How to Verify a CAC Certificate of Incorporation

The fastest way to verify a CAC certificate

You can confirm a CAC certificate in well under a minute. Go to the official CAC Public Search at search.cac.gov.ng, reachable from the official CAC website at cac.gov.ng, and use only the official domain.

Type the RC number from the certificate. For a limited company it is prefixed RC, for example RC 1234567. Select the correct entity type — Company, Business Name, Incorporated Trustee, or LLP or LP — then run the search and review the result.

Finally, match the name, RC number, and registration date against the certificate, and check the status, which shows as ACTIVE or INACTIVE. If the details match and the company appears as registered, the certificate corresponds to a real CAC registration. If the company does not appear, or the details do not match, stop and investigate before you proceed.

What is a CAC Certificate of Incorporation, and the RC number?

The Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) is the Nigerian federal agency responsible for registering and regulating companies and business names. When the CAC approves a registration, it issues a certificate and assigns a unique RC number, short for Registration Certificate number — a permanent identifier that belongs to that one registration, much like a NIN belongs to a person.

Where the number appears, and its prefix, depends on the entity type.

Because two businesses can have similar names, the RC number — not the name — is the reliable way to verify a specific company.

How to verify a CAC certificate online, step by step

The CAC Public Search is free, public, and available to anyone, with no account needed.

Open the official portal at search.cac.gov.ng. Only ever use the official cac.gov.ng domain; clone sites exist specifically to harvest data or mislead, so check the address bar before you type anything.

Enter the RC number exactly as printed on the certificate. A single wrong digit returns no record found, so double-check it. Select the entity type — Company, Business Name, Incorporated Trustee, LLP, or LP — to match the certificate, then run the search. Results usually load within a few seconds.

Review and match. Compare the returned name, RC number, registration date, and type against the certificate; they should line up exactly. Then check the status: note whether the company shows as ACTIVE or INACTIVE, which reflects whether annual returns are up to date.

If you only have the company name, you can search by name instead — but expect multiple similar results, and always confirm the exact match using the RC number.

What a genuine CAC record shows you

A successful search returns the core registration facts. Use them as a checklist against the certificate.

If any of these do not match — especially a mismatch between the name and the RC number — the certificate should not be trusted on its face.

Other ways to verify a CAC certificate

The online public search is the quickest route, but you have options depending on how much assurance you need.

The CAC mobile app provides quick basic checks — registered name, RC number, registration date, type, and status — handy for a fast snapshot. For more detail, visit the nearest CAC office in person, request a company search with the name or RC number, and, with valid ID and a small fee, obtain a more detailed check.

For contracts, legal use, or high-value due diligence, request a Certified True Copy (CTC) of the incorporation documents from the CAC. A CTC is the strongest form of proof because it is certified by the Commission itself. A CAC-accredited agent can also run searches and obtain certified documents on your behalf.

For most commercial checks, the public search plus a status review is enough. For litigation, large transactions, or onboarding a major counterparty, get a CTC.

Red flags: how to spot a fake CAC certificate

Fraudulent or doctored certificates usually fail at least one of these tests.

The company does not appear in the CAC public search at all. The RC number does not match the name on the certificate, or returns a different company. The registration date on the certificate differs from the register. The status is INACTIVE when the holder claims to be a fully operating, compliant business — worth probing, though not proof of forgery on its own.

There is pressure not to verify; a genuine business will share its RC number and welcome a public search without hesitation. You were sent to a verification link that is not on the official cac.gov.ng domain. Or there is visual tampering — mismatched fonts, misaligned seals, or a QR code that leads somewhere other than an official CAC result.

The single most reliable test is always the same: does the certificate match the CAC's own register, keyed on the RC number?

Registered is not the same as compliant or licensed

One important nuance trips people up: appearing in the CAC register confirms a company legally exists — it does not confirm that the company is tax-compliant, properly licensed for its sector, or financially sound. A bank, fintech, insurer, or healthcare provider also needs the relevant regulatory licence from its supervising body. And an INACTIVE status means annual returns are outstanding, which is a compliance gap even if the company is genuinely registered. Treat CAC verification as the essential first layer of due diligence, not the whole of it.

What CAC verification teaches every business that issues documents

Step back and notice why verifying a CAC certificate is so easy: the CAC made its certificates verifiable at source. Anyone can confirm one in seconds, for free, against the issuer's own register — without phoning the CAC, creating an account, or trusting the holder's word. That is the gold standard of document trust, and it is the issuer-side model: the organisation that creates a document also gives the world a way to verify it.

Now turn that around. Your own organisation issues documents every day that other people have to trust — invoices, contracts, proposals, engagement letters, certificates, account statements, employment letters. Your customers, partners and counterparties face exactly the same question about your documents that you just asked about a CAC certificate: is this real? But unlike the CAC, most businesses give recipients no way to check. That is why a forged invoice or a doctored letter in your company's name can circulate undetected — and why the reputational damage lands on you.

VerifyDoc.ai lets any organisation give its own documents the same property the CAC gives its certificates. Every document you issue can carry a QR-backed Certificate of Authenticity and a hosted proof page, so a recipient can scan and verify in seconds that the document is genuine, unaltered, and issued by you — no account, no phone call, no special software. The verification record stays with the document even after it is printed, forwarded, or archived.

The CAC made its certificates impossible to fake convincingly, because they are verifiable at source. You can do the same for everything your business issues. See how it works.

Give your own documents CAC-grade trust

A CAC certificate is easy to trust because it is verifiable at source. VerifyDoc.ai brings that same property to every document your business issues — a QR code and proof page anyone can scan to confirm it is real, unaltered, and yours. Start free or see how it works.

Related reading: Are electronic signatures legally binding in Nigeria? and Nigeria Data Protection Act 2023: a guide for document issuers.

This guide is for general information. The CAC's portals, processes and fees can change; always start from the official CAC website at cac.gov.ng and confirm current steps there.