US Expatriation (Exit) Tax Calculator

About the US Expatriation (Exit) Tax Calculator

Work out whether giving up US citizenship, or ending a long-term green card, makes you a covered expatriate and what the exit tax of section 877A would add to your tax for the year. You are covered if any one of three tests is met: an average annual net income tax of more than $211,000 for the five tax years before you expatriate, a net worth of $2,000,000 or more, or not being able to certify five years of tax compliance on Form 8854 (IRS: Expatriation tax; Rev. Proc. 2025-32, section 4.37).

A covered expatriate is taxed as if everything they own were sold on the day before the expatriation date. The net gain is reduced by the exclusion of $910,000 for 2026, shared among the gains in proportion to their size; retirement accounts such as IRAs count as paid out in full, with no early-withdrawal penalty. Enter your status and date, your tax for each of the five years, what you own with what it cost, and your other income for the year. Nothing you type leaves your browser.

Without a pass the free preview shows whether the exit tax applies, in full; a Pro pass opens every figure: each test with your figure, the deemed sale asset by asset with its share of the exclusion, the working and the tax it adds, the CSV and printing.

The three tests

You are a covered expatriate if any of these is true (Form 8854 instructions):

• Tax liability test: your average annual net income tax for the five tax years ending before your expatriation date is more than $211,000 for an expatriation in 2026 (Rev. Proc. 2025-32, section 4.37). Form 8854 counts each year's total tax less any foreign tax credit; on the 2024 return that is Form 1040 line 24 less Schedule 3 line 1.
• Net worth test: your net worth is $2,000,000 or more on your expatriation date. Everything you own counts, at its fair market value, including retirement accounts, deferred compensation and interests in trusts, less your debts. This amount is not adjusted for inflation.
• Certification test: you do not certify on Form 8854 that you complied with all federal tax obligations for the five tax years before. Being behind on returns makes you covered even with little income or wealth.

Long-term residents

A green card holder is reached only as a long-term resident: a lawful permanent resident in at least 8 of the 15 tax years ending with the year the residency ends. A year in which a tax treaty treated you as a resident of another country, and you did not waive the treaty's benefits, does not count (Form 8854 instructions). Residency can also end when you start to be treated as a resident of another country under a treaty and tell the IRS on Forms 8833 and 8854 (IRS: Expatriation tax).

Exceptions for dual citizens and minors

Two groups escape the tax liability and net worth tests, but never the certification test (26 U.S.C. § 877A(g)(1)(B)):

• Dual citizens from birth who are still citizens of, and taxed as residents of, the other country on the expatriation date, and were US residents for no more than 10 years in the 15 tax years ending with the year of expatriation.
• People who relinquish citizenship before age 18½, with no more than 10 tax years of US residence before.

Residence here is counted with the substantial presence test described in chapter 1 of Publication 519 (days present in the United States).

The deemed sale and the exclusion

Everything a covered expatriate owns is treated as sold for its fair market value on the day before the expatriation date. Each asset's gain or loss is its value less its adjusted basis; the gains are reduced by the exclusion ($910,000 for 2026, Rev. Proc. 2025-32, section 4.38), shared among the gain assets in proportion to their gains and never more than an asset's own gain, and losses count as they normally would, without the wash-sale rule (Notice 2009-85, section 3; Form 8854 instructions). A loss on your home or other personal-use property does not count.

For property you held when you first became a US resident, the basis is at least its value on that day, unless you make the irrevocable section 877A(h)(2) election, property by property, not to use that rule. Notice 2009-85 (section 3.D) leaves US real estate and, with a treaty exception, property used in a US trade or business out of this rule: their basis is generally what they cost you. Each gain keeps its character on the return: shares and a home on Form 8949, depreciated rental property on Form 4797.

Retirement accounts, deferred compensation and trusts

• Specified tax-deferred accounts — IRAs (not SEP or SIMPLE plans), 529 and ABLE plans, Coverdell accounts, HSAs and Archer MSAs — count as paid out in full on the day before the expatriation date, taxed as a normal withdrawal but without any early-distribution tax (Form 8854 instructions; Notice 2009-85, section 6, which predates ABLE accounts).
• Eligible deferred compensation (a US payer, Form W-8CE given by the day before the first payment or 30 days after you expatriate, whichever comes first, treaty benefits waived) is not taxed now: each later payment is withheld at 30%, which no treaty can reduce (Notice 2009-85, sections 5 and 8). An ineligible item counts as received now at the present value of the accrued benefit (for a defined contribution plan, the account balance).
• Distributions from a nongrantor trust are withheld at 30% when paid.

How the tax is estimated

The year you expatriate is a dual-status year: you cannot take the standard deduction (you can itemize), cannot file jointly or as head of household, and a married person uses the married-filing-separately rates (Publication 519, chapter 6). The calculator works out your 2026 federal income tax with and without the deemed sale and the accounts, at the regular rates and the 0%, 15% and 20% capital gain rates, and shows the difference. The 3.8% net investment income tax applies only to the part of the year you were a US citizen or resident, with no cut in its threshold (Form 8960 instructions); those instructions do not mention the deemed sale, so it is added only when you leave its box ticked.

Official sources

• IRS: Expatriation tax
• IRS: Instructions for Form 8854, Initial and Annual Expatriation Statement
• IRS Rev. Proc. 2025-32: inflation-adjusted amounts for tax year 2026 (sections 4.37, 4.38, 4.42 and 4.47)
• IRS Notice 2009-85, guidance for expatriates under section 877A (Internal Revenue Bulletin 2009-45)
• IRS Publication 519, U.S. Tax Guide for Aliens (dual-status tax year, expatriation tax)
• IRS: Instructions for Form 8960, Net Investment Income Tax (dual-status individuals)
• 26 U.S.C. § 877A, tax responsibilities of expatriation (Legal Information Institute)

Limitations

• For an expatriation date in 2026 (from January 2), with the 2026 amounts and rate tables; another year has other thresholds and exclusion amounts (the Form 8854 instructions list them).
• An estimate of the federal income tax only: the alternative minimum tax, credits, the qualified business income deduction, state taxes and the tax of the country you move to are not worked out, and all other income is taxed at the regular rates.
• Values and bases are what you enter: Form 8854 accepts good-faith estimates of fair market value and basis, without formal appraisals. The value of interests in a business, a partnership or a trust is yours to work out.
• Only the section 877A exclusion is applied, not the home-sale exclusion of section 121 or a treaty rule: ask an adviser whether either changes the tax on your home or another asset.
• Not tax or legal advice. The exit tax is final once you expatriate: have a tax professional check your figures before you renounce or give up your green card.

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