How to Check if a Company Is Registered in Tanzania

Before you pay a supplier, sign with a partner, or invest in a Tanzanian business, there is one check worth two minutes of your time: confirming the company is actually registered. A real company in Tanzania is recorded with BRELA — the Business Registrations and Licensing Agency — and you can verify it for free, by name or by company number. This guide shows you how, what a genuine record looks like, and how to spot a business that isn't what it claims to be.

Who keeps Tanzania's company register?

Tanzania's official company registrar is BRELA, the Business Registrations and Licensing Agency. BRELA registers and maintains the record of every company and business name in the country, and runs the Online Registration System (ORS) — the digital platform through which companies are incorporated and searched. Every limited company and registered business name operating legally in Tanzania is recorded there, and its name, status, and registration details are matters of public record.

How to search the Tanzania company register

1. Get the company's exact registered name or its company number (the certificate or invoice usually shows one).
2. Search it on Fylings — type the name or number in the box and we match it against BRELA's register.
3. Open the matching result to see the registered name, status, entity type, registration date and address, plus the source and date the record was checked.
4. No match under that exact name? Try a shorter form of the name, or search by the company number instead. Still nothing — that's a red flag worth pausing on.

What a Tanzania company record shows

Tanzania is one of our richest datasets — more than 50,000 companies with full fields, not just a name. On Fylings, a Tanzania record typically shows:

• The registered (legal) name — the exact name on the BRELA register
• The status — whether the company is active, dissolved, or otherwise, as published by the registrar
• The entity type — e.g. private limited company, public limited company, or registered business name
• The registration date — when the company was incorporated or the business name was registered
• The company number — BRELA's unique identifier for the entity
• The registered address and region — where the company is officially located
• The source and date — every record is attributed to BRELA, with the date it was checked

How to spot a company that isn't registered

Most problems aren't elaborate forgeries — they're businesses that simply never registered, or that use a name close to a real one. Watch for:

• No match on the register under the exact name they gave you — the single biggest signal.
• A company number that doesn't resolve to the name on the document.
• A name that is suspiciously similar to a well-known company (e.g. an extra word or initial).
• A record that exists but is marked dissolved — the company is no longer active.
• Pressure to pay before you've had a chance to verify anything.

Doing due diligence on a Tanzanian company

Because Tanzania records carry full fields, you can go beyond a yes/no existence check. Use the registration date to confirm a business is as established as it claims, the status to confirm it's still active rather than dissolved, and the registered address and region to check it lines up with where the business says it operates. For a definitive position you can request an official certified extract from BRELA, or verify a company programmatically through the Fylings company search and API.