FTA Public Clarification TAXP010 · Corporate Tax · VAT · Excise

Which zone are you in, for each tax?

A free zone can be a zone for one UAE tax and not another. Pick your zone from the list, or answer for your own premises, and see the answer tax by tax, with who confirms it.

Find your zone

Or try a sample

Corporate Tax

Confirm with your Free Zone authority

Is your area a free zone named by Cabinet decision?

The Corporate Tax test: a defined area specified in a Cabinet decision, at the Minister's suggestion.

CT Law, Art 1

VAT

Confirm with the FTA list and your authority

Is your area on the FTA's List of Designated Zones?

The list made under Cabinet Decision 59 of 2017 and its amendments, published by the FTA.

Cabinet Decision 59 of 2017

Fenced, with security and customs controls

Entry and exit of people and movement of goods are monitored.

VAT Exec Reg, Art 51(1)(a)

Internal procedures for goods

How goods are kept, stored and processed inside the zone.

VAT Exec Reg, Art 51(1)(b)

The operator follows FTA procedures

The zone operator complies with the procedures the FTA sets.

VAT Exec Reg, Art 51(1)(c)

Excise Tax

Confirm with your authority or the Warehouse Keeper

What kind of area is it?

Excise recognises two routes to a Designated Zone.

A specific geographic area

Excise Exec Reg, Art 15(2)(b)(1)

Security on people and excise goods

Entry, exit and movement of excise goods restricted under FTA controls.

Excise Exec Reg, Art 15(2)(a)(1)

Controlled and supervised by customs

Excise Exec Reg, Art 15(2)(a)(2)

A Warehouse Keeper is appointed

A person approved and registered with the FTA to supervise the zone.

Excise Exec Reg, Art 15(2)(a)(3)

The FTA has approved the area

On the Warehouse Keeper's application to register it as a Designated Zone.

TAXP010

Distribution

Only if you distribute goods

Do you rely on 0% for distributing goods?

As a Qualifying Free Zone Person, distributing goods or materials.

MD 229 of 2025, Art 2(1)(l)

Goods enter the UAE through the Designated Zone

MD 229 of 2025, Art 2(3)(l)

Customers resell or process the goods

Or the customer is a public benefit entity.

MD 229 of 2025, Art 2(3)(l)

Extra FTA procedures followed

Including the independent auditor's report for distributors.

MD 84 of 2025, Art 2(3)

Field reading

One address, different answers

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How it works. Each tax has its own definition. A Corporate Tax Free Zone is an area specified by Cabinet decision CT Law, Art 1. A Corporate Tax Designated Zone is a VAT Designated Zone that is also a Corporate Tax Free Zone Cabinet Decision 100 of 2023, Art 1; a VAT Designated Zone alone is not enough. A VAT Designated Zone is on the FTA's list and, where it meets Article 51(1), is treated as outside the UAE for VAT VAT Exec Reg, Art 51(1). An Excise Tax Designated Zone is a fenced free zone or an FTA specified area meeting the excise conditions Excise Exec Reg, Art 15(2). Distribution qualifies for 0% only in or from a Corporate Tax Designated Zone, and a Qualifying Free Zone Person that fails a condition loses the status from the start of that period and for the next four MD 229 of 2025, Arts 2 and 5(2). Source: FTA Public Clarification TAXP010.

General information, not tax advice. VAT list status in the zone picker follows the FTA’s List of Designated Zones under Cabinet Decision 59 of 2017, as amended up to Cabinet Decision 81 of 2021 (checked 6 October 2026); the other entries are free zones not on that list, compiled from public sources and not exhaustive. Corporate Tax free zone status is pre-filled, not confirmed. The sample habitats are illustrations, not real zones. Confirm your own location with your Free Zone authority, the FTA's published list, or the Warehouse Keeper, as shown for each tax.