LegalZoom vs. Bizee: Which Is the Better Fit for Your Business?
LegalZoom vs. Bizee: Which Is the Better Fit for Your Business?
LegalZoom has helped launch 4.8M+ businesses—nearly five times more than Bizee—and can save you over $500 when comparing features side by side.
Start My LLC
Bizee and LegalZoom can both help you start a limited liability company (LLC) with minimal hassle, but as any founder knows, building a business takes a lot more than filing a few documents.
Look closer, and LegalZoom stands out for its depth. Whether you need affordable attorney consults, dedicated compliance support, or IP protection, LegalZoom has you covered well after you launch. Bizee can keep things simple and affordable upfront, but if you’re thinking about long-term growth, LegalZoom is better equipped to support you from day one.
Plus, LegalZoom gives you more for your dollar when comparing paid plans side by side, with up to $522 in savings versus Bizee.
LegalZoom vs. ZenBusiness: Key takeaways
Save $322 on your LLC formation
Save $322 on your LLC formation
Up to 38% less than Bizee
Save $522 on your LLC formation
Save $522 on your LLC formation
Up to 47% less than Bizee
 Pro Plan |  Standard Plan | |
|---|---|---|
$249 + filing fees | Base cost | $199 + filing fees |
 | EIN + operating agreement | |
| 30 days of attorney support | ~$500 (local attorney) |
| 1 year of legal doc library access | $150 |
$249 | 1 year of registered agent services | |
$29 | 1 month of virtual address services | |
$527 | Total cost | $849 |
$322 | You save | - |
Premium Plan | Premium Plan | |
|---|---|---|
$299 + filing fees | Base cost | $299 + filing fees |
| EIN + operating agreement | |
| 30 days of attorney support | ~$500 (local attorney) |
| 1 year of legal doc library access | |
| 6 months of bookkeeping tools | ~$300 |
$249 | 1 year of registered agent services | |
$29 | 1 month of virtual address services | |
$577 | Total cost | $1,099 |
$522 | You save | - |
Why should you use an LLC formation service?
You’re legally able to set up an LLC on your own, but doing so takes time and knowledge. Thankfully, you don’t have to become an expert in business law to give your business a reliable start. By using an LLC formation service, you can get help with:
- Choosing the right business structure
- Organizing paperwork and filing documents
- Meeting compliance requirements
- Getting an employer identification number (EIN)
- Appointing a registered agent
Even the most basic LLC formation plan can give you peace of mind, knowing that there’s an extra set of eyes on your business’ foundational documents. You’ll also get access to the tools you need to get into good standing so you can grow your business.
Bizee or LegalZoom: What’s the difference?
LegalZoom and Bizee both offer three different LLC formation packages, including a free LLC formation package that lets you manage most of the process yourself. Each package is designed to help you register your LLC with your Secretary of State and covers the basics needed to operate.
LegalZoom LLC plans
- Basic: The basic package creates your articles of organization, includes a business name check, and gives you a free tax consultation from 1-800Accountant, a LegalZoom partner offering comprehensive small business tax preparation services.
- Pro: You’ll get everything included in the Basic plan plus unlimited 30-minute attorney consultations for 30 days, an EIN, an operating agreement, and access to a business document library of more than 150 templates with free eSignature service for one year.
- Premium: The Premium package includes everything in the Basic and Pro packages plus six months of bookkeeping tools, income and expense tracking, unlimited proposals and invoices, and automatic mileage capture for company travel.
Bizee LLC plans
- Basic: Bizee’s Basic package includes your articles of organization, a business tax consultation, one month of virtual address services, and one year of registered agent services.
- Standard: The Standard package includes everything in the Basic plan plus an EIN, operating agreement, lifetime compliance alerts, unlimited phone and email support, and IRS Form 2553 preparation.
- Premium: The Premium plan includes everything in the Basic and Standard plans plus expedited filing, business contract templates, a website domain name and business email, and a free business phone number for one year.
LLC formation process
LegalZoom and Bizee both stick with you step-by-step through the LLC and business formation process, whether you’re choosing the free basic package or one of the premium plans with additional features.
You’ll go through a guided questionnaire that asks you to enter basic information about your business and let the system prepare your articles of organization. After completing the questionnaire, Bizee and LegalZoom will send your information to your Secretary of State, who will process your documents and register your LLC.
