How we score every zone.

When you select a priority — say, lowest cost or fastest setup — that dimension's weight is boosted by 1.5×. The total is then re-normalised to 100 so the scale stays consistent. In effect, the priority dimension can contribute up to ~29 points instead of 20 for cost, for example, and other dimensions shrink proportionally.

The multiplier is deliberate: founders who choose "banking matters most" should not be served the same shortlist as founders who choose "cheapest possible." The rubric must reflect that.

Some constraints are not soft preferences — they are hard requirements. Knockouts remove a zone from consideration entirely. The rules below run before scoring.

1. 01
   Industrial / warehouse mismatch

   If you need warehouse or industrial space, zones without those facilities are excluded. Virtual-only and commercial-tower zones don't qualify.

2. 02
   Financial services restricted

   Regulated financial services activities (banking, asset management, fund management) are restricted to DIFC and ADGM. Other zones are excluded — the regulators are jurisdiction-specific.

3. 03
   Freelancer workspace mismatch

   Solo founders / freelancers need a zone offering at least one of: flexi desk, virtual office, or a dedicated freelancer permit. Zones without any of those are excluded.

4. 04
   Regulatory approval required

   Activities flagged 'requires approval' (e.g. healthcare, education, regulated trading) trigger a warning rather than a hard exclusion — the wizard doesn't yet collect the can-you-attend-in-person input that would resolve them definitively. Visible in the per-zone warning panel.

5. 05
   Restricted activity match

   If your stated activity appears on a zone's published restricted list (parenthetical qualifiers stripped to avoid false positives), the zone is excluded for that activity regardless of other fit.

6. 06
   Visa cap below need

   Zones with absolute visa caps below your stated visa need are removed entirely, not downgraded. The exclusion message cites the cap (e.g. 'Visa cap (5) is below your need (12)').

7. 07
   Holding company restricted

   Holding-company and pure-investment structures are limited to ADGM, DIFC, and RAK ICC — other zones lack the legal framework. All other zones are excluded for this use case.

Final scores are bucketed for clarity. The bucket is for orientation; the score is what drives ordering.

Costs are verified against official zone fee schedules — published online, in current 2026 dirhams. Banking difficulty is sourced from anonymous interviews with corporate bankers across five UAE banks. Activity licensing is mapped from each zone's official published activity catalogue.

• High All scoring-critical fields verified from primary sources.
• Medium Most fields verified; minor gaps estimated from comparable zones.
• Low Significant gaps; treat scores as directional only.

Where a number is unverifiable or rapidly changing, we mark it explicitly rather than guess.

Zone Compare is an independent reference. We do not receive commissions from free zones for ranking positions. Scores are computed deterministically from the data — no zone pays for placement.

Zone Compare carries no affiliate links or sponsored placements. The tool is an independent reference — funded as such, not by commissions on the zone you choose.

The Corporate Tax tab inside /cost models three legal outcomes a Free Zone Person can land in under Federal Decree-Law 47 of 2022 and the CTGFZP guide. Inputs are your facts about substance, qualifying revenue, audit posture, and transfer-pricing compliance; outputs are AED tax under each regime plus the legally-available scenario with the lowest tax that year.

QFZP — 0% qualifying, 9% non-qualifying

A Qualifying Free Zone Person is taxed at 0% on Qualifying Income and 9% on the rest. There is no AED 375,000 buffer for QFZP non-qualifying income — the 9% rate applies from the first dirham, per Article 3(2) of the Corporate Tax Law. Eligibility requires all six conditions to hold:

• Adequate substance in the Free Zone — qualified UAE-based employees, operating expenditure, assets, and core income-generating activity all located there.
• Derives qualifying income (transactions with other Free Zone Persons, qualifying activities with foreign customers, ancillary income).
• De-minimis test — non-qualifying revenue must not exceed the lower of 5% of total revenue or AED 5,000,000.
• Audited financial statements prepared in accordance with IFRS.
• Compliance with arm's-length pricing and transfer-pricing documentation (master and local file where applicable).
• Has not elected to be subject to standard CT under Article 19.

