Advance tax due dates for FY 2026-27

Advance tax is the income tax you pay during the year, instead of leaving the whole bill for the return. It is the same tax. The dates are how it is collected.

For income earned from 1 April 2026 to 31 March 2027, the law calls the year tax year 2026-27. People still say FY 2026-27. They are the same twelve months. This is the first year of advance tax under the Income-tax Act, 2025. The instalments for FY 2025-26 were still under the Income-tax Act, 1961.

The income tax calculator gives the year’s tax under section 202. The split below is that tax, minus what has already been deducted, divided by the dates in section 408.

Who has to pay

Section 404 (this was Section 208) says advance tax is payable when the tax due for the year, worked out under the advance-tax rules, is ₹10,000 or more.

Tax already deducted at source counts. If your employer withholds the full tax on your salary, and you have no other income, the amount left can be zero. You do not pay an instalment in June just because the salary bill is large.

Interest on a fixed deposit, rent, a professional receipt, or a capital gain can leave tax that nobody has deducted. If that leftover is ₹10,000 or more, the instalments start. If it is ₹9,999 or less, they do not.

Section 403 (this was Section 207) is the duty to pay during the year. Section 403(3) takes one group out of it.

The four dates

Section 408 (this was Section 211) sets four dates for everyone except the presumptive rows below. The percentage is of the year’s advance tax, and it is cumulative. By September you should have paid 45% in all, not another 45% on top of June.

Table: Cumulative advance tax for tax year 2026-27

Anything paid by 31 March still counts as advance tax for that year. A Sunday or a bank holiday does not move the date in the Act. Pay on the previous working day if the portal or the bank will not take it on the 15th.

Section 516 (this was Sections 288A and 288B) rounds an amount you pay to the nearest ₹10. This page rounds an instalment up to the next ₹10 when that is what keeps it from falling under the percentage.

Resident senior citizens

A resident individual who is 60 or older at any time during the tax year, and who has no income chargeable under the head “Profits and gains of business or profession”, does not have to pay advance tax. The department’s senior-citizen FAQ states that relief under section 403. The age in the Act’s definition of a senior citizen is the same 60.

Pension, interest and rent are not business income. A retired person living on those can still owe tax, and pays it with the return rather than on 15 June. Business or professional income drops the exemption, and the ordinary dates apply.

The person has to be resident. A senior who is not resident in India for the tax year does not get Section 403(3), even with no business income.

Presumptive income, one date

Section 408(2) gives a different calendar to anyone who declares profit under Section 58(2), table serial number 1 or Section 58(2), table serial number 3. Those rows are the scheme people knew as Section 44AD and Section 44ADA. The whole advance tax is due on or before 15 March. There is no 15% in June.

Row 1 deems profit at 6% of turnover received by bank or other online mode, and 8% of the rest, if the actual profit is not higher. The turnover ceiling is ₹2,00,00,000. It rises to ₹3,00,00,000 when cash receipts are not more than 5% of turnover.

Row 3 deems profit at 50% of gross receipts of a specified profession, if the actual profit is not higher. The ceiling is ₹50,00,000, or ₹75,00,000 when cash is within 5%.

The goods-carriage computation, which was Section 44AE, is a different row of section 58. Section 408(2) does not put that row on the single March date.

Take a resident shop with turnover of ₹2,00,00,000 and no other income, in the new regime, with no salary. If every rupee arrives in cash, the deemed profit at 8% is ₹16,00,000. The income tax calculator, with the salaried box off, puts the year’s tax at ₹1,24,800. That is above ₹10,000, so the whole ₹1,24,800 is the 15 March instalment. Nothing is due in June for being on this scheme.

If the same ₹2,00,00,000 arrives by bank transfer, the deemed profit at 6% is ₹12,00,000. On the same calculator the tax is ₹0, because the income sits on the section 156 rebate line. Advance tax on that figure alone is nil. The 6% and the 8% are why two shops with the same sales can face different March challans.

A salary, some FD interest, and rent

Here is one resident, under 60, in the new regime, for tax year 2026-27.

Salary ₹18,00,000. The employer withholds the tax on that salary and nothing else. On the calculator, with the salaried box on, the bill is ₹1,50,800. Taxable income after the standard deduction of ₹75,000 is ₹17,25,000. Slab tax is ₹1,45,000. Cess at 4% is ₹5,800.

Two more incomes arrive, and the employer does not see them. A bank credits FD interest of ₹1,20,000. That is above the ₹50,000 line in Section 393 for a person under 60, so the bank deducts 10%, which is ₹12,000. Rent of ₹2,40,000 is received with no tax deducted.

Gross income is now ₹21,60,000. The same calculator, still salaried, gives tax of ₹2,30,100. Taxable income is ₹20,85,000. The extra slice crosses into the 25% band of section 202. Slab tax is ₹2,21,250 and cess is ₹8,850.