As far as how long it takes to get your LLC formed, Bizee’s website states that you’ll have to wait 3 or 4 weeks (depending on the state) unless you pay extra for their expedited filing service. At LegalZoom, we’ve formed over 4.8 million businesses over the course of nearly 25 years, and our experience is that the process takes nowhere near that long. Our standard processing time takes only 5 to at most 14 days, and expedited 1-day service is also available. Most states need only a few more days on top of that to make your business official.
Attorney review
When you start a business, it’s normal to have questions about different legal topics like the forms you need to submit or contracts you need to create to protect your company. If you use Bizee to start your LLC, you’ll have to find an attorney yourself to look over everything and give you legal advice, which could cost anywhere from $250 to $1,000 or more for one hour of their time.
By contrast, with LegalZoom’s Pro and Premium LLC plans, you get 30 days of unlimited attorney consultations on new legal topics relating to your business. Experienced small business attorneys licensed in your state can give advice, review documents, and point you towards your next steps—all included with your plan.
After the first 30 days, you’ll continue to enjoy unlimited attorney consultations for new legal topics for just $49/month. If you want to get attorney support without an LLC package, you can also get a 6-month or 12-month subscription for as little as $39.09/mo.
Business document library
LegalZoom has a business template library of more than 150 legal document templates. These forms have been drafted and reviewed by business attorneys, and you also get eSignatures to sign them with legally-binding effect. Access to the library is included for one year if you sign up for the Pro or Premium LLC plan. If you choose the Basic plan, you can still buy access to the document library for $99 per year or $59 per document.
In comparison, Bizee’s library only has around 25 legal document templates that you can use for your business, and there’s no mention of eSignature capability. Some of these documents are available for free, but if you want the full library, you’ll need to either purchase the Premium plan when starting your LLC or pay $150 for access.
Whenever you use document templates, it’s always a good idea to have them reviewed by an attorney to make sure they fit your business’ needs. You can easily do this through LegalZoom’s attorney consultations, whereas you’d need to find one externally if you use Bizee.
Filing guarantee and customer support
When starting your business, you need to make sure all documents are accurate and filed correctly. Unfortunately, Bizee doesn’t offer a filing guarantee. They also have a strict refund policy that only allows you to request a refund generally within 24 hours of starting the business formation process.
Their customer support hours and options are also somewhat limited. If you need help with your LLC or need to speak with a customer service representative about your account, you’ll have to do so during business hours. Bizee’s team is only available Monday through Friday, 7 a.m to 4 p.m. PT.
LegalZoom’s customer service team is available Monday through Friday from 5 a.m. to 7 p.m. PT and on weekends from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. You can also access a 24/7 chat support service through your dashboard for simple questions or contact customer support at (888) 379-0854.
With such dedicated customer service, it should come as no surprise that LegalZoom stands by its filings. Every new LLC gets the 100% Accurate Filing Guarantee. If your filing is rejected due to an error on LegalZoom’s part, the team will correct it with the appropriate government agency for free.
Is it cheaper to start an LLC with LegalZoom or Bizee?
Both LegalZoom and Bizee offer free plans that let you start your LLC on a budget. You’ll just have to cover state filing fees—which you’d have to pay even if you were filing without a service.
Bizee’s two paid plans may look cheaper upfront, but when you compare both service’s premium features side by side, LegalZoom delivers more for less.
LegalZoom paid plans:
- 30 days of unlimited 30-minute attorney consults on new legal topics, which is worth around $500 if you schedule just four sessions during this period (assuming $250/hr for a local attorney)
- Access to a larger business document library and eSignatures for one year
- Bookkeeping tools in the Premium plan to help you manage your finances for six months—a great value considering small business accounting software can cost around $50 per month
Bizee paid plans:
- A year of registered agent service
- One month of virtual mailing address service
With LegalZoom’s Pro plan, the total cost including registered agent and virtual mail services comes out to $527. These features are already included in Bizee’s Standard plan, but once you add external attorney consults and Bizee’s document library separately, the total rises to $849—or $322 more than LegalZoom’s equivalent plan and features.
If you choose LegalZoom’s Premium tier and add on the extras that Bizee includes, it’ll cost $577. While Bizee includes its document library in the Premium plan, six months of bookkeeping tools and 30 days of attorney consults brings the total to $1,099, costing you around $522 more than LegalZoom.
What other services do LegalZoom and Bizee offer?
Forming your business, whether you choose an LLC or a corporation, is just the beginning. You’ll want to consider the other services each provider offers to help your business stay in compliance and make running things easier.