Failing any one condition is not a downgrade — the FTA treats the entity as a standard Article 3(1) taxable person for the current tax period and the consequent four. In our output that's labelled "QFZP failed → reverts to standard CT."

Standard CT — 0% to AED 375K, 9% above

The general regime under Article 3(1). Applies to any Taxable Person who isn't a QFZP — including Free Zone Persons who fail a QFZP condition. The 375,000 buffer is per tax period, not per year.

Small Business Relief — 0% if revenue ≤ AED 3M

Ministerial Decision 73/2023. An eligible Taxable Person with revenue at or below AED 3 million can elect Small Business Relief and pay 0% Corporate Tax for that tax period. Under current law, SBR is only available for tax periods ending on or before 31 December 2026 (subject to extension by the Cabinet). Our 5-year projection defaults SBR availability to Year 1 only — the toggle in the calculator lets you override if your tax period ending date qualifies.

Each zone profile and the comparison table surface four regulatory fields: qfzp_eligible, requires_audit, substance_level, and mainland_permit_available. Every value carries its own per-field source link — clicking through takes you to the authority that backs it.

What each field means

• qfzp_eligible. Whether this zone counts as a "Free Zone" under Article 1 of Federal Decree-Law 47/2022 — the structural prerequisite for entities established there to be Qualifying Free Zone Persons. Offshore registries (RAK ICC, JAFZA Offshore, Ajman Offshore) are NOT Free Zones for CT purposes; active FZA-administered zones generally are. This is a zone-level flag — meeting QFZP at the entity level still requires the six conditions modelled in the Corporate Tax tab.
• requires_audit. Whether the zone authority mandates annual audited financials for licence renewal. This is distinct from the entity-level audit requirement for QFZP status, which applies universally under CTGFZP1 regardless of zone. Tier-1 regulator-heavy zones (DIFC, ADGM, DMCC) mandate audit; most low-cost zones do not.
• substance_level. How easy it is to demonstrate QFZP economic substance in this zone — function of the zone's own physical-office offering. Minimal = virtual-only zone, substance is harder to evidence. Standard = physical-office options available, typical bar. High = regulator-grade Tier-1 zone where substance is straightforward to demonstrate but scrutiny is higher.
• mainland_permit_available. Whether entities established in this zone can obtain a mainland trading permit (via Dubai DED or the emirate equivalent) to serve UAE-mainland customers directly. Most active free zones support this; offshore registries don't.

How values are sourced

Values are either official (authoritative primary source — FTA decision, zone authority's own publication) or inferred(derived from documented rules where no primary source is published for that specific zone). Every cell tells you which.

• Official sources we cite directly:FDL 47/2022; Cabinet Decision 100/2023; CTGFZP1 (May 2024); Cabinet Decision 59/2017 (VAT Designated Zones); FDL 32/2021 (Commercial Companies); and each zone authority's own licence-rules publication where applicable.
• Inferred values follow documented rules inscripts/populate-schema-fields.mjs — e.g., substance_level = minimal for zones whose only office option is virtual. The inference rules are auditable in source.

How to use them

On a zone profile, the Jurisdiction & ecosystem section shows the value plus a "Source: Official / Inferred · date" link under each field. Click it to open the primary source in a new tab. On /compare, each cell shows the same attribution underneath the value, so you can cross-reference at a glance. The /zones page exposes filter pills for high-substance zones, audit-required zones, and mainland-permit zones.

Every monetary value in our data — zone fee schedules, the cost engine, the QFZP and mainland calculators, the scenario engine, the Plan store — is stored canonically in UAE Dirhams (AED). The display layer converts to your selected currency at render time. The picker in the top nav switches the conversion for every surface at once; AED data is never re-denominated.

How rates are sourced

Rates are committed manually as a static data file (src/data/fx-rates.json) with a verified_at timestamp. The AED-USD anchor is the UAE Central Bank peg of 3.6725 AED/USD, in place since 1997 — that one doesn't drift. Cross-rates for EUR, GBP, INR, SAR, CNY, AUD, CAD, SGD, and ZAR are refreshed manually vianode scripts/refresh-fx-rates.mjs which pulls from open.er-api.com (or exchangerate.host as fallback), prints a per-currency delta, and rewrites the file.

