Answered from official registries
What is a DBA?
A DBA is the name a business trades under when that differs from the name on its formation papers or, for an unincorporated business, from the owner's own name. The initials stand for "doing business as". Almost no government office uses that phrase in its own paperwork, which is the first thing that confuses people who go looking for the form.
Registries rarely call it a DBA
Across the 49 published state and District of Columbia guides on this site, the authorities use 9 different official labels for the same registration. What you file is decided by the wording your own authority uses, not by the phrase you searched for.
| Official term | Jurisdictions | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| trade name | 20 | Alabama, Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut |
| assumed name | 10 | Illinois, Kentucky, Maine, Michigan |
| assumed business name | 6 | Idaho, Indiana, Montana, North Carolina |
| fictitious name | 5 | Arkansas, Florida, Missouri, Pennsylvania |
| fictitious business name | 4 | California, Mississippi, Rhode Island, South Dakota |
| assumed or fictitious name | 1 | Nevada |
| business certificate | 1 | Massachusetts |
| business name | 1 | Alaska |
| dba | 1 | Kansas |
One term per jurisdiction is quoted directly from that authority's own page or statute:
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trade name
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assumed name
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Assumed Business Name (DBA)
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fictitious name
A jurisdiction-by-jurisdiction table of every term and its filing authority is on the terminology comparison page.
What registering the name does not do
A name filing is narrower than most people expect. It records that a particular trader is using a particular name. It does not, on its own, bring a company into being, serve as the licence a city may separately demand, or hand you an enforceable claim over the words. Several authorities say as much in their own guidance, and one states all three points in a single passage, quoted on the page comparing a name filing with forming an LLC.
What the filing does achieve varies by jurisdiction, which is why each guide records the effect its own authority describes rather than repeating a generic promise.
Who has to file one
There is no single national answer, and the honest summary is a split. Of the 49 published state and District of Columbia guides, 34 carry verified wording that an unincorporated owner trading under another name must register, and 31 carry the same for a limited liability company. The rest either leave the obligation unstated in the sources reviewed or make registration optional, and each guide records which of those it is.
Where you file splits too. For sole proprietors, 27 jurisdictions name a state office and 19 send the filer to a county or local counter. For limited liability companies the balance tips the other way, with 42 state offices against 7 local ones.
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The types of businesses that would typically use the form are sole proprietorship’s and general partnerships.
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A for-profit business not using the entity’s true name or an individual not using their legal first and last name to conduct business in Colorado is required to file a trade name.
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A trade name can be registered by: (1) one individual; (2) a group of individuals; or (3) a business organization registered with the Secretary of the State. A trade name is filed with the local town clerk where the business is primarily transacted. When you deliver the trade name application to the town clerk, you must pay a $20 filing fee payable to the town clerk.
Find the rule that applies to you
Pick your jurisdiction and the guide gives the authority, the official term, the fee, how long the registration lasts, and what to do when details change. Where an answer could not be confirmed from an official source, the guide says so instead of guessing.
Start from the finder or read a specific guide, for example Texas, California or New York. This site is not a filing service and does not accept filings or fees.