Searching the Companies House register
How to follow companies and find company information for free using our online services.
With over 4 million companies registered and over 7 million documents filed each year, there are lots of ways to find the company information you’re searching for.
How to find company information
Free company information online
Our Find and update company information service makes all of the public data we hold on companies available free of charge. You do not need to register to view company information through this service.
You can also access this free data through our application program interface (API). This allows both consumers and technology providers access to real time updates on companies.
You can get details about a company for free, including:
- basic company information (including company type, registered office address etc)
- the nature of business (SIC)
- the company status (for example, live, dissolved etc.)
- the date of last accounts or confirmation statement filed
- the date of next accounts or confirmation statement due
- full transaction filing
- images of documents
- officer searching
- current and resigned officers
- disqualified directors
- previous and dissolved names search
- mortgage charge data
- insolvency information
From 1 November 2022 you will not be able to order copies of company information by phone or by post with a cheque, postal order or similar. This information is available online free of charge.
Records of dissolved companies
Following the government’s response to the Corporate Transparency and Register Reform consultation, we’ve:
- stopped removing dissolved records from the Find and update company information service
- added the records of all companies dissolved since January 2010 to the Find and update company information service
Previously, records of dissolved companies were removed from this service after 6 years (from the date of dissolution).
As part of our commitment to enhancing corporate transparency, we’ll continue to keep records of dissolved companies for 20 years from the date of dissolution. These records are currently available on other Companies House products for a fee.
Our long term intention is to make these dissolved records available for free on the Find and update company information service. But we will not do this until the law is changed to allow greater protection of personal information on the public register.
It’s important that we balance corporate transparency with personal data privacy concerns. If you’re currently a company officer (or were previously), you may wish to review your company records to check if you’ll be affected by this change.
See our guidance on restricting the disclosure of personal information.
Follow companies for free
Follow is a free service from Companies House which sends you email alerts of company transactions. The alert tells you instantly what information has been filed as soon as we’ve accepted it.
The email alert includes a link to the filing history of the company you’re following, where you can download a copy of the document for free.
How to follow a company
- Sign in to Find and update company information once you’ve registered an email address and password.
- Search for a company to follow.
- Select the company.
- Select ‘Follow this company’.
Last updated 30 November 2023 + show all updates
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Companies House WebCheck service has now closed.
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WebCHeck service closing on 30 November 2023.
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From 1 November 2022 we will no longer accept requests for copies of company information by post.
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Records of dissolved companies since 2010 have been added to Companies House Service (CHS).
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Update to records of dissolved companies on CHS following the government’s response to the Corporate Transparency and Register Reform consultation.
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First published.