Freshness contract

The picker shows the verified date on click. We treat rates as fresh up to 30 days, warning between 30 and 90 days (a coloured dot appears next to the picker), and stale above 90. The freshness-stale state fails CI via a gate in src/lib/currency.test.ts — so the maintenance cadence is enforced rather than implied.

The VAT tab inside /cost models obligations under Federal Decree-Law No. 8 of 2017 on Value Added Tax + its Executive Regulation (Cabinet Decision 52/2017, as amended by Cabinet Decision 99/2022). The thresholds and rates are statutory and exact; how they apply to your specific supply mix is what the engine works out.

Registration thresholds

Mandatory registration when taxable supplies plus imports exceed AED 375,000 over the previous 12 months (or expected next 30 days). Registration must happen within 30 days of crossing. Voluntary registration from AED 187,500. Below the voluntary threshold, no registration obligation — and no input VAT recovery on expenses.

Supply treatments

• Standard-rated (5%). Most taxable supplies of goods and services in the UAE.
• Zero-rated (0%). Exports outside the GCC, international transport, certain healthcare and education, first supply of new residential property. Counts toward the registration threshold; input VAT remains recoverable.
• Exempt. Most financial services, bare land, second-and-later residential supplies, local passenger transport. Does not count toward the threshold; input VAT on related expenses is not recoverable.
• Designated-Zone goods. Per Cabinet Decision 59/2017, supplies of goods within or between Designated Zones are treated as outside the UAE — no UAE VAT applies. Services in Designated Zones remain standard 5%. Twenty-three zones currently hold Designated-Zone status; the FTA verifies physical fencing, customs controls, and segregation.

Input-VAT recovery

When registered, input VAT on VAT-bearing expenses is recoverable in proportion to taxable supplies. Salaries and out-of-scope costs don't carry input VAT — the calculator's "Input-VAT recovery %" input lets you size what share of your expense base is VAT-bearing. The proportion of recoverable input is then (taxable supplies / total supplies), a simplification of the partial-exemption methods in Article 54 of the Executive Regulation.

What we don't model (yet)

• Capital goods scheme (10-year buildings, 5-year other capital assets).
• Tax grouping mechanics for related entities.
• Real-estate-specific supply chronology (residential first-supply vs subsequent).
• Detailed partial-exemption methods beyond the proportional simplification above.

When the engine detects an input combination that touches any of these (e.g., meaningful exempt supplies + high input-VAT recovery), it surfaces an advisor question rather than ploughing forward with a misleading number.

The 5-year cost line in /cost and on the mainland calculator at /freezone-vs-mainland uses a full payroll engine rather than a flat per-visa cost. Senior, mid, and junior tiers are distributed by mix percentage; salaries are applied at the user-supplied per-tier monthly rate; health insurance, sponsorship, and visa amortisation are added per head; and Article 51 end-of-service gratuity is surfaced as a separate Y5-exit lump sum.

Annual payroll line

• Salaries — monthly salary per tier × 12 × tier headcount. Each year's salary is constant (no auto-inflation; users can edit). The engine warns when any tier sits below AED 4,000 — not a federal floor (no statutory minimum exists for non-Emirati skilled labour), but the typical visa-eligibility threshold for skilled work permits.
• Health insurance. AED 1,500/yr per employee + founder (Dubai DHA basic equivalent); AED 3,000/yr per family dependent (basic dependent plan).
• Employee visa + labour card. AED 2,500/yr employment visa amortised (2-year validity), AED 750/yr Tasheel labour card + MoHRE sponsorship per employee.
• Founder + family visas. AED 1,800/yr per residence visa, amortised over the 5-year renewal cycle. Includes Emirates ID, medical, and residency renewal admin.

End-of-service gratuity (Article 51)

Per Article 51 of Federal Decree-Law 33/2021 on the Regulation of Labour Relations: 21 days of basic salary per year for the first 5 years of service, 30 days per year thereafter, capped at 24 months' total wages. "Basic salary" excludes housing, transport, utilities, and furniture allowances — we use 65% of gross as a conservative basic-salary proxy.

