As of 2012-02-01, the annual Membership fee for an organization is shown by a fee table. To summarize the changes from the 1 January 2010 fees:

• Introduced a "startup level" for small organizations (limited to two years). Effective 1 January 2012 retroactively.

Determination of Currency

Each organization pays Membership fees in one of three currencies, depending on the country where its headquarters are located. W3C uses multiple currencies to offset some of the vagaries of currency exchange rates, which vary more often than W3C changes its fees. This means more predictability for Members (when establishing their budgets) and more predictability for the W3C staff -- almost all of the Member fees that are received in a given currency are also spent by the W3C staff in that same currency.

US Dollars, Euros, and Japanese Yen were chosen as the three currencies in light of the locations of the three W3C Host institutions: MIT, ERCIM, and Keio University.

The currency for a given country is determined as follows:

• In Europe, the Middle East, and Africa: EUR
• Japan and Korea: JPY
• All other countries: USD

Determination of Fee

Membership fees vary depending on certain characteristics of the organization.

• Nature of activity
  • For-profit
  • All other organizations, including not-profit organizations and government agencies.
• Annual gross revenue
• Country of headquarters

Regional Fee Adjustments

The country of headquarters influences affects the currency of payment, but also whether a lower fee level is available. To promote diverse Membership, W3C offers lower Membership fees for organizations in some countries, based on a World Bank classification of country income. This resource defines four categories of countries: high income countries (HIC); upper middle income (UMC), lower middle income (LMC), and low income (LIC). The World Bank revises their categorization each year on 1 July. The changes take effect in W3C fee calculations on the following 1 January.

Any country classification changes will affect the annual membership fee for an organization in the fourth and subsequent years of membership.

Startup Level

We now offer lower fees to enable small companies such as "startups" to participate in W3C. The fee level is available to organizations:

• That are enterprises or non-profits with annual gross revenues of 2.25M EUR / 3M USD / 250M JPY. Note: "Projects" (e.g., EU-funded projects and other Membership-based organizations) are not eligible for this fee level.
• That have 10 or fewer employees.
• That have never been a W3C Member.

This fee level is only available for the first 2 consecutive years of Membership. During the first year of Membership, if an organization changes to either an Affiliate or Full Membership level, W3C will give them a discount on the new fee (1/12 per month remaining on their current contract).

Starting 1 October 2014, organizations that:

• have completed two years at this fee level, and
• would still qualify for this fee level in terms of their revenues and employees

may extend their Membership for a third year at a rate of 60% of the then-current next higher fee level.

Members at this fee level are treated as non-Members for the purposes of W3C Business Group Fees.

Note: Due to regional fee adjustments, in some cases an organization is eligible to join at a lower fee level than the startup level. When that is the case, we do not show the startup level in the online fee table.