UAE Corporate Tax Filing Deadline Checker

No later than 9 months from the end of the relevant Tax Period (Federal Decree-Law No. 47 of 2022, Article 53). A financial year ending 31 December 2024 means a return due by 30 September 2025. A year ending 31 March 2025 means a return due by 31 December 2025.

Yes. Corporate Tax payable must be settled within 9 months from the end of the relevant Tax Period (Article 48), which is the same date the return is due. Filing on time but paying late still carries a penalty.

For a company that already existed, it is your first financial year beginning on or after 1 June 2023. A company with a December year end has a first Tax Period of 1 January 2024 to 31 December 2024. A company with a May year end starts earlier, on 1 June 2023. For a company incorporated on or after 1 June 2023, the first Tax Period runs from incorporation to your first financial year end.

AED 500 for each month, or part of a month, for the first 12 months the return is late — then AED 1,000 for each month after that. The penalty starts the day after the deadline, so a single day late already costs a full month.

Unsettled Corporate Tax payable attracts a penalty of 14% per annum on the unpaid amount, accruing monthly from the day after the due date. It runs alongside, not instead of, any late-filing penalty.

For your FIRST Tax Period only, the FTA has run an initiative waiving the AED 10,000 late-registration penalty where the Tax Return is submitted within seven months from the end of that first Tax Period, rather than the usual nine. The FTA states this does not change the deadline to settle Corporate Tax payable, which remains nine months. It applies only to the first Tax Period, and a penalty already paid can be credited back in EmaraTax. Confirm your eligibility and the current status of the initiative with the FTA or your advisor before relying on it — the seven-month date is a condition of the waiver, not a statutory deadline (FTA Public Clarification CTP006).

Yes. The 0% rate on the first AED 375,000 of taxable income is a rate, not an exemption from filing. Every registered Taxable Person must file a return for every Tax Period, including a nil return and including a year with a loss.

Yes. A Qualifying Free Zone Person may pay 0% on its qualifying income, but it must still register, file a return for every Tax Period, and maintain audited financial statements. The rate you pay does not change whether you file.

Yes. Small Business Relief is elected in the tax return, so the return is how you claim it. A business that simply does not file has not claimed the relief; it has missed a deadline.

A Tax Period can be changed only in limited circumstances and with an application to the FTA. It is not a way to defer a deadline that is already approaching, and a change affects the length of the period and the return that covers it. Take advice before applying.

File as soon as you can. The monthly penalty keeps accruing for every month the return is outstanding, so delay makes it worse rather than buying time, and unpaid tax accrues separately. Bring the books to a filable state and submit on EmaraTax — a specialist can reconstruct the period and file quickly.