For a 5-year tenure (the projection window), each employee accrues 21 days × 5 years = 105 days = 3.5 months of basic salary. The cap doesn't bind below 5 years. EOSG is surfaced as a separate "if you close at Y5" callout on the cost cards, not rolled into the annual cost — matches how labour-law liabilities sit on a balance sheet rather than the P&L.

What we don't model (yet)

• Year-on-year salary inflation or raises.
• Per-emirate variation in health insurance (DAMAN in Abu Dhabi, etc.) and sponsorship overhead.
• The 6 AED 6,000/month Emirati minimum-wage floor (Cabinet Decision, effective 1 Jan 2026). Calibrate manually if your team includes Emirati staff.
• The Voluntary End-of-Service Savings Scheme (Cabinet Decision 96/2023). If your employer registers under the scheme, EOSG contributions are made monthly to a regulated fund rather than accrued as a balance-sheet liability.

The /residency calculator evaluates seven pathways against your facts (age, education, employment, income, capital, property, savings, specialist field, endorsements). Each pathway returns one of eligible, endorsement-based, borderline, or ineligible plus the specific missing criteria.

The seven pathways

• Golden Visa — Investor (10y). AED 2M+ in UAE real estate or capital in a UAE-licensed entity (Cabinet Resolution 65/2022).
• Golden Visa — Entrepreneur (10y). Project value ≥ AED 500k + Ministry of Economy endorsement (incubator approval or technical-project evidence). Engine returns endorsement-based when the threshold is met.
• Golden Visa — Specialist Talent (10y). Specialist field + bachelor's (athletics and arts exempt) + federal endorsement / nomination letter. Without endorsement → endorsement-based.
• Green Visa — Skilled Employee (5y). AED 15k+ monthly basic salary + bachelor's + UAE employment. Self-sponsored after issuance.
• Green Visa — Freelancer (5y). AED 180k+ average annual income across the prior 2 years + diploma/bachelor's + freelance permit. Self-sponsored.
• Investor Visa — Property (2y). AED 750k+ UAE real estate. Lower threshold than Golden but shorter validity; the engine flags Golden as the better option when both qualify.
• Skilled Worker Visa (2y, employer-sponsored). Standard employment residency. AED 4k+ minimum monthly salary + high-school certificate (skilled level 3) up to bachelor's (level 1).
• Family Visa (sponsor spouse + children). Requires AED 4k+ monthly salary (AED 3k+ if employer provides housing).
• Retirement Visa (5y, renewable). Age 55+ AND one of: AED 1M+ UAE property / AED 1M+ liquid savings / AED 180k+ annual income.

What "endorsement-based" means

Some Golden pathways (Talent, Entrepreneur) require a nomination letter from a UAE federal authority or an accredited body before UAEICP will process the application. The engine returns endorsement-based when the quantitative criteria are met but the endorsement is the remaining open question — it surfaces the specific authority to engage in the advisor prompt.

What we don't model

• Per-nationality nuances (some pathways require additional security clearances or document attestation depending on the applicant's nationality).
• Outstanding-Student Golden pathway (top-100 university + academic excellence).
• Humanitarian-pioneers and frontline-heroes Golden sub-categories.
• Parent-sponsorship thresholds (higher than spouse-sponsorship; varies by emirate).
• Application costs (typically AED 2,800–5,000 per pathway + medical + biometric fees).

The /uae-vs-gcc comparator runs the same scenario through nine entity tracks across four GCC jurisdictions. Statutory rates are exact; the operational model is intentionally apples-to-apples (single salary average, single revenue trajectory, fixed peg-rate FX) so the comparison isn't muddied by depth asymmetry.