The employer has already covered ₹1,50,800. The bank has covered ₹12,000. The tax still to pay is ₹67,300. That is above ₹10,000, so this is advance tax.

The four cumulative amounts, rounded up to the next ₹10 so each one stays at or above the percentage:

Table: Instalments on the ₹67,300 still to pay

June’s ₹10,100 is 15% of ₹67,300, lifted from ₹10,095 to the next ₹10. September’s ₹30,290 includes June. You do not add the columns. By 15 March the ₹67,300 should have been paid in all. If a bonus changes the salary, recompute. The employer’s TDS should move with the salary. Your instalments move with whatever is still uncovered.

How to pay

Use e-Pay Tax on the e-filing portal. The department’s steps are: open the portal, choose e-Pay Tax, confirm PAN with the OTP sent to your mobile, and check the name that comes back.

For tax year 2026-27, select the Income-tax Act, 2025. The challan is ITNS 280N. Choose income tax (major head 0021 for a person who is not a company). The type of payment is minor head 100, Advance Tax. The period is tax year 2026-27. CBDT’s transition note says a payment for this year’s income should be tagged to the tax year, so the credit does not land on the old assessment year.

Type the tax. In this example there is no surcharge, so the ₹10,100 June figure is the amount of tax. Keep the receipt for the return.

A payment for FY 2025-26 is still the 1961 Act. Use ITNS 280 and assessment year 2026-27. The PAN on the challan has to be yours.

Interest when a date is missed

Two sections deal with a shortfall in tax year 2026-27. The rates match the old Act. The numbers changed.

Section 425 (this was Section 234C) looks at each date. If what you have paid by 15 June is under 15% of the tax due on the income you finally return, interest is 3% of that shortfall. September and December are the same 3% on the shortfall from 45% and 75%. March is 1% of the shortfall from the full amount, which is one month at 1%.

There is a small margin on the first two dates. Section 425(2) says you owe no June interest if you have paid 12% or more by 15 June, and no September interest if you have paid 36% or more by 15 September. On this example, 12% is ₹8,076. A challan of ₹8,080 sits on a multiple of ₹10 and still clears that line. It does not clear the 15% instalment. It only switches off the June interest.

If this person pays nothing by 15 June, the shortfall is the June instalment of ₹10,100. Interest at 3% is ₹300 after Section 516. Paying the September amount later does not cancel that ₹300.

Section 424 (this was Section 234B) is the year-end test. It applies if you were liable under Section 404 and you paid no advance tax, or less than 90% of the assessed tax. Interest is 1% for every month or part of a month from 1 April after the tax year. Assessed tax is the year’s tax minus TDS and the reliefs the section lists. On this example the ₹67,300 is already after TDS, and 90% of it is ₹60,570. Pay ₹67,300 by 15 March and this section does not start. Leave the ₹67,300 unpaid on 1 April 2027 and one month’s interest is ₹670.

FY 2025-26 is the other Act. CBDT’s FAQ says a shortfall for that year still draws interest under Sections 234B and 234C, even when the interest is worked out after 1 April 2026. Do not put section 424 on a challan that belongs to assessment year 2026-27.

Salary, plus income the employer never saw

Salary TDS does not know about the FD, the rent, or a share sale. FD interest above ₹50,000 (₹1,00,000 if you are 60 or older and the bank has your PAN) is deducted at 10% under Section 393. That is often less than the slab. In the example the bank took ₹12,000 and the rest sat in the instalments. Rent with no deduction puts the tax on that rent into the same instalments.

A capital gain gets a later catch-up. Section 425(4) skips interest on an earlier shortfall that came from underestimating capital gains, winnings of the kind in section 2(49)(n), business or professional income that arose for the first time, or dividends, if you pay the tax on that income in a remaining instalment or by 31 March. A gain in January does not create June interest once that tax is paid by 31 March. A gain you could see in May does not get the same quiet treatment. Estimate it on the capital gains calculator and pay it on the next date still open. The Act tests the return, not the June guess. A low June estimate corrected in September can still cost the June interest, unless you had cleared the 12% margin or the income is one of those late items.

The return for tax year 2026-27 is where these challans are claimed. The filing guide is about the previous year, FY 2025-26, which still uses the old section numbers. Keep the two years apart when you type a BSR code.

Figures were checked on 29 October 2026 against section 403, section 404, section 408, section 424, section 425 and section 58 of the Income-tax Act, 2025, CBDT’s transition FAQs, the department’s senior-citizen FAQ, and the e-filing challan steps. The rupee bills use this site’s tax engine for section 202 and the 4% cess. A later Finance Act can change a slab. The dates on this page move only if the Act moves them.