Your first year in Ireland is the most complicated one for tax.
Moving in the middle of the year means two countries, different periods and special rules for the year of arrival. We explain how Ireland treats this year of transition.
The problem of the first year
Irish residence depends on days, not months. If you spend 183 days in the country in a tax year, you are resident, and resident for the whole year. The Irish tax year is the calendar year. The details of the day rules are on the page Ordinary residence.
In the year of arrival this creates an awkward position. If you move to Ireland in March, you are resident for the whole year, including January and February, when you were still working in the UK, the Netherlands or Sweden. Without a special rule, Ireland would reach that salary, which has already been taxed in your old country of residence.
What split year treatment does
The special rule is called split year treatment and is found in section 822 of the Taxes Consolidation Act 1997. It divides the year of arrival in two: for the time before you arrive you count as non-resident, for the time after as resident. When you leave, it works the other way round.
The double advantage is why the rule matters at all. Employment income from the time before your arrival stays out of the Irish tax base, yet you are still entitled to the tax credits and the full rate band of the year. So you get a whole year’s relief on the income of part of a year.
What it does not do
This is where most accounts go too far. Split year treatment applies only to income from employment. Nothing else.
Interest, dividends, rents, capital gains, distributions: none of these is touched by the split year. For this income you are resident in the year of arrival, and resident from January. If you move in the autumn and sold a shareholding in the spring of the same year, you can end up with an Irish tax question even though you were not yet in Ireland at the time.
Two further limits are stated expressly in Revenue’s manual. If, during the time you count as non-resident, you work in Ireland, an Irish tax liability still arises for those days. And holiday visits to Ireland do no harm; working days in Ireland do.
The new procedure since 2026
Until recently, split year treatment was a matter for the year itself: under the Finance Act 1994 you applied during the year itself to an authorised officer. If you missed it, you had a problem that was hard to put right afterwards.
The Finance Act 2024 changed that. Under the Finance Act 2024 you now claim it yourself, in the return for the year of arrival. The new rule has applied since 1 January 2026 and covers for the first time people who arrived or left from 1 January 2025. If you moved to Ireland during 2025, you therefore claim the split in the return for 2025, which you file in 2026.
| Year | Condition |
|---|---|
| Year before arrival | not resident in Ireland |
| Year of arrival | resident in Ireland |
| Following year | resident in Ireland |
The test is applied looking back, in the year after arrival, using the statutory day rules. When you leave, the condition applies the other way round: no longer resident in the following year, and the departure must not be merely temporary. An application to Revenue during the year is still needed if the effect is to apply within the year, for instance for a PAYE exclusion order.
Source: Revenue, Tax and Duty Manual Part 34-00-11 “Split year residence” (as of September 2025), section 5; s. 822 TCA 1997. As of: retrieved 24 August 2026.
Electing to be resident
There is a second lever in the year of arrival, mentioned less often and working in a different direction. If you do not reach the day limits in your year of arrival, you can elect in writing to Revenue to be resident, provided you will be resident the following year.
If you do not reach the day count in your year of arrival, you can elect in writing to Revenue to be treated as resident, provided you will be resident the following year. The usual reason is the full tax credits. What matters is the other side, stated expressly in Revenue’s manual: this election cannot be withdrawn. It is therefore not a formality but a decision that has to fit the rest of the plan, especially if gains still arise in your old country of residence in the same year.
| Rule | Effect |
|---|---|
| 183 days in a tax year | resident in that year |
| 280 days over two consecutive years | resident in the second year, provided more than 30 days in each year |
| Election to be resident | on written application, irrevocable |
The residence of spouses and civil partners is assessed separately for each.
Source: Citizens Information, “Tax residence and domicile in Ireland” (as of 15 December 2025), based on the Revenue rules; s. 819 TCA 1997. As of: retrieved 23 August 2026, rechecked 23 October 2026.
An order for your move
From this page follows a simple order that turns the date of your move into a tax variable.
First: everything that is not employment income belongs before the start of the year of arrival, or deliberately after it. A sale of shares in January and a move in September fall into the same Irish tax year.
Second: putting your accounts in order, as on the page The account before 1 January, follows the same date. Both rules hang on the first day of the year in which you become resident. Registering with Revenue and the return for the year of arrival itself are covered by the tax registration.
Third: the question of what the UK still taxes when you leave is not answered from the Irish side. The UK has a split year of its own under the statutory residence test, with its own cases and conditions, and its rules on temporary non-residence reach back to anyone who returns within 5 years. The UK side is set out in Expert knowledge.
More in Tax
The first step is a conversation
When you move is a tax decision. We work it through with you before the date is set.