MCA Company Search in India: How to Check a Company on the MCA Portal (2026)

How-To · Company Search

Updated for 2026 · Claw Editorial

To look up a company on the MCA portal, open mca.gov.in, choose View Company/LLP Master Data, and search by company name or CIN. It is free and shows status, directors, and charges. It does not show court cases. For that, you search the company name in a case database such as Claw.

01Why MCA search is the first step

Before you sign a contract, lend money, hire a vendor, or join a company, you need to know that the company is real and in good standing. In India, the first place to check is the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) portal.

The MCA keeps the official record of every registered company and LLP. Anyone can search it for free, without logging in. That makes it the standard first check for lenders, buyers, company secretaries, HR teams, and lawyers.

The problem is that many people stop there. A clean MCA record tells you a company is registered and filing returns. It does not tell you whether the company is being sued, or is suing others. This guide shows how to use MCA properly, and where it ends.

The MCA portal tells you who a company is. It does not tell you what courts say about it.

02How to search a company on the MCA portal

The MCA site is updated from time to time, so menu names can shift slightly. These steps match the portal as of October 2026.

1. Open the portal. Go to mca.gov.in.
2. Choose the service. Open the MCA Services menu. Under Company Services, click View Company/LLP Master Data.
3. Enter the search term. Type the company name (full or part of it) or the CIN. Enter the captcha and submit.
4. Select the correct company. Many companies have similar names. Match the CIN and registered address before you trust the result.
5. Read the master data. You will see the company details, its status, and the list of directors and signatories. Charges are shown in a separate section.
6. Use Check Company Name for new names. If you want to register a name, the Check Company Name service shows whether it is already in use.

Search by name or by CIN?

Search by CIN whenever you have it. A CIN points to exactly one company. A name search can return several, and companies change names over time. If you only have a name, confirm the CIN from the company’s invoice, website footer, or contract.

03What a CIN tells you

A CIN, or Corporate Identification Number, is a 21-character code that identifies a company registered in India. It never repeats and stays with the company for life.

The code carries real information if you know how to read it. In general, it shows:

• whether the company is listed or unlisted (the first letter),
• the industry code,
• the state of registration,
• the year of incorporation,
• the type of company (such as private limited or public limited),
• the Registrar of Companies registration number.

So a CIN lets you spot problems quickly. For example, if a company claims to be ten years old but the CIN shows a registration year two years ago, ask why.

04Company status explained

Company status is the single most important line in the master data. It tells you whether the company can lawfully do business.

• Active: the company is registered and in the register of companies. Check whether it is also “active compliant” where the portal shows this, because an active company can still be behind on filings.
• Strike off: the Registrar has removed, or proposed to remove, the company name from the register, usually for not filing returns or not carrying on business. A struck-off company is treated as dissolved.
• Under liquidation: the company is being wound up. Its affairs are handled by a liquidator, and new dealings carry high risk. Insolvency proceedings run through the NCLT, and those are not shown in full on the master data page.
• Amalgamated or converted: the company has merged into another or changed form. Look for the successor.

Treat anything other than Active as a reason to stop and ask questions.

05Free master data vs paid documents

The master data page is free. It gives you a snapshot. The actual filed documents sit behind the MCA public documents service and carry a fee.

In short, the free page tells you what exists and when it was filed. The paid documents let you read the detail. If you are lending against a company, the charge documents and latest financials are worth paying for.

06What MCA does not show

MCA is a registry of filings. It does not record what happens to a company in court. That gap matters, because a company can be fully compliant on MCA and still face serious cases.

• Civil suits and recovery cases filed by or against the company.
• Cheque bounce and criminal complaints naming the company or its directors.
• Tax, writ, and appeal matters in High Courts and the Supreme Court.
• Intellectual property disputes over brands and designs. For how those differ, see passing off vs infringement.

This is why a proper company check has two layers: the MCA record, and a court-case search. HR and compliance teams use the same two layers for hiring checks, as explained in our guide on litigation checks during employee onboarding.

07Where Claw fits

Claw is an all-in-one legaltech platform for Indian advocates, law firms, and corporate legal teams, combining AI-based case search, an AI legal assistant (Legal GPT), case management, and compliance automation across all Indian courts and tribunals.

For this job, Claw covers the layer MCA leaves out. Once you have confirmed the company on MCA, you can search the company name in Claw to find court cases that mention it. Claw runs across 9,102 forums and more than 30 crore judgments, and search results come back in under 5 seconds. Name search is tolerant of spelling variations and old names, which matters because company names are written many ways in court records.

Claw has a free plan for individual advocates. Creating a free Claw account lets you start. Teams and enterprises are on paid plans. A full written litigation report is a separate per-search product.

Create a FREE Claw account to find every court case for a company by name (company litigation search). For how this works in detail, read the complete guide to company litigation search. If you are comparing background-check providers, see AuthBridge alternatives.

08Sources and further reading

• Ministry of Corporate Affairs (View Company/LLP Master Data, Check Company Name): mca.gov.in
• Claw: clawlaw.in

Last verified October 2026. The MCA portal changes its layout and services from time to time, so confirm the current menu on the live site.

09Frequently asked questions