges and processing times can change without notice. AL HUDHUD Documents Clearing Services is a documents clearing and PRO services company, not a law firm; this is information, not legal advice. Fees: quote on request.
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