Should You Skip Filing a Tax Return? Minimum Income to File and What Skipping Costs You in 2026

For tax year 2025 — the return most people filed by April 2026 — you were required to file if your gross income was at least $15,750 as a single filer under 65, or $31,500 married filing jointly with both spouses under 65. Below that, the IRS generally doesn’t require you to file based on income alone.

But “not required” and “shouldn’t bother” are two different things, and I get this question every filing season: if my income is low, or the IRS is stretched thin, can I just skip it?

The short answer is almost always no. Skipping a return you’re required to file risks steep penalties and indefinite collection exposure. And even when you’re not required to file, skipping one can quietly cost you thousands in refundable credits you’d otherwise get paid for free.

Minimum Income to File: 2025 and 2026 Thresholds

These are IRS gross-income filing thresholds from Publication 501. Gross income means money, goods, property, and services that aren’t tax-exempt — including income earned outside the U.S.

Tax year 2025 (returns filed in 2026) — official IRS Table 1:

Tax year 2026 (returns filed in 2027) — projected from the IRS’s already-released standard deduction figures (Revenue Procedure 2025-32):

The IRS typically doesn’t publish the official Table 1 filing-requirement chart for a tax year until early in the following year, so the 2026 row is a reasonable projection based on the standard deduction the IRS has already locked in — not yet an official Table 1 figure. I’ll update this table when the official version is released.

Why the Income Threshold Isn’t the Whole Story

A few situations require you to file even if your income is below the table above:

• Self-employment: If you had $400 or more in net self-employment earnings — freelance work, gig income, a side business — you must file regardless of your total income.
• Married filing separately, spouses living apart: If you didn’t live with your spouse at year-end and your gross income was at least $5, you must file, regardless of age.
• Advance Premium Tax Credit payments: If the marketplace paid health insurance subsidies on your behalf during the year, you need to file to reconcile them.
• Unreported tip income or certain Schedule 2 taxes: These can trigger a filing requirement independent of the income thresholds.

Your filing status is determined by your situation on December 31 of the tax year — if you got married mid-year, you file as married for that full year, not single.

Credits You Lose By Not Filing

This is the part people miss. Filing isn’t only about what you owe — for a lot of households, it’s how you get paid. These credits are only available if you file a return, even with zero tax liability:

• Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC): Worth up to $8,046 for 2025 (three or more qualifying children) and up to $8,231 for 2026. It’s fully refundable — the IRS pays it even if you owe no tax at all. See our EITC income limits and qualification guide for the full income table by number of children.
• Child Tax Credit: Up to $2,200 per qualifying child, with a refundable portion available regardless of tax owed. Full rules in our Child Tax Credit and Kiddie Tax guide.
• Withheld tax refunds: If you had any W-2 withholding during the year, that money is only returned to you by filing — the IRS doesn’t refund it automatically.
• Education credits: The American Opportunity and Lifetime Learning credits both require a filed return to claim.

Skipping a return under the income threshold doesn’t just leave you neutral — for many working families with kids, it means walking away from money the IRS is already sitting on.

Penalties for Not Filing

If you are required to file and don’t, the penalties stack up fast:

• Failure-to-File Penalty: 5% of unpaid tax for each month (or part of a month) your return is late, capped at 25%.
• Failure-to-Pay Penalty: 0.5% of unpaid tax per month, also capped at 25% — but this applies separately from the failure-to-file penalty.
• Interest: Charged on unpaid tax and compounds daily until paid in full, on top of both penalties above.

The failure-to-file penalty being ten times steeper than failure-to-pay is intentional — the IRS wants your return even if you can’t pay the bill yet. File on time, then work out payment separately.

Wage Garnishments, Liens, and Bank Levies Are Real

Skipping a return doesn’t mean the IRS forgets. Even with a leaner workforce, most collection tools are largely automated and don’t require a live audit to trigger:

• Wage garnishments — the IRS can take a portion of your paycheck until the debt is settled
• Bank levies — funds in your account can be frozen and seized
• Property liens — a lien on your home, car, or other assets that complicates selling or refinancing

The IRS also uses automated third-party matching — comparing W-2s, 1099s, and other information returns against filed tax returns — to flag missing filings without needing a human to open a case.

The Collection Clock Never Starts If You Never File

One of the most persistent myths about skipping a return is that the IRS eventually gives up. The IRS generally has 10 years to collect an assessed tax debt (the Collection Statute Expiration Date, or CSED) — but that clock only starts once a return is filed or the IRS assesses the tax on your behalf.

If you never file, there’s no CSED running. The IRS can come after you at any point in the future, with penalties and interest compounding the entire time.

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Two Worked Examples

Example 1 — Priya, single, $22,000 in wages, one child. Priya’s income is above the $15,750 single threshold, so she’s required to file. She’s also eligible for a meaningful EITC and the Child Tax Credit. If she skips filing thinking her income is “too low to matter,” she loses both the refund from her withholding and a credit that could be worth several thousand dollars — plus she’s now exposed to the failure-to-file penalty on any balance due.

Example 2 — Marcus, self-employed graphic designer, $9,000 in net freelance income. Marcus is well under the $15,750 single filing threshold, but self-employment income has its own $400 trigger — he’s required to file and pay self-employment tax regardless of his total income being low.

Common Issues to Watch Out For

I get versions of this question every year, and the same misunderstandings come up:

• Assuming low or no income means no need to file. It often means the opposite — that’s exactly when refundable credits are most valuable, and skipping the return skips the payment.
• Confusing the failure-to-file and failure-to-pay penalties. They’re not the same size. If you can’t pay, file anyway — the penalty for not filing is far worse.
• Self-employed filers ignoring the $400 threshold. Side income and gig work can trigger a filing requirement well below the standard thresholds.
• Thinking an old unfiled year eventually disappears. It doesn’t — the 10-year collection clock never starts without a filed return.
• Waiting past 3 years to claim a refund. After that window, the money legally becomes the Treasury’s, not yours.

Looking Ahead: 2027 Filing Thresholds

The IRS typically releases the following year’s inflation adjustments — including the standard deduction that the filing thresholds are built from — in October or November. I’d expect modest increases of roughly 2-3% over the 2026 figures above, consistent with recent inflation trends, with the official numbers landing in the IRS’s fall 2026 Revenue Procedure.

The bigger question for 2027 is enforcement capacity: if IRS staffing stays reduced, expect more reliance on automated income matching to catch non-filers rather than traditional audits — meaning skipping a required return remains risky even with a smaller IRS workforce. I’ll update this page as the 2027 figures and enforcement posture become clear. Related reading:

• Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) income limits and qualification rules
• Child Tax Credit (CTC) and Kiddie Tax thresholds
• Best online tax filing software and free filing options