Tracks covered

• UAE Free Zone — QFZP. 0% on qualifying free-zone income. Engine assumes 100% qualifying — methodology section #qfzp covers the de-minimis cliff.
• UAE Free Zone — standard / UAE Mainland. 9% CIT on profit ≥ AED 375k (Federal Decree-Law 47/2022).
• KSA — General LLC. 20% CIT on foreign-owned share + 2.5% Zakat on Saudi/GCC-owned share (Royal Decree M/1 of 1425 H).
• KSA — RHQ (Regional Headquarters). 30-year package: 0% CIT + 0% WHT on eligible RHQ activity. Substance: 15 employees + 3 resident executives + physical office + KSA board meetings (ZATCA guideline, Feb 2024).
• KSA — ECZA / SILZ. 20-year 0% CIT for qualifying logistics, light manufacturing, and warehousing activity inside special economic zones.
• Qatar — Mainland. 10% CIT on the foreign-owned share of Qatar-source profits; 0% on Qatari/GCC-owned share (Law 24 of 2018).
• Qatar — QFC. 10% on locally-sourced profits; 0% concessionary rate for investment managers, reinsurers, captives, 90%+ Qatari-owned entities (QFC Tax Regulations).
• Bahrain. 0% CIT for non-oil/gas sectors. From 1 Jan 2025, a 15% Domestic Minimum Top-Up Tax (DMTT) applies to Pillar Two in-scope MNE groups (Decree-Law 11 of 2024). Bahrain is the first GCC state to enact Pillar Two.

VAT / sales tax

UAE: 5%. KSA: 15%. Bahrain: 10% (raised from 5% in 2022). Qatar: not enacted (GCC VAT framework signed 2017, implementation indefinitely deferred). Each engine applies the headline rate to local-customer revenue and recovers input VAT on VAT-bearing expenses proportionally to taxable supplies (export + standard-rated). Exports are zero-rated; refund position surfaces when input exceeds output.

Payroll + social insurance asymmetry

All four jurisdictions have radically different cost structures for nationals vs expats:

• UAE: ~0% employer SI on expats (DEWS-eligible), pension contribution on Emiratis only.
• KSA: GOSI ~22% combined on Saudis (employer 11% + employee 11%), 2% employer-only occupational hazard on expats.
• Qatar: ~14% employer SI on Qataris, 0% on expats (EOS gratuity instead — 21 days/year).
• Bahrain: SIO 12% employer + 7% employee on Bahrainis, 4% employer-only on expats.

Each engine reads the "Local nationals %" input and prices accordingly. KSA, Qatar, and Bahrain also have hiring quotas (Saudization, Qatarization, Bahrainisation) — the engines flag advisor questions when the scenario falls below typical thresholds.

Pillar Two interaction

For multinational groups in scope (consolidated revenue ≥ EUR 750M in 2 of the last 4 fiscal years): Bahrain's DMTT already tops up to 15% from FY 2025. UAE / KSA / Qatar haven't yet enacted DMTTs, so a 0% incentive (UAE QFZP, KSA RHQ, KSA ECZA, Qatar QFC concessionary) is eroded by the home-jurisdiction Income Inclusion Rule (IIR) — the global minimum still applies, just collected elsewhere. Engines surface this as a "Pillar Two — IIR top-up risk" flag.

What we don't model

• Withholding tax on cross-border services (KSA 5–20%, Qatar 5%, Bahrain 0%). Material when the entity has cross-border related-party flows.
• Transfer pricing rules and documentation costs (mandatory in KSA, formalised in UAE, less prescribed in Qatar and Bahrain).
• Treaty network impact on outbound dividend / interest / royalty flows.
• Sector-specific incentives (Saudi industrial loans, Qatar Free Zones QFZA, Bahrain export incentives).
• Per-emirate / per-region variation within each jurisdiction.
• Real-time FX moves. Engines use fixed peg rates (USD-pegged currencies don't drift materially, but a hard repeg or de-pegging event would invalidate the comparison.)

Zone Compare collects data directly from free zone authority websites, official fee schedules, and published registration documents. Where official sources are ambiguous or silent, we note this explicitly on the zone profile. We never rely solely on secondary sources or agent websites.

Commission disclosure

Zone Compare earns no referral fees, commission, or placement revenue from any free zone authority or formation agent. The "get a quote" links on zone profiles connect you with our formation partner; Zone Compare receives a flat fee per qualified introduction — not a percentage of your licence cost, and not conditional on which zone you choose. This structure means our rankings cannot be purchased.

Errors & corrections

If you spot incorrect data, email home@zonecompare.com with the zone name, the field, and the correct source. We aim to verify and correct within 5 business days. All corrections are noted in the zone profile's data attribution section.