How to Get a CAGE Code (It Costs Nothing)

A CAGE code is not applied for on its own. For almost every U.S. business, it is assigned automatically as a byproduct of registering as an entity in SAM.gov — the federal government's own registration system — and that registration costs nothing. There is no government fee at any point in the process, and nobody legitimate will ask you to pay one.

How to get a CAGE code, in one sentence

You get a CAGE code by completing a free entity registration on sam.gov, which requires a login.gov account, your entity's Employer Identification Number, and basic business details, after which the Defense Logistics Agency assigns the code as part of processing that registration — no separate CAGE application and no charge. The only real decision to make in advance is whether you need the full registration at all, or a narrower, direct request instead (covered below).

Is a CAGE code free? Yes — and so is SAM.gov

Both SAM.gov registration and the CAGE code that comes out of it are entirely free of charge, with no exceptions. This is worth stating plainly because it is the single most searched-for detail about this process, and because it is also the detail scammers exploit: fraudulent emails and lookalike websites specifically target businesses that just appear in SAM.gov's public data, offering to "activate," "renew," or "expedite" a registration or CAGE code for a fee. A genuine communication about your SAM.gov registration will never come from anything other than a .gov address, and the government will never ask for payment to assign, renew, or keep an active CAGE code.

Separately, a number of businesses offer paid help filling out the registration on your behalf — that is a legal service to sell, similar to paying someone to prepare a tax return you could file yourself, and it is a different thing from being charged a government fee. The distinction matters: paying for assistance is a choice, being told the code itself has a fee is false.

The actual path, in order

SAM.gov's own interface changes from year to year, so this is described as a sequence of what has to happen, not a click-by-click walkthrough of a specific screen — for the current forms and buttons, start directly at sam.gov's entity registration page.

First, you create a login.gov account if you do not already have one. Login.gov is a separate federal identity service that handles authentication — the username, password, and multi-factor login — while SAM.gov itself holds the actual entity registration data. This split trips people up (it is a large share of what "sam.gov login" searches are actually about), but it means your login.gov credentials work across other federal systems too, not just SAM.gov.

Second, you request a Unique Entity ID, generated directly by SAM.gov. Since April 2022 this step no longer runs through Dun & Bradstreet or requires a DUNS number at all — the government generates its own identifier now, and there is nothing to buy or request from a private company at any point in this process. A full explanation of how that identifier relates to a CAGE code lives in CAGE code vs. UEI vs. DUNS.

Third, you complete the entity registration itself: core business information, the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) codes describing what you do, and — for entities pursuing federal contracts rather than only grants — banking details for electronic funds transfer. SAM.gov validates this information against other federal records, including a name and taxpayer-ID match with IRS records, before the registration can go active.

Fourth, once validation clears, DLA assigns a CAGE code as part of finishing that registration, tied to the physical address on file. Nothing about this step requires action on your part — there is no separate CAGE form to submit alongside the SAM.gov registration for a domestic entity going through this path.

What you need before you start

Having these ready before you begin shortens the process, because most delays come from information gathered mid-registration rather than in advance:

Your entity's legal business name exactly as it appears in IRS records, its Employer Identification Number (EIN) or, for a sole proprietor without one, a Social Security Number, its physical address (a P.O. box is not sufficient for the physical address field), the NAICS code or codes describing its line of business, and — if pursuing paid federal contracts rather than grants only — banking information for electronic funds transfer. An authorized representative of the entity has to be the one completing registration; SAM.gov ties the registration to a real person's login.gov identity, not to a third-party account acting generically on the business's behalf.

How long it actually takes

Realistic expectations matter more here than a single number, because the timeline depends heavily on whether anything needs manual review. A registration with no mismatches — name, address, and EIN all lining up cleanly against IRS and other federal records — commonly finishes within roughly one to two weeks of submission. A registration that trips a validation mismatch, most often a business name that does not exactly match IRS records, can take substantially longer while that gets manually resolved, sometimes stretching to several weeks.

There is no way to pay for a faster government review — that is precisely the promise several of the paid third-party services above make, and it is not something the government offers at any price. If a registration has been pending for longer than roughly two weeks with no update, the Federal Service Desk (fsd.gov) is the correct place to check status, not a paid intermediary.

Getting a CAGE code without a full SAM.gov registration

A full SAM.gov registration is not always the right tool. An entity that needs a CAGE code for a narrower reason — most commonly a classified-contract requirement that does not otherwise call for open-market SAM.gov registration — can request one directly from DLA's CAGE Program Office through cage.dla.mil instead. That direct path is also free, runs through the same underlying DLA verification of the entity and its physical location, and is meant for the narrower case, not as a shortcut around SAM.gov registration for a business that actually needs to bid on contracts. If your goal is to hold or maintain a SAM.gov registration for contracting or grants generally, register through SAM.gov directly rather than trying to obtain a CAGE code first and a registration later — for most entities, the code is the byproduct, not the starting point.

Once a code exists either way, checking what is currently on file for it — status, registration dates, whether an exclusion flag is present — is a live lookup, not something this guide can freeze in place; use the CAGE code lookup for a specific code once you have one.

Why paid "CAGE code registration" services exist anyway

Searching "cage code registration" or "sam.gov registration" surfaces a large number of businesses offering to handle the process for a fee, often several hundred to several thousand dollars, sometimes with marketing that implies urgency or a limited window. Some of what they sell is legitimate: preparing paperwork correctly the first time has real value if you would rather not do it yourself, in the same way a paid preparer has value for a tax return you are legally capable of filing on your own.

What is not legitimate is any framing that implies the registration or the CAGE code itself has a government fee, that a paid service can register you faster than the government's own review timeline, or that failing to pay will cause an existing registration or CAGE code to lapse — none of that reflects how the free, government-run process actually works. The same caution applies to unsolicited emails referencing a specific CAGE code or expiration date: this information is drawn from SAM.gov's own public entity data, so seeing it correctly quoted back to you in an email is not proof the sender is affiliated with the government.

Common mistakes that slow this down

The most common one is a name mismatch: registering under a trade name or a slightly different legal name than what the IRS has on file, which triggers manual validation and adds real time. Registering under the exact legal business name tied to your EIN avoids this entirely.

A second is assuming a DUNS number is still required somewhere in the process. It is not — SAM.gov has generated its own Unique Entity ID directly since April 2022, and there is no D&B step to complete first for federal registration purposes.

A third is paying for "renewal" of a CAGE code the moment it is due, without confirming who is actually asking. SAM.gov registrations require renewal roughly annually to stay active, and that renewal is free and done through the same sam.gov account — not through a third party that reached out first.