Gift Tax Calculator

For 2026, the per-recipient annual gift tax exclusion is $19,000. The exclusion is per donor, per recipient, per calendar year, so a single donor can give $19,000 to as many separate people as they like in one year with no gift tax consequence and no Form 709 to file. Married couples who split gifts can together give $38,000 per recipient. The exclusion does not roll over: any unused amount disappears on December 31 and does not bank for next year, which is why year-end gifting is so common.

The lifetime gift tax exemption and the federal estate tax exemption are a single unified credit under IRC Section 2010, set at $15 million per individual for 2026. Every dollar of taxable gift you make during your lifetime (gifts above the annual exclusion) reduces the exemption available to your estate at death. So a couple who together give away $5 million in taxable lifetime gifts leaves $25 million of combined exemption ($30M minus $5M) to shield assets from the 40% federal estate tax when the second spouse dies.

Gift splitting lets consenting spouses treat eligible gifts to a third party as made one-half by each spouse. The election has detailed marriage, citizenship or residency, consent, remarriage, and filing rules and generally applies to eligible gifts made during the calendar year. It does not simply require that the couple was married for every day of the year. Form 709 filing is commonly required to make the election.

You must file Form 709 (United States Gift and Generation-Skipping Transfer Tax Return) whenever you give more than the annual exclusion ($19,000 for 2026) to any single recipient in a calendar year. Filing is required even if no tax is owed, because the IRS uses the form to track lifetime exemption usage. Other triggers: any gift to a non-citizen spouse above the $194,000 special exclusion for 2026, any gift of a future interest regardless of amount, and any couple that elects gift splitting. The form is due April 15 of the following year and is filed separately from your Form 1040. An extension on your 1040 also extends Form 709, but it does not extend the time to pay any tax owed.

Almost no state taxes gifts directly. Connecticut is currently the only US state with a standalone gift tax, with rates of 11.6% to 12% on transfers above the state's $15 million exemption for 2026, matching the federal lifetime exemption. Every other state repealed or never enacted a gift tax, so federal Form 709 is the only filing most donors face. Several states do still tax estates, often with thresholds far below the federal $15 million, so very large gifts can shrink the estate enough to reduce state estate tax later. The flip side: lifetime gifts in Connecticut consume both the federal and state exemption, so big in-state gifts can trigger state tax that federal gifts in other states would not.