What a UAE filming permit costs and which line on the bill is the government's
UAE filming permit cost has no single answer, and treating it as one is the mistake that reaches budgets. There is a federal figure, Dubai publishes a different structure, and Abu Dhabi, Sharjah, Fujairah and Ras Al Khaimah each publish something else again. Inside Dubai the answer changes a second time, at the line between a government-managed location and a private one.
This guide covers the two numbers a Dubai budget carries, what a venue may charge and the ceiling above it, how the answer moves at each emirate line, the unit behind each figure, and what the penalty instruments charge for going without.
The one line to hold onto
On a private location the Dubai government's line on a shoot day is the AED 520 processing fee the Dubai Film and TV Commission publishes per application. The AED 2,500 that circulates as the Dubai permit fee sits under the Commission's Government Location Fees heading, and private locations carry a separate published band, from zero to a maximum of AED 25,000 per day. Which side a named venue falls on is not stated on any Commission page read here. Read the emirate, and read who owns the ground, before you read the number.
UAE filming permit cost, in the two numbers a budget carries
The Dubai Film and TV Commission publishes two figures on its own fee page: a non-refundable processing fee of AED 520 per application, and a government location fee matrix by production type, with AED 2,500 in it, set against permit durations of up to 3, 7, 14 and 30 days.
Both come from one instrument. Executive Council Resolution No. 50 of 2014, Schedule (1), sets an application fee of AED 500 and, for six of its nine rows, a permit fee of AED 2,500, each against a maximum permit duration by production type. The Commission heads that column Location Fees, and the resolution calls the same number a permit fee. Both words are published, and this article records both rather than choosing.
The AED 520 is the AED 500 application fee plus two Dubai statutory charges: a Knowledge Dirham of AED 10 under Law No. 1 of 2018 and an Innovation Dirham of AED 10 under Law No. 2 of 2018, each levied on revenue a government entity collects for its services. The Commission itemises it nowhere, so that breakdown is a reading built from three primary instruments and not a published statement.
The federal figure is a different charge sharing a number. Cabinet Resolution No. 41 of 2025 on media services fees prices ground, aerial and maritime filming permits in the State at 500 dirhams for one day each, in the schedule for services provided by the Competent Authority. That is the federal media permit fee. It is not the AED 500 per day that circulates in production guides as a Dubai Municipality location charge, which no Dubai Municipality page read for this article publishes.
Where the federal figure and the Dubai structure meet is not resolved by anything read for this article. Across ten pages of the Commission's site read on 28 August 2026, the federal regulator is not named once and the federal fee instrument is not cited.
The government's line and the venue's line on one Dubai shoot day
Take a corporate or promotional shoot at a government-managed location in Dubai. It sits in the Schedule (1) row for firms filming for promotional or internal purposes, carrying the AED 500 application fee and a permit fee of AED 2,500 against a maximum permit duration of up to seven days. With the two statutory dirhams the paperwork line is AED 520 plus AED 2,500, so AED 3,020.
Now move the same shoot to a private location. The AED 2,500 sits under the Commission's Government Location Fees heading, so the government's line is the AED 520 and the rest belongs to the venue. Which side a named venue falls on is not stated on any Commission page read here. The Commission's own answer is that private location fees are subject to the location owner's decision, so the classification of a hotel, a clinic, a restaurant or a sales gallery is settled with the Commission or the venue.
The Commission publishes private location fees as charged from zero to a maximum of AED 25,000 per day, and the instrument behind that band is stronger than the phrasing. Article 5(d) of the 2014 resolution provides that private entities may not charge more than AED 25,000 per day for filming in locations accessible to the public, and must refund any excess unless the Commission decides otherwise. That is a statutory ceiling with a refund obligation, not a negotiated range.
Where inside that band any named Dubai venue sits is not established. Nine free-zone and private hosts were read on 28 August 2026 and none publishes a filming tariff, the Commission assigns the decision to the location owner, and no attestation from anyone who has paid one supports this article. That stays a band rather than a number.
Three scope clauses belong beside that arithmetic. Aerial filming in Dubai carries the AED 520 application and no permit fee, because Schedule (1) leaves the permit column blank for the all-purpose aerial row, which is not the same as a free drone permit. Whether the federal AED 500 per day sits alongside these Dubai figures is unresolved. And all of it is pre-VAT, because no VAT position is established for these figures.
