United Arab Emirates VAT registration threshold

What this value means

PERIOD BASIS: rolling backward 12-month test PLUS a 30-DAY forward expectation test (Decree-Law art. 13(1)) — unlike KSA's 12-month forward test. Application within 30 days of being required to register (Executive Regulation art. 7(2)); on the backward test registration takes effect from the first day of the following month (art. 7(4)); a late registrant is liable for tax on all taxable supplies and imports made BEFORE registering (art. 7(7)). Art. 19 counts taxable goods/services, Concerned Goods/Services received (imports), acquired-business turnover and Related-Party supplies; capital assets are excluded (art. 20). The FTA's live page (read 2026-08-10) states the same: mandatory where taxable supplies and imports exceed AED 375,000 over the past 12 months or are expected to within the next 30 days; voluntary above AED 187,500. NON-ESTABLISHED SUPPLIERS: NIL threshold. Decree-Law art. 13(2): 'Every Person, who does not have a Place of Residence in the State or an Implementing State, shall register for Tax if he makes supplies of Goods or Services, and where no other Person is obligated to pay the Due Tax on these supplies in the State.' Registration is BACKDATED to the date supplies in the State began (Executive Regulation art. 7(6)). IMPORTED DIGITAL SERVICES: B2B — reverse charge: a Taxable Person importing Concerned Services for his business is treated as making a taxable supply to himself and accounts for the tax (Decree-Law art. 48(1)); those imports count toward the CUSTOMER's threshold via art. 19(2). B2C — no one else is obligated to pay, so a non-resident supplier of electronic services to UAE consumers registers under art. 13(2) with nil threshold. Electronic services are defined in Executive Regulation art. 23 (automatically delivered over the internet, an electronic network or an electronic marketplace) and sourced by actual use and enjoyment in the State (Decree-Law art. 31). The UAE has NO marketplace deemed-supplier liability rule: art. 23's 'electronic marketplace' definition exists for sourcing only, and Cabinet Decision 100/2024 added none — an agent selling in its own name is treated as supplier under general agency principles (art. 9); otherwise the underlying non-resident supplier registers. Traps: (1) The voluntary threshold AED 187,500 (Executive Regulation art. 8(1)) is not the mandatory one — between the two, registration is optional, requires carrying on a Business in the State, and since Cabinet Decision 100/2024 (effective 2024-11-15) requires proof of intention to make taxable supplies. (2) GCC origin: the figure is the dirham fixing of GCC Common VAT Agreement art. 50(2) ('SAR 375,000 or its equivalent in the GCC State currencies'; voluntary = 50% per art. 51(3)) — the AED amount sits in the Executive Regulation, not the Decree-Law, which only defines the term. (3) Exempt-only suppliers never cross the threshold and cannot register — exempt supplies are not among the art. 19 components. (4) Zero-rated-only suppliers are NOT automatically excused: art. 15 is a registration EXCEPTION the Authority 'may' grant on request (as amended by Federal Decree-Law 18/2022) — unlike KSA's automatic exclusion. (5) Imports count toward the threshold (art. 19(2)) — turnover-only computations understate the test. (6) Cabinet Decision 100/2024 amended 33 articles but did NOT touch art. 7's thresholds; figures unchanged through 2026, as the FTA's live pages confirm. (7) Non-resident registration is backdated to the first supply with liability for pre-registration tax. Arabic text prevails; operative figures were read in the FTA's own consolidated published texts (Decree-Law: https://tax.gov.ae/DataFolder/Files/Legislation/Federal%20Decree-Law%20No.%208%20of%202017%20and%20amendments%20-%20For%20Publishing.pdf).

Get it programmatically

curl https://mearef.dev/v1/ae/vat-registration-threshold
# $0.005 per call — x402 on Base (USDC). No key, no signup.
# History:    curl https://mearef.dev/v1/ae/vat-registration-threshold/history?from=2020-01-01
# Provenance: curl https://mearef.dev/provenance/ae/vat-registration-threshold

Other United Arab Emirates series: CBUAE Base Rate (Overnight Deposit Facility) · VAT standard rate · Statutory minimum wage · Public holidays · CPI inflation (year-on-year) · Corporate Tax (headline rate) · Withholding tax rates · Statutory delay interest on commercial debts · Personal income tax · Statutory social-insurance contributions

The same figure elsewhere: Bahrain · Iraq · Israel · Jordan · Kuwait · all 9