Licenses and permits
In most states, businesses need to maintain licenses and permits each year to remain in good standing with the state. Without those permits, you could face fines and other penalties.
Both LegalZoom and Bizee offer business license and permit reports that help you identify the necessary licenses and permits for your area and your industry. Bizee’s reports identify which licenses and permits you need to get started based on your state’s licensing requirements and offer filing instructions for each license or permit required. The service costs $99 per report and tells you about the licenses you need at the time you request the report. Bizee's transactional report is a one-time purchase, meaning that you will not receive any notifications if permit or license requirements change.
LegalZoom’s business license plan starts at $99/year (which auto-renews annually) and gives you the same features as Bizee’s plan, but keeps you updated for the whole year with ongoing notifications of license report updates for licensing requirement changes and deadlines. When you sign up for the service, you’ll receive a detailed report that lists the permits and licenses you need to maintain each year to remain in good standing. The plan also lets you track all your permits and licenses in one dashboard, making it easier to share information with your bank, the county government, or any professional licensing boards you work with.
Business compliance
Bizee offers compliance services as individual products rather than bundling everything together into an easy-to-use package, like LegalZoom’s Compliance Concierge. With Bizee, you can choose the types of compliance services you want help with. This includes filing annual reports, articles of amendment, and other similar documents. However, it lacks the comprehensive and integrated compliance service options that LegalZoom provides.
LegalZoom’s compliance plans offer a more holistic approach to managing your business’s compliance needs. All subscription plans give you real-time notifications about upcoming deadlines or changes to local regulations that could impact your business, plus personalized support from experienced compliance specialists.
If you need more help or want someone to manage your compliance efforts for you, LegalZoom’s Compliance Concierge plan makes it easy. You’ll get white-glove, hands-on management of your compliance needs by a concierge who is trained and dedicated to your business.
Prices start at $199 per year for LegalZoom’s Compliance Filings package, and every package includes our 100% accurate filing guarantee. If LegalZoom makes an error on your filing or your filing is rejected as a result of our mistake, we’ll correct it for free. LegalZoom also offers standalone options like annual report filing and foreign registration.
Registered agent
Bizee’s registered agent service is included in your business formation package for the first year. They offer registered agents in all 50 states, plus Washington, D.C. After the first year, their registered agent service costs $119/year. You can also buy their registered agent services as a standalone product if you’ve already formed your business.
LegalZoom’s registered agent service is also available in all 50 states and Washington, D.C., and starts at $249/year. While that’s more expensive than Bizee’s service, we also cover the filing fees if you need to switch registered agents when you move to a new location. You’ll also get unlimited cloud storage for your business documents, so you won’t have to worry about losing important communications or notices from the government.
Virtual mail
Both Bizee and LegalZoom offer virtual mail services. Bizee’s virtual mail services give you a physical address that you can use to receive mail for your business. Bizee’s service, however, only lets you receive paper mail—you can’t receive packages of any size. If you receive important documents like business credit or debit cards, they’ll forward them to you at your preferred address. The service is $29/month.
LegalZoom’s LZ Virtual Mail also gives you a physical address, not a P.O. box, and allows you to receive both paper mail and packages. The service scans your mail and offers unlimited cloud storage for those scans to help you maintain stronger records. If you receive checks at your virtual address, LegalZoom can direct deposit those checks into your business’s bank account. Prices start at $29/month.
Ongoing attorney support
Businesses encounter all sorts of situations, and finding the answers to those questions isn’t always straightforward. When you form your business with Bizee, you’ll need to hire an attorney on your own if you need legal advice.
On average, business attorneys in the U.S. charge between $150 and $325/hour, with the average lawyer charging $250/hour for most services. If you consult with an attorney for two hours per quarter, you could end up spending more than $500 just for those two hours on top of the rates you pay for Bizee’s services. And that doesn’t even account for the cost of your time in finding an attorney with experience advising small business clients, who is willing to take on new clients for ad hoc advice, who won’t charge you additional time to prepare for your actual consultation, and is available to speak at a convenient time for you.
When you form your business with LegalZoom using either the Pro or Premium package, you’ll receive 30 days of unlimited 30-minute attorney consultations about new legal topics for your business. But you can sign up for attorney support even if you don’t choose LegalZoom for your business formation needs. Prices start at $39.09/month when you buy a year of service ($439/year). Even if you just schedule a few consultations, you’ll likely save money compared to hiring a traditional attorney.