What a supplier may add to a permit line, in the Commission's own words
The Commission's permit terms answer the invoice question directly. Clause 3.2 reads that the permit holder should not claim any additional fees as location or processing fees other than the fees implemented by the Commission. Read the scope as tightly as the clause is written. It binds the permit holder, and whether the phrase reaches a location owner's own charge is not settled by the clause itself. On a private venue the owner's fee is a separate charge under Article 5(d).
Clause 12.3 is the cash-flow half. The fees are not refundable in all cases, regardless of any cancellation by the permit holder at any stage. A permit filed early against a date that is still moving is money at risk, which makes filing timing a scheduling decision.
The practical reading is the reader's to make. The government fee on a Dubai application is the AED 520, and a production company's own charge for preparing and lodging it is a production charge. Both clauses are published and an invoice can be held against them.
The answer changes at the emirate line, and it changes four ways
Good to know
Name the emirate in every sentence that carries a number. A sentence beginning "in the UAE, a filming permit costs" is wrong in at least two emirates.
Abu Dhabi charges the federal figure exactly. The Creative Media Authority publishes a cost of 500 AED for each day on its ground, aerial and maritime filming permit records, with a service duration of up to 15 working days for ground and maritime, each noting it might take longer where external approvals are needed, and up to 3 for aerial. Its aerial record adds that once the Authority's clearance letter is obtained, General Civil Aviation Authority approval must also be secured.
Sharjah publishes its own tariff and it is higher, priced by duration band. The Sharjah Media Council charges AED 1,710 for one to seven days, AED 3,210 for one to fourteen days and AED 5,710 for one to thirty days. Each band also fixes how long the resulting material may be distributed, at fourteen, thirty and sixty days respectively. The same page adds that certain locations in Sharjah may require additional fees.
Dubai charges the structure set out above, an application fee and a permit fee against a maximum duration, and never names the federal figure on any page read.
Ras Al Khaimah's published figure is a landowner's charge rather than a media permit. The emirate's Public Services Department publishes a filming permit at AED 2,000 insurance plus AED 2,000 filming fee per day, issued the same day, for the areas that department manages. Read the source before the number: the manual's cover reads 2020, a running footer on the following page reads 2018, it repeats the same fee row under an unrelated service, and its English and Arabic columns list different required documents. Who issues a media activity permit in that emirate is not established here, because the federal routing note is scoped to script and printing permit services.
Fujairah publishes AED 500 for each filming day plus AED 200 in other service fees plus Value Added Tax, the only UAE filming fee found anywhere that states a VAT position at all. The Journal's article on filming permits in the northern emirates carries the rest of it.
Which unit each figure is priced in
Federally, the 500 dirhams buys one day, and Article 3 of Cabinet Resolution No. 41 of 2025 provides that for the purposes of collecting these fees a part of a day is deemed a full day, a part of a month a full month and a part of a year a full year. A half day on a call sheet is a full day on the schedule.
Dubai prices the other way, and the AED 2,500 is not a per-day rate. There is no per-day multiplier anywhere in Executive Council Resolution No. 50 of 2014, which prices each Schedule (1) row once against a maximum permit duration. Across ten of the Commission's own pages read on 28 August 2026 the phrase "per day" occurs once, in the sentence about private locations, and "half day" does not occur at all. The Commission adds that a single application can include permit requests for multiple days and locations.
Set the two published models side by side and they behave differently. A Dubai permit window priced once against a maximum duration does not grow with the shooting days inside it, so a slate shot across several days in one window carries one government location line. A federal schedule priced per day does grow. That is a comparison of two published models, not a promise about any particular budget.
Sharjah adds a unit nobody else publishes, because its band prices how long you may shoot and how long the material may then be distributed. Dubai and Abu Dhabi split ground and aerial in opposite ways: Dubai publishes that aerial and ground filming can be applied for in one permit, while Abu Dhabi runs three separate services, each at 500 AED for each day.
What the permit does not buy
Federal Decree-Law No. 55 of 2023 settles this in one sentence. The licence or permit issued by the Council or the Competent Authority does not substitute for obtaining the necessary permits or approvals from the concerned authorities, and the federal service record repeats it as a published condition. The Journal's article on filming people and consent covers a different layer of the same shoot.
