Autónomo or SL: what suits you and when

Autónomo and SL: what each one is

They are two different legal ways to run a business in Spain. As soon as you start invoicing regularly, you have to be in one of them.

• Autónomo: you, as an individual, invoice and are liable. You register with the tax office and social security and pay personal income tax (IRPF). There is no separation between your assets and the business.
• SL: you create a new legal person, with its own tax ID (NIF), its own capital and its own accounts. The company invoices, the company pays corporate income tax (Impuesto de Sociedades), and you are its shareholder and usually its director.

The core difference: an autónomo and the business are the same person; an SL is an entity separate from you. That separation explains almost everything else, from liability for debts to the cost of upkeep and the way tax is paid. Neither is better in the abstract: they are tools for different situations, and choosing well from the start saves you paperwork and money later.

Liability, image and access to contracts

This is the practical difference that weighs most:

• Personal liability: as an autónomo you answer for the debts of the business with all your present and future assets, in principle including your home (there is a limited-liability autónomo status that can protect your main residence under certain conditions, but its scope is narrow). In an SL, liability is in principle limited to the capital you put in: if the business fails, it does not drag down your personal assets, except for guarantees you signed yourself or cases of mismanagement.
• Image with clients: for many large clients and for the public administration, an SL signals more solidity and continuity than an autónomo. In B2B sectors it can open doors.
• Access to certain tenders and contracts: some public tenders and large private contracts require or prefer a legal person, with proven solvency and filed accounts. An autónomo can be left out for form, not for ability.

If your activity is unlikely to generate debts or claims (professional services with little investment), the autónomo's unlimited liability weighs little. If you handle stock, staff or contracts that can go wrong, the SL's protection starts to matter.

How each one is taxed: IRPF versus corporate tax

This is the comparison everyone wants and the one most often misread.

• The autónomo pays IRPF, Spain's progressive personal income tax: the more you earn, the higher the rate on the top slice of your income. The scale combines a state band and a regional one (it varies by autonomous community; the Basque Country and Navarre have their own rules) and, as a reference, runs from around 19% at the bottom to 47% on the highest incomes. You have a personal allowance (5,550 euros) and, under estimación directa simplificada (the simplified direct-assessment regime), a 5% deduction for hard-to-justify expenses capped at 2,000 euros per year.
• The SL pays Impuesto de Sociedades (corporate income tax), with a general rate of 25%. A small newly created SL that meets the conditions is taxed at 15% in its first profitable year and the next; after that, as a micro-enterprise (turnover below one million euros), in 2026 it pays 19% up to 50,000 euros of taxable base and 21% above that.

The honest reading: with low profits, the autónomo's IRPF usually lands well below 25%; with high, stable profits, the SL's rate becomes more attractive. The Agencia Tributaria explains how net income is calculated for the autónomo.

The 1 euro SL from the Crea y Crece law: the small print

Since Ley 18/2022, the business creation and growth law (known as Crea y Crece), the minimum capital to set up an SL dropped from 3,000 euros to 1 euro. It sounds like a free pass, but the law added two safeguards while capital stays below 3,000 euros, and they are worth knowing (they sit in article 4 of the Ley de Sociedades de Capital, Spain's companies act):

• Reinforced legal reserve: you must allocate at least 20% of each year's profit to the legal reserve until that reserve plus capital reaches 3,000 euros. In other words, you cannot pay out all the profit: part of it stays inside the company.
• Differential liability up to 3,000 euros: if the company is wound up and its assets are not enough to pay its debts, the shareholders are jointly liable for the difference between 3,000 euros and the capital they subscribed.

The practical upshot: the 1 euro is more symbolic than real. The 3,000 euro protection does not disappear, it is deferred. Setting up with such low capital can also look fragile to banks and suppliers, who sometimes ask for extra guarantees. That is why many advisers still recommend putting in a reasonable amount of capital from the start.

The autónomo societario: running the SL still means paying RETA

A costly misunderstanding: setting up an SL does not free you from being an autónomo. If you control the company and work in it (the classic case of the sole shareholder who also runs it), social security requires you to register as an autónomo societario (company-director self-employed) in the RETA, the special social security scheme for the self-employed. You pay your monthly contribution regardless of what the SL pays in corporate tax.

• The new-starter tarifa plana (the flat reduced social security rate), designed for people beginning on their own account, has not usually been applied to autónomos societarios: when you set up your SL, count on paying the full contribution from month one, not the reduced one.
• The contribution base is worked out with slightly less favourable rules than for an ordinary autónomo (a smaller generic expense deduction), so it tends to start from a higher base.

In short: on top of the SL's costs comes your autónomo societario contribution, which is not small. For an estimate of what you would pay per month, use our 2026 autónomo quota calculator, bearing in mind that, as a societario, you cannot count on the tarifa plana.

What it costs to set up and run each one

Beyond tax, each form carries its own structural bill.

• Autónomo: registering is free and done with modelo 036 at the tax office, plus your RETA registration. Bookkeeping is simple (income, expenses and investment-goods ledgers), you file your periodic returns and, to prepay IRPF, the quarterly modelo 130. You can handle it yourself or with an adviser, but the fixed cost is low.
• SL: setting one up requires a deed before a notary and registration at the Registro Mercantil (the commercial registry); the Crea y Crece telematic route makes this cheaper and faster with standard bylaws. Then come double-entry commercial accounting, legalisation of the accounting books, the drafting and filing of annual accounts at the registry, and the corporate income tax of its first year with its instalment payments (modelos 200 and 202). Almost nobody runs an SL without an adviser, so the recurring cost is clearly higher.

kontora builds the box-by-box drafts of those forms (303 and 390 for VAT, 111 and 115 for withholdings, 200 and 202 for corporate tax), keeps your double-entry accounts, is multi-company and warns you of every deadline; filing on the AEAT website is always done by you.

The an SL pays less myth and when it really pays off

The line set up an SL and you will pay less tax is a half-truth. It depends on three things: how much profit you make, what salary you assign yourself as director, and how much the structure costs to maintain.

There is also a double layer that is easy to forget: the SL pays 25% (or the reduced rate) on its profit, and when you distribute that profit as a dividend you are taxed on it again in your personal savings-income IRPF. Adding up corporate tax, your autónomo societario contribution and the cost of advisers, annual accounts and notary, for a modest profit the SL rarely beats the autónomo.

An SL starts to pay off when: profits are high and stable and you can leave part inside the company to reinvest; your activity carries real risk and you want to shield your assets; partners or investors come in; or you need the image of a legal person to sell.

For most people starting to invoice in Spain, the honest recommendation is to begin as an autónomo and set up the SL when the numbers call for it. And yes, you can switch later: you can transfer your business into an SL, but it is neither free nor automatic (valuing the business, the deed, possible transfer taxes and renegotiating contracts and tax details with your clients). Switching in good time is easy; switching late and under pressure, less so.

Frequently asked questions

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