Texas State Income Tax Filing
No individual income tax
Individual income tax
None — no state return, no state withholding
Wage withholding
Federal only
Business tax
Franchise tax applies at entity level, not to you personally
Where revenue comes from
Property tax and sales tax rather than income tax
Texas income tax at a glance
Texas levies no individual income tax, so there is no annual state return for you to file and no state withholding on your paycheck. That is genuinely the whole answer to the headline question, and it is why Texas absorbs so much relocation from California, New York and New Jersey. The parts that actually need attention are elsewhere. Your federal obligation is unchanged and unaffected. If you moved to Texas partway through the year, the state you left still wants a part-year return covering the period before the move, and states with aggressive residency rules do not simply accept a Texas address as proof you left. If you run a business through an entity, Texas levies a franchise tax at entity level rather than on you personally. And the revenue has to come from somewhere — Texas leans heavily on property and sales tax, which is why the total burden is lower than California but not zero.
What to watch out for in Texas
- The absence of state income tax does not reduce your federal tax. Federal brackets, the standard deduction and every federal credit apply exactly as they would anywhere else.
- It does remove the state and local income tax deduction from your federal itemised deductions, which for some filers makes the standard deduction the better federal choice where itemising previously won.
- The year you move to Texas is a part-year return in your former state, not a clean break. States you leave — California and New York in particular — apply their own residency tests and can continue to treat you as a resident if your connections there persist.
- Income earned from sources in another state can still be taxable by that state even while you live in Texas. Rental property, a business operating elsewhere, or days physically worked in another state are the usual triggers.
Forms and deadlines
- Which form
- No individual state income tax return
- Deadline
- Not applicable — there is no individual return to file.
- State authority
- Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts
Federal deadlines are separate from state ones. Our US tax deadlines page covers the federal calendar, and the federal tax brackets apply on top of whatever Texas charges.
Where these figures come from
Rates, bracket floors, standard deductions and exemptions are taken from the compilation below, stated as of January 1, 2026 and built from state statutes, forms and instructions. The state authority is always the final word on your own position.
Reviewed by Teja K, CPA · last reviewed . General information, not tax advice for your situation. State tax law changes frequently — confirm before acting.
Texas tax questions
Does Texas have a state income tax?
No. Texas is one of the states that levies no broad-based individual income tax on wages or salaries, so there is no state income tax return to file and nothing withheld from your pay for the state. The Texas constitution makes introducing one difficult, so this is a stable position rather than a current policy setting.
I moved to Texas mid-year. What do I file?
Your federal return as normal, plus a part-year resident return in the state you moved from covering the portion of the year you lived there. There is no Texas return. The work is in allocating income to the pre-move period correctly and, where your former state is one that scrutinises departures, in being able to show that residency genuinely ended when you say it did.
Do I still pay federal tax living in Texas?
Yes, in full. Federal income tax, Social Security and Medicare are unaffected by which state you live in. The saving from a no-income-tax state is limited to the state layer, and part of it is offset federally because you no longer have state income tax to include in itemised deductions.
Is Texas actually cheaper on tax overall?
For wage earners it usually is, but by less than the headline suggests. Texas funds itself through property tax and sales tax, and Texas property tax rates are among the higher ones in the country. For a renter on a good salary the saving is substantial; for a homeowner with a large property, considerably less of it survives.
What is the Texas franchise tax and does it apply to me?
It is a tax on entities doing business in Texas — LLCs, corporations and similar — calculated on margin rather than on personal income. Sole proprietors and general partnerships of natural persons are generally outside it. There is a revenue threshold below which no tax is due, though a report may still be required. If you operate through an entity, this is the Texas filing to be aware of, and the Comptroller is the authority on your specific position.
We file Texas returns alongside your federal
No Texas return — but your federal one still needs filing
Federal returns from $19.99, state returns from $29.99. Multi-state and part-year situations are what we do most of, so bring us the complicated year.