A Dubai road closure permit for a public event is AED 220, being AED 200 for the permit and AED 20 Knowledge and Innovation, over seven working days, and open to companies and government entities only. The Roads and Transport Authority lists Commission approval among its own requirements, and names Executive Council Resolution No. 54 of 2021 behind a fine for unpermitted right-of-way use, for which no figure is quoted here because the instrument was not retrieved.
Commercial filming in Dubai's protected areas needs a No Objection Certificate from Dubai Municipality's Natural Reserves Section, and the Municipality publishes no filming or photography fee on that page or across the 687 page URLs its sitemap carried on 28 August 2026. The DIFC requires prior approval for all photography and videography, publishes no fee on that page, and routes commercial productions to the Commission first, while the Commission's terms require the location owner's written permission before the permit. Two published sequences, read on the same day, and this article picks neither.
Script clearance flips at the emirate line. Dubai requires it for TV series, films and documentaries and charges nothing. Its FAQ names those three and does not name commercials or corporate video, and whether either needs clearance was not established here. Abu Dhabi prices a content approval at 500 AED for each script, covering commercials among others, and lists it among the filming permit's own required documents. The Journal's article on the UAE advertiser permit covers the separate advertising layer, which this article does not price.
Two more sit off the fee page. The permit for filming equipment accompanying crews from outside the State is its own federal service, and the federal service for media materials entering through the country's ports is not it: that one prices publications, and none of its figures attaches to a camera case. Anything airborne carries a second authority, with Abu Dhabi sequencing a General Civil Aviation Authority approval after its clearance letter and Sharjah routing final aerial procedures to Sharjah's Department of Civil Aviation. The civil aviation authorities' own pages could not be read here, returning client-side shells, so no aerial figure is established.
What it costs to film without one
Watch out
A full-text search of the fifteen-page English text of Federal Decree-Law No. 55 of 2023 finds no imprisonment, confiscation or criminal charge for practising a media activity without a permit. That is a statement about that one instrument. Its Article 23(3) expressly preserves penalties in other legislation, and no other legislation was read here.
Schedule (2) of Executive Council Resolution No. 50 of 2014 carries five fines: AED 25,000 for filming without a permit, AED 15,000 for filming outside the permitted locations, AED 15,000 for filming on days or at times other than those in the permit, AED 25,000 for filming for other than the permitted purposes, and AED 20,000 for any other breach of the permit terms. The Commission's fee page, read on 28 August 2026, publishes four of the five. The row it leaves out is the one for days and times, which catches a production overrunning into a day it did not book.
Three further exposures sit in the instrument and on none of the Commission's pages. A repeat of the same violation within a year doubles the fine, provided it does not exceed AED 50,000, and the Commission may suspend the filming operation, prohibit filming for up to six months, or prohibit it permanently. Nominated inspectors hold the capacity of law enforcement officers, and a grievance must be filed within thirty days and decided within thirty days by a committee whose decision is final. For a company that films for a living, the ban weighs more than the fine.
Federally, Cabinet Resolution No. 42 of 2025 prices practising a media activity without a licence or permit at AED 10,000 for a first offence, with thirty days to rectify, and AED 40,000 for a second, with administrative closure until it is rectified. Its second table prices twenty media content standards violations from AED 5,000 up to AED 1,000,000, with advertising content failing to respect the State's culture, identity and values, and privacy breaches, both running from AED 20,000 to AED 100,000. Fines double where the same violation repeats within a year, and the article imposing them carries no general cap. Above it sits the decree-law's own sanctions article, from a warning through a fine between AED 1,000 and AED 1,000,000, doubled on repetition to AED 2,000,000, with closure for up to six months and cancellation of licences and permits.
The answer changes at the emirate line, and it changes four ways.
The questions this article did not settle
No VAT position is established for any figure here except Fujairah's, which states its own fees as plus Value Added Tax. The federal fee resolution mentions no tax in either table or in any of its nine articles, and the operative federal provision could not be retrieved on any host tried, so every calculation above is pre-VAT.
Whether Dubai's fee and fine schedules survived Decree No. 67 of 2024 is open. That decree repealed Executive Council Resolution No. 50 of 2014 while continuing in force the bylaws and resolutions issued in implementation of it. The schedules are annexes to the resolution itself rather than instruments issued under it, no superseding schedule appears on the Dubai Legal Portal or on the Commission's pages read here, and the Commission goes on charging these figures while the Dubai Legal Portal records the resolution as in force.
