A free zone package is a licence and a desk. Everything that makes the company work is priced separately, and most of it is published.
Last checked 2 min readFree zones
Meydan's AED 12,500 licence covers three activity groups and a flexi-desk. Added separately:
AED 1,000 per activity for further activities, AED 1,850 per visa of visa allocation,
AED 3,500 per employment visa, offices from from AED 15,000 a year, and
corporate tax of 9% above AED 375,000 of taxable income.
The framed part is the package. The rest of the receipt is still yours to pay.
What does the headline price cover?
Less than most people assume, and more than the cheapest comparisons suggest. A licence and a flexi-desk is a real
product: it gives you a company, an address and the right to invoice. What it does not give you is a person living
in the country, which is usually the actual goal.
Meydan Free Zone: headline price against the lines added to itMeydan Free Zone, checked 2026-09-12Show the numbers as a table
Item
Amount (AED)
Headline licence price
AED 12,500
First year, solo founder (estimate)
AED 21,000 to 23,000
Dedicated office, a year
AED 30,000
Shared office, a year
AED 15,000
Dependent visa, per person
AED 6,000
Employment visa
AED 3,500
Visa allocation, per visa
AED 1,850
Each activity past the third
AED 1,000
Source: Meydan Free Zone, checked 2026-09-12
Meydan's own first-year estimate for a solo founder is AED 21,000 to AED 23,000, excluding living costs.
That is roughly the licence plus one visa and the identity paperwork, and it is a reasonable sanity check: if a
quote for one founder with one visa comes in far under it, something has been left out.
Which lines get added first?
In the package, and beside it
In the headline price
Charged separately
Licence for three activity groups
AED 1,000 per activity for each activity beyond them
Flexi-desk
Shared office from AED 15,000 a year, dedicated office around AED 30,000 a year, dedicated desk around AED 3,500 a month
The company itself
Visa allocation AED 1,850 per visa, then AED 3,500 per visa
Nothing for the family
Dependent visas at around AED 6,000 per person
Activities are the quiet one. Three groups sounds generous until you write down what the business actually does:
a consultancy that also resells software and runs training has crossed into a fourth line before it has earned a
dirham.
What does the free zone never charge, but you still pay?
Two things sit outside every package page. The first is the medical test and Emirates ID for each resident, which
Meydan estimates at AED 2,000 to AED 2,500. The second is running the company: it puts bookkeeping and
compliance at AED 1,000 to AED 1,500 a month, which over a year is comparable to the licence fee itself.
Then there is tax. UAE corporate tax has applied since 1 June 2023, at 0% on taxable
income up to AED 375,000 and 9% above it. Nothing to pay in a thin first year, but it changes
how you think about the second one, and registration is not something to discover late.
How to read a package page
Take the headline figure, then ask four questions in this order: how many activities, how many visas, what
workspace, and what renews. Those four turn a price into a budget. On the zones that publish detail you can answer
them yourself in ten minutes; on the ones that do not, they are the questions to put in an email before you book a
call.
RAKEZ, for example, prices its Biz Starter package at AED 6,000 with
up to 10 activities, which is more activity headroom than Meydan's base licence. But its visa
allocation is not stated, so the comparison stops there until you ask.