Intellectual property protection
Bizee can help you register trademarks for your business. However, they can’t help with other intellectual property protection, like copyright registration or filing for patents. You’ll need to work with a different service or hire an independent attorney to guide you through the process if you need anything beyond a trademark.
With LegalZoom, you can get help with trademarks, copyright registration, and patent filing, all from the same place. Here’s a quick breakdown of what you can do to protect your intellectual property:
- Trademark registration. Get help from LegalZoom’s own law firm, LZ Legal Services, which will prepare and file your trademark application from start to finish.
- Copyright registration. Register your copyright to protect your creative works.
- Utility and design patent filing. LegalZoom connects you with attorneys who will prepare patent filings to keep your inventions and designs safe and prevent others from using it without your permission.
- Provisional patent. Start the patent registration process by filing for a provisional patent. This allows you to use the phrase “patent pending” on your packaging and product information. LegalZoom offers both a do-it-yourself option or, if you really want to make sure the job gets done right, you can work with an attorney at our law firm LZ Legal Services.
LegalZoom makes it easier to protect your company’s intellectual property by letting you manage everything from one account. You’ll receive updates about your applications and next steps required in your user dashboard. That means you won’t have to use more than one service to take care of everything.
Start your LLC with LegalZoom
If you’re looking for a simple way to start an LLC that gives you access to extensive legal templates, comprehensive customer support, and access to ongoing legal guidance from trusted business attorneys at a fraction of the price of hiring a lawyer, LegalZoom is a great choice.
When you use LegalZoom to form your LLC, you’ll be able to take advantage of the suite of services we’ve developed over our 24+ years of experience helping people form businesses. We offer a wide variety of options that let you tailor your experience to fit your unique needs and budget. Choose one of three LLC formation plans:
- Basic package: Our basic LLC formation service starts at $0 plus state filing fees.
- Pro package: The Pro plan gives you guidance from experienced business formation attorneys, an EIN, an operating agreement, and access to other resources to make starting your business easier.
- Premium package: The Premium plan gives you access to everything in the Pro plan, plus bookkeeping tools, unlimited proposals, and more.
More than 4.8 million small business owners have trusted LegalZoom with their business formation. See why in just a few steps.
Starting a business takes courage. LegalZoom makes sure the legal details don’t stand in your way, from the day you register until the day you retire.
LegalZoom vs. Bizee FAQs
Is Bizee better than LegalZoom?
The two companies offer many of the same services, although LegalZoom’s offerings are more extensive. Bizee’s prices are lower on the surface, but its packages don’t offer as much as LegalZoom’s. If you need ongoing attorney advice, you’ll need to hire a private attorney or work with a dedicated legal services provider. LegalZoom’s attorney consultations (included for 30 days in the Premium and Pro plans) make it super easy to get the advice you need when you’re first starting out.
Furthermore, LegalZoom has a substantial review base on sites like Trustpilot and Better Business Bureau, so you can see why millions have trusted LegalZoom with their businesses.
What are the cons of using Bizee?
Bizee could be a great choice for business owners looking for a low-cost way to incorporate or start an LLC. However, many of their services are only available as add-ons. You’ll have to pay additional fees for useful services, like annual report filing. These extra charges can add up and leave you paying more than you may initially expect.
Worse, there’s a chance that you may miss out on features that you need if you’re not paying close attention when setting up your LLC through Bizee. LegalZoom’s more robust LLC formation packages include holistic services that cover all your bases, even if you’re unfamiliar with the process of starting a business and what you might need.
What are the downsides of using LegalZoom?
LegalZoom’s Pro formation package costs more than Bizee’s Standard package—but you do get a lot for the price tag. You get an operating agreement, an EIN, unlimited consults for 30 days with an experienced attorney, unlimited eSignatures, and a document library of over 150+ templates for your business. You’ll have to pay extra if you sign up for a virtual mailing address or need a registered agent, but adding these still costs less than the total you’d pay with Bizee (factoring in external attorney consults).
Who offers better support during and after the business formation process?
LegalZoom’s team strives to support you during and after your business formation. Our customer service experts are available Monday through Friday from 5 a.m. to 7 p.m. PT, and on weekends from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. PT. They’re able to answer questions about your account. If you need legal advice, our Business Attorney Plans let you schedule unlimited 30-minute consultations on new legal topics at a fraction of the cost of an independent attorney. Bizee, on the other hand, has shorter customer service hours and its team is only available during the week.
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