Who permits a shoot inside a Dubai Development Authority zone is also open. The Commission's terms assert sole authority for all filming in Dubai including the free zones and the DIFC, while Decree No. 66 of 2024 designates the Development Authority for media activities within its own zones, whose licensed entities need no additional Council licence or permit inside them.
The free-zone carve-out is narrower than it reads. The statute, the federal regulator and the penalty schedule all reach into the free zones, and only the fee amounts are disapplied, governed instead by Cabinet Resolution No. 39 of 2016, read for this Journal on 17 August 2026 and not re-readable on 28 August. Whether a shoot taking place in an emirate is a media service provided within a free zone for that purpose is not answered anywhere retrieved.
Common questions
What does a filming permit cost for a shoot at a Dubai venue?
The Commission publishes a non-refundable processing fee of AED 520 per application. Its AED 2,500 matrix sits under a Government Location Fees heading, and private locations carry a separate published band, from zero to a maximum of AED 25,000 per day, subject to the location owner's decision. Which side a named venue falls on is not stated on any Commission page read here.
Is the AED 2,500 charged per day?
No. Executive Council Resolution No. 50 of 2014 prices each row of Schedule (1) once, against a maximum permit duration, and carries no per-day multiplier. Across ten of the Commission's pages the phrase "per day" appears once, and only about private locations. The Commission also publishes that a single application can include permit requests for multiple days and locations.
Do we pay the federal AED 500 as well as the emirate's fee?
It depends on the emirate, and one of the four answers is unresolved. Abu Dhabi publishes the federal figure exactly, at 500 AED for each day. Sharjah publishes its own and higher tariff by duration band. Dubai publishes a different structure and never mentions the federal instrument on any page read. Whether the federal figure sits alongside Dubai's is not settled.
Does the permit fee include VAT?
Not established. Fujairah is the only UAE filming fee found anywhere stating a VAT position, and it states it as an addition, at AED 500 for each filming day plus AED 200 in other service fees plus Value Added Tax. Every figure here is pre-VAT.
What happens if we film without a permit in Dubai?
Executive Council Resolution No. 50 of 2014 sets a fine of AED 25,000, doubled on a repeat within a year up to AED 50,000. The Commission may suspend the filming operation, prohibit filming for up to six months, or prohibit it permanently.
Can a production company charge us a handling fee on top of the permit?
Clause 3.2 of the Commission's terms states that the permit holder should not claim any additional fees as location or processing fees other than the fees implemented by the Commission. Whether that reaches a location owner's own charge is not settled by the clause. Clause 12.3 adds that the fees are not refundable in all cases, regardless of any cancellation at any stage.
What to hold onto, in one pass
On a private location the Dubai government's take on a shoot day is the AED 520 processing fee, and the rest is the venue's, inside a published band running to a maximum of AED 25,000 per day. On a government-managed location it is AED 520 plus AED 2,500, so AED 3,020. That AED 2,500 is priced per permit against a maximum duration and never per day. The answer changes at the emirate line and it changes four ways. The permit does not substitute for the other approvals, and the road, the protected areas, the DIFC and anything airborne are separate stacks. And the cost of going without is measured by the power to suspend a filming operation, or to prohibit filming for up to six months, or permanently, rather than by the fine.
Grolez Films: the permission chain, worked out before the quote
The pattern that costs money here is a location added late, priced off a number from a different emirate or a different kind of venue, and the venue's own fee arriving after the date is locked.
Before we quote a job, we work out who has to give permission and who has to apply for it. A brief that needs a permit does not cost a client more than one that does not, so the work sits in the sequence rather than in the price. The Journal's article on video production cost in Dubai carries the production tier bands.
Luis Grolez, the founder, pitches this personally, founder to founder.
See the work. Then get in touch about a specific location and a specific quarter.
