B Corp certification: what V2 requires, and what it costs

No. B Lab’s V2 standards, published on 8 April 2025, moved away from cumulative point scoring, and B Lab says there is no longer a target point score.

A company must instead meet Foundation Requirements and Impact Topic Requirements across seven topics, phased in at Year 0, Year 3 and Year 5.

Part 1, the Foundation Requirements, covers eligibility, the legal requirement and a risk assessment.

Part 2 sets requirements in seven Impact Topics: Purpose and Stakeholder Governance; Climate Action; Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion; Government Affairs and Collective Action; Fair Work; Human Rights; and Environmental Stewardship and Circularity.

Certification is audited by an independent, B Lab-approved assurer.

The company amends its own Articles of Association with B Lab UK’s prescribed stakeholder wording.

A company with 0–49 full-time employees must do it before certification; a larger limited company has up to a year after certification, and an LLP 90 days.

It is not an amendment to section 172 of the Companies Act, which is unchanged.

B Lab UK charges a one-off tiered submission fee, a verification fee that covers the initial Year 0 headquarters audit, and an annual fee based on revenue in the last audited accounts.

It has frozen its fees through 2026 and publishes the amounts in its own pricing tool.

Companies above $75 million revenue or 250 employees may also pay a scoping fee and site-audit fees, and an equity reduction of 40% on the annual fee applies to eligible companies under £5 million revenue.

B Lab’s V2 standards set a five-year cycle with a Year 3 audit and recertification at Year 5.

Micro and small companies are audited at Years 0, 3 and 5; larger companies annually.

Some B Lab UK pages still say a B Corp recertifies every three years; the five-year figure is the one that matches the global standards and B Lab UK’s own how-to-certify and pricing pages.

Set up the assessment on B Lab’s platform, complete and submit it with the submission fee, make the legal change on the timetable your size requires, go through audit and verification by an approved assurer, then sign the B Corp agreement and pay the annual fee.

Financial services companies above US$1 billion revenue cannot currently apply.

No. B Corp is a private certification owned by B Lab.

It does not discharge SECR, ESOS or UK SRS duties, and those apply by threshold or listing whether or not a company is a B Corp.

B Lab UK says that B Corps communicating to EU consumers which have neither recertified on the V2 standards nor signed an amendment to the B Corp Agreement lose the right to use the B Corp logo or describe themselves as certified, from 27 September 2026, regardless of where they are based.

The date is when the EU Empowering Consumers Directive rules apply.