Doing business in Georgia

Georgia is a standout for free-market efficiency: a company can be set up in a day, applications run in parallel, contracts are enforceable, and the day-to-day admin of a business is genuinely light. Even arriving is easy — citizens of more than 90 countries enter visa-free and may stay up to a year, which suits founders who want to test the ground before committing.

The fundamentals back it up — low taxes, a strong regional rule-of-law record (World Justice Project), and high safety scores: Georgia topped Numbeo’s Safety Index in Europe in 2020 and still ranks among the safest today.

Registering an IE is the simplest way in — typically one 1%-of-turnover tax and a short monthly declaration, handled entirely through the online portal with no in-person visits.

Updated: May 2026

Georgia was long a top performer in the World Bank’s Doing Business index (which the Bank discontinued in 2021), and that standing carried over to its successor: in the inaugural Business Ready (B-READY) 2024 assessment Georgia placed among the top three of 50 economies, alongside Singapore and Estonia. The same reform path earned EU candidate status in December 2023.

Investors have followed: foreign direct investment reached roughly US$1.68 billion in 2025 (up about 8% year on year, preliminary Geostat data), with reinvested earnings near US$1.4 billion — a sign that companies which arrive tend to stay and grow.

Tax is light and, just as importantly, predictable. Companies follow the Estonian model — 15% corporate tax only on distributed profit, nothing on what is reinvested — while individual entrepreneurs on Small Business Status pay just 1% of turnover. Georgia also has 58 double-tax treaties in force.

• Corporate profit tax — 15%, due only when profit is distributed (IEs on Small Business Status: 1% of turnover)
• VAT — 18%
• Personal income tax — 20% (reduced rates apply to certain income, e.g. rental)
• Import duty — 0%, 5% or 12%, with goods from partner markets (EU, CIS, China) often exempt
• Property tax — progressive for individuals, 0.05%–1% by household income (capped at 1%)
• Free Industrial Zones — designated areas with no corporate, income, VAT or property tax
• Virtual Zone status for IT — 0% profit tax on software/IT services exported abroad, though a 5% dividend tax still applies when profits are paid out (International Company Status is a separate 5% regime)
• A range of government support programmes

Successive governments have stripped out red tape, and it shows in practice:

• Register and run a company remotely, with no physical presence required
• No minimum charter capital — it can be set to zero
• Low-cost banking with access to international payment systems (approval still depends on the bank and your nationality)
• Investment-based residence: a permit is available on real estate worth from US$100,000, or US$300,000 via the investment route
• Georgia now takes part in the OECD automatic exchange of financial-account information (CRS), with first exchanges in 2024
• 58 double-tax treaties plus duty-free access to major markets — the EU, China and CIS among them
• Simple accounting and reporting

Beyond the balance sheet, Tbilisi rewards the people who move here. The capital blends the cuisines and influences of the cultures that shaped Georgia, paired with wine from the country that effectively invented it — fermented in clay qvevri and poured generously at any gathering. It is a low-cost, high-texture place to actually live while you build a business.