Sources and methodology
Every regulatory sentence here was read from primary text rather than from commentary. No production company blog, permit reseller, fixer guide, agency listicle, drone blog, law-firm page or news report is cited or paraphrased anywhere, and several exist on this subject and were set aside. The Dubai Film and TV Commission's own pages return a near-empty application shell to an ordinary request and return their content to a Googlebot user-agent, which is the rung used here, and which is why an earlier note in this Journal's working files that the fee page was unreadable was wrong. The federal legislation portal refused its search and listing endpoints at every rung including a real browser, so federal instruments were reached only where their identifiers were known from another host, and no positive search for an amending instrument was possible. The Abu Dhabi Film Commission's own permit and FAQ pages returned HTTP 403 at three rungs, and nothing here says what those two pages publish; the Abu Dhabi figures come from the Creative Media Authority's own service records. Cabinet Resolution No. 39 of 2016 could not be re-read on 28 August 2026, and the sentence relying on it rests on the 17 August 2026 retrieval. The Ras Al Khaimah service manual is dated 2020 on its cover with a 2018 running footer and repeats one fee row under an unrelated service, and it is quoted with those qualifications. No VAT position is established for any figure except Fujairah's own. No figure is established for what any named private venue charges inside the published band, for the civil aviation fees that stack on an aerial permit, or for the fine under Executive Council Resolution No. 54 of 2021. Four questions are left open in both directions: the VAT position, whether Dubai's schedules survived Decree No. 67 of 2024, who permits inside a Dubai Development Authority zone, and whether a shoot in an emirate is a media service provided within a free zone. Every negative statement above is scoped to the instruments, hosts and pages actually read, on the dates given. The federal legislation portal refused its index in both directions, so nothing here states what that index does or does not contain. No claim is made anywhere that Grolez Films has filed, paid or waited out any permit named here. This article is informational and is not legal advice. Confirm your position with the relevant authority or with counsel before relying on it. Prepared 29 August 2026.
- UAE legislation portal, Cabinet Resolution No. (41) of 2025 on media services fees, for the federal filming permit fees, the part-day rule, the free-zone disapplication and the amendment power: uaelegislation.gov.ae
- UAE legislation portal, Cabinet Resolution No. (42) of 2025, for both penalty tables, the doubling rule and the grievance route: uaelegislation.gov.ae
- Creative Media Authority, Cabinet Resolution No. (86) of 2020, for the 2020 filming and equipment figures and the earlier part-day rule: cma.gov.ae
- Creative Media Authority, Federal Decree-Law No. (55) of 2023, for the permit power, the non-substitution rule and the administrative sanctions ceiling: cma.gov.ae
- UAE legislation portal, Cabinet Resolution No. (68) of 2024, the Executive Regulation, for the one-permit-per-application rule, the fifteen working day review and the implicit rejection: uaelegislation.gov.ae
- UAE legislation portal, Federal Decree by Law No. (11) of 2025, for the transfer of the Council's competences to the National Media Authority on 1 January 2026: uaelegislation.gov.ae
- National Media Authority service records, for the published federal fees, delivery times, the activity definition and the equipment entry permit: nma.gov.ae
- Dubai Legal Portal, Executive Council Resolution No. (50) of 2014, for Schedule (1), Schedule (2), the private-location ceiling and the enforcement powers: dlp.dubai.gov.ae
- Dubai Legal Portal, Executive Council Resolution No. (16) of 2012, for the definitions and the history only, as a superseded instrument: dlp.dubai.gov.ae
- Dubai Legal Portal, Law No. (1) of 2018 and Law No. (2) of 2018, for the Knowledge and Innovation Dirham fees behind the AED 520: dlp.dubai.gov.ae
- Dubai Media Council, Decree No. (66) of 2024 and Decree No. (67) of 2024, for the split of competence and the repeal: dubaimediacouncil.ae
- Dubai Film and TV Commission, its fee page, FAQ and permit terms, for the AED 520, the location fee matrix, the private band, the published fines and clauses 3.2 and 12.3: filmdubai.gov.ae
- Creative Media Authority Abu Dhabi, filming permit service records, for the 500 AED for each day, the service durations, the required documents and the content approval: cma.gov.ae
- Sharjah Media Council, for the duration bands and the distribution windows: smc.ae
- Fujairah Culture and Media Authority, for the only stated VAT position on a UAE filming fee: fcma.gov.ae
- Ras Al Khaimah Public Services Department, published service manual, for the land charge and its own internal contradictions: psd.rak.ae
- Roads and Transport Authority, service 341, for the AED 220 road closure permit and its Commission prerequisite: rta.ae
- Dubai Municipality, for the protected-areas No Objection Certificate and the absence of a published filming fee across its sitemap: dm.gov.ae
- DIFC, for the photography consent regime, its terms and the order-of-operations conflict: difc.com