Data-center law in Costa Rica

National jurisdiction · as of 2026-09-05

Costa Rica has no data-center-specific siting, permitting, or utility statute; a data center is governed by the general export-incentive framework of Ley No. 7210, Ley de Regimen de Zonas Francas.

That law grants tax incentives to categories of enterprises defined by activity (export processing, export trading, and export services, among others) rather than by sector, so a data center operator could potentially qualify as an export-services company, but the statute does not name information technology, data infrastructure, or data centers as a distinct incentive category, and no provision addresses electricity grid interconnection, water use, or air emissions specifically.

Instruments on record

1 instrument on record, grouped by the family of approval each one governs.

Public agreements

What fiscal agreements attach a data center to its host jurisdiction?

Ley de Regimen de Zonas Francas

In force

Ley No. 7210, Ley de Regimen de Zonas Francas, y sus reformas

Applies to private

Article 1 defines the Free Zone Regime as the set of incentives and benefits the State grants to companies making new investments in the country that meet the law's requirements, and requires beneficiary companies to comply with national and international environmental protection rules for sustainable development.

Article 17 classifies eligible enterprises by activity, including export-processing industries, non-producing export-trading companies, and industries and service companies that export their services to persons domiciled abroad or supply companies already in the Regime, but the classification does not name a technology, data, or telecommunications sector.

Article 20 grants qualifying enterprises a ten-year exemption from income, capital and net-asset taxes and real-estate transfer tax, an exemption from sales and consumption tax on purchases of goods and services, an exemption from taxes on remittances abroad, and a ten-year exemption from municipal taxes and business licenses, while still requiring payment for municipal services actually used.

Article 15 requires the Ministry of Health to resolve a sanitary-permit application for installing or operating a beneficiary enterprise within twenty business days, with the application deemed approved if that period lapses without a ruling. The President signed the law in San Jose on 23 November 1990. Article 39 states it takes effect on its publication, without itself stating that publication date.

Source: Full text of law