Starting a business in Italy
Opening the partita IVA is free - the whole game is choosing the forfettario regime well and knowing which INPS box you fall into.
Checked against the sources on 2026-08-30
Before anything else
The Italian start is the partita IVA - the VAT number that is also your business identity - opened free at the Agenzia delle Entrate. What deserves the thinking is the tax regime attached to it: the regime forfettario turns the first years of most small businesses into a flat-tax arrangement generous enough that leaving money on the table means choosing wrong, not registering wrong.
Forfettario in one paragraph: up to €85,000 revenue, tax is a flat 15% - and 5% for the first five years of a genuinely new activity - applied to a coefficient of revenue by activity code (78% for most professionals), with no VAT charged and almost no bookkeeping. The trade-off is the usual one: no cost deduction beyond the coefficient, and no VAT reclaim.
The legal shell
Ditta individuale or SRL?
Ditta individuale / libero professionista
The default. Professionals open only the partita IVA; trades register with the Registro Imprese too, via the Comunicazione Unica.
€0 to open the partita IVA; artisans and traders pay INPS fixed contributions (~€4,500/year) regardless of profit.
Which INPS box you land in - gestione separata (~26% of profit, professionals) versus artigiani/commercianti (fixed minimums) - changes the economics more than the tax rate does.
SRL / SRLS
Liability or partners. The SRLS variant has €1 capital and no notary fee, on unmodifiable standard bylaws.
SRL by notary €1,500-2,500; SRLS state costs only (~€320), but the fixed bylaws bite once you want investors.
Corporate accounting and a commercialista from day one - €2,000-4,000 a year is a normal quote.
The sequence
Open the partita IVA
Where: Agenzia delle Entrate: form AA9/12, directly or through a commercialistaCost: €0
You choose the ATECO activity code and the regime. The code matters twice: it sets the forfettario coefficient and the INPS classification. Most people hand this one form to a commercialista precisely because of those two consequences.
Register with INPS (and the Registro Imprese if trading)
Professionals enrol in the gestione separata (or their profession’s own cassa - lawyers, engineers and the like have separate funds with their own rules). Artisans and traders go through the Comunicazione Unica, which files the chamber of commerce, INPS and INAIL in one act.
Watch out: The artigiani/commercianti fixed minimums (~€4,500/year) are due from enrolment even at zero revenue - a first-year reduction exists on request.
Invoice electronically
Fatturazione elettronica through the SdI exchange system is compulsory for essentially everyone now, forfettario included. Your invoicing tool talks to the state; paper is over.
What it costs to start
| What | Amount |
|---|---|
| Partita IVA | €0 |
| Forfettario tax5% for the first five years of a new activity. | 5-15% of coefficient revenue |
| INPS gestione separataProfessionals without a cassa. | ~26% of taxable income |
| INPS artisans/tradersPlus a percentage above the minimal income. | ~€4,500/year fixed minimum |
| CommercialistaForfettario keeps it cheap; ordinary regime does not. | €300-1,500/year |
The words on the forms
- Partita IVA
- The VAT number that is the business identity.
- Regime forfettario
- The flat-tax regime to €85,000: 15%, or 5% for new activities.
- ATECO
- The activity code that fixes coefficient and INPS box.
- Gestione separata
- INPS scheme for professionals without their own fund.
- Comunicazione Unica
- The single filing for trades: register, INPS, INAIL at once.
- Fatturazione elettronica / SdI
- Compulsory e-invoicing through the state exchange.
- Commercialista
- The accountant nearly everyone hands the forms to.
The traps
- Picking an ATECO code casually and inheriting the wrong coefficient and INPS box.
- Losing forfettario eligibility mid-year (the €85k ceiling, or invoicing mainly your recent employer) and discovering it at return time.
- Artisans’ fixed INPS minimums at zero revenue.
- Assuming the 5% rate applies to a relaunched old activity - it requires genuine novelty.
Where to check this yourself
- Agenzia delle EntratePartita IVA and the forfettario rules.
- INPSGestione separata and the artisan/trader minimums.
- Registro ImpreseThe Comunicazione Unica.
This is a map, not legal or tax advice - and an honest one about how it was drawn: the Germany guide was written by a person who walked the route; most other countries were drafted with AI against the official sources and have not yet been walked by someone who did it. Laws change. Every guide carries the date it was last checked and the sources to check it yourself - and if you have been through one of these routes, your corrections are exactly what this handbook wants.