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Registration

Name Reservations

Put forward your preferred business names and manage a CIPC reservation application.

R150

once-off

  • Up to 4 proposed names checked
  • CIPC name reservation filing
  • Reservation confirmation certificate
  • 2–4 business day turnaround

Tell us what you need

Most people here do not need this

Every company registration package already includes the name work. If you are incorporating now, start at Pty Ltd registration or packages and do not pay for the name twice.

Buy a reservation on its own when the name matters and the company does not yet:

  • You have settled on a trading name and want it held while you finish a shareholders' agreement, a lease, or a funding round
  • You are registering later and would rather not lose the name in the meantime
  • A previous application was rejected on the name, and you want that resolved before filing everything else

How CIPC decides

You submit preferences in order, and CIPC approves the first one that clears against the register. A name can be refused for being too similar to a registered name even when a plain search turns up nothing — similarity is judged by CIPC, not by a text match.

The company name search on our homepage looks up existing South African companies and is genuinely useful for weeding out obvious clashes. Treat it as a guide. CIPC makes the final call when the application is filed.

Use all four names

The service checks up to four proposed names. Submitting one is the most common reason people end up paying for a second round, and the alternatives cost nothing at submission.

Choose names that differ in substance rather than in punctuation. "Acme Tech" and "Acme Technologies" will often stand or fall together, so a genuinely different second choice is worth more than a variant of the first.

Entity type belongs on the application

The form asks whether you are heading for a private company, a non-profit company, or a personal liability company, because the entity type determines the legal ending your approved name carries. Nominate the one you actually intend to register. If you are still deciding between a profit-making entity and a public-benefit one, Pty Ltd vs NPC works through that fork before you spend anything.

What you get

A reservation confirmation certificate once CIPC approves one of your preferences. The reservation filing carries a two to four business day turnaround, and CIPC processing can vary beyond that.

A reserved name is not a company

It gives you nothing to trade with: no registration number, no tax number, no CoR14.3. It is a hold. When you are ready to convert it into a company, come back to register your company and tell us the reservation exists so we do not file the name a second time.