Last updated on สิงหาคม 1, 2026
What changed: Nothing yet, and that is the point. The rules that govern money you bring into Thailand in 2026 are the ones in force since 1 January 2024. The widely discussed relaxation, which would exempt foreign income remitted in the year it is earned or the year after, remains a draft. It has not been published in the Royal Gazette.
Effective: The current regime applies to remittances made from 1 January 2024 onward, including the 2026 tax year (filed January to March 2027). No expiry date. The draft exemption has no effective date because it is not law.
Who it affects: Anyone who spends 180 days or more in Thailand in a calendar year and brings foreign income into the country. Retirees drawing pensions, remote workers paid offshore, investors remitting gains, and property buyers funding a purchase from abroad.
What to do now: Plan your 2026 remittances against the law as it stands, not the law as it is discussed. Separate pre-2024 capital from post-2024 income in your records before you transfer. Do not delay a remittance waiting for an exemption that has no enactment date.
ตรวจสอบครั้งล่าสุด: 1 August 2026, against Revenue Department Departmental Instructions Por. 161/2566 and Por. 162/2566, Section 41 of the Revenue Code, and a negative check of the Royal Gazette for any exempting royal decree or ministerial regulation.
The rule that governs your 2026 transfers
Thailand taxes foreign-sourced income on a remittance basis. Two conditions must both be met before the Revenue Department can tax money you bring in. You must be a Thai tax resident in the year the income arises, and the money must enter Thailand. Miss either condition and the charge does not arise.
Section 41 of the Revenue Code sets the residence test at 180 วันขึ้นไปในหนึ่งปีปฏิทิน. The count is cumulative, not continuous. Twelve separate trips of sixteen days each will make you resident just as surely as one long stay. If you are working out where you stand across several countries, our guide to ภาษีเงินได้บุคคลธรรมดาในประเทศไทย sets out how the threshold interacts with treaty tie-breakers.
What Por. 161/2566 changed
Before September 2023, a well-known planning technique existed. Foreign income brought into Thailand in a later calendar year than the year it was earned escaped Thai tax entirely. Earn in 2022, remit in 2023, pay nothing. Practitioners called it the deferral rule, and it was the backbone of most expat tax planning in Thailand.
Departmental Instruction หมายเลข 161/2566 ended it. The Revenue Department reinterpreted Section 41 so that foreign income earned by a Thai tax resident becomes assessable whenever it is remitted, regardless of which year it arrives. The timing gap closed. The instruction applies to remittances from 1 January 2024.
One point is routinely misunderstood. A departmental instruction is not a new tax. It is the Revenue Department stating how it reads existing statute. The charging provision is still Section 41. That distinction matters if you ever need to argue your position, because the department’s reading binds its own officers but does not bind a court.
What Por. 162/2566 protects
A second instruction, หมายเลข 162/2566, carved out a significant protection. Income earned ก่อน 1 January 2024 falls outside the new interpretation. Remit it whenever you like and the reinterpretation does not reach it.
This makes the boundary between pre-2024 and post-2024 wealth the single most valuable line in your financial records. It is also the line most people cannot evidence when asked, because they never expected to be asked.
Por. 162/2566 protects pre-2024 income, but only if you can prove which money is which.
If pre-2024 savings and post-2024 earnings sit in one commingled account, you are asking an officer to accept your characterisation without documents. Statements dated 31 December 2023 are the cheapest insurance available, and they cost nothing to download today.
The exemption everyone is waiting for is not law
Since mid-2025 the Revenue Department has signalled a relaxation. The concept is straightforward. Foreign income remitted in the same calendar year it is earned, or in the year immediately following, would be exempt. Earn in 2026, remit in 2026 or 2027, pay nothing.
It is a genuine proposal from a real source. It is also, as at 1 August 2026, not law.
Thai tax instruments follow a fixed path. A draft must clear Cabinet, pass Council of State review, and then appear in the ราชกิจจานุเบกษา. Publication is what makes it binding, and publication has not happened. Until it does, nothing about your liability has changed.
Be careful with what you read elsewhere. A great deal of commentary describes this measure in the present tense, as though it already governs. It does not. Treat any article that fails to name the gazettal date with suspicion, because there is no gazettal date to name.
Announced, approved, in force: three different things
| เวที | What it means | Does it change your tax bill? |
|---|---|---|
| Announced or proposed | A department states an intention. Press reports follow. | เลขที่ |
| Cabinet approved | Government agrees to proceed. Drafting and Council of State review follow. | เลขที่ |
| Published in the Royal Gazette | The instrument becomes binding on its stated effective date. | ใช่ |
Before and after: what the 2024 shift actually did
| Situation | Until 31 Dec 2023 | From 1 Jan 2024 (current) |
|---|---|---|
| Income earned abroad in year 1, remitted in year 2, you are Thai tax resident in both | Not taxable | Taxable on remittance |
| Income earned abroad and remitted in the same year | Taxable | Taxable |
| Savings accumulated before 1 January 2024 | Not taxable | Not taxable (Por. 162/2566) |
| Income earned in a year you were in Thailand under 180 days | Not taxable | Not taxable |
| Money that never enters Thailand | Not taxable | Not taxable |
What this means in practice
Retirees
A pension remitted monthly is foreign income arriving in Thailand. Whether Thailand may actually tax it depends on the double tax agreement between Thailand and the country paying it. Several treaties assign taxing rights over government-service pensions exclusively to the paying state. Others do not. Read your specific treaty rather than a general summary, and factor the answer into the budget set out in our guide to the cost to retire in Thailand.
Remote workers
Income you earn while physically working in Thailand is Thai-sourced, and it is taxable whether or not it ever reaches a Thai bank. This catches people who assume an offshore employer and an offshore account keep them outside the system. It does not. If you are structuring a long stay around remote work, read this alongside our note on Destination Thailand Visa requirements, because immigration status and tax residence are decided separately and one does not determine the other.
Property buyers
Funds remitted to buy a condominium are frequently pre-2024 capital, which Por. 162/2566 protects. The difficulty is evidential, not legal. Thai banks issue a Foreign Exchange Transaction form on inbound transfers above the reporting threshold, and you need that form anyway to register foreign-quota ownership. Keep it filed with your dated pre-2024 statements. Our guide to moving money to Thailand from abroad covers the mechanics, and การซื้อคอนโดมิเนียมในประเทศไทย explains why the same paperwork does double duty at the Land Office.
Investors holding digital assets
Gains on digital assets follow their own rules and interact with the remittance question in ways that catch people out. See cryptocurrency tax in Thailand before you move exchange balances onshore.
Five steps to take before your next remittance
- Count your days honestly. Use entry and exit stamps, not memory. The 180-day line decides everything else.
- Download statements dated 31 December 2023 for every foreign account. This is the evidence that makes Por. 162/2566 usable.
- Stop commingling. Keep pre-2024 capital in accounts you do not pay new income into.
- Read your double tax agreement, not a summary of it. Relief is usually a credit, not an exemption, and you generally have to claim it.
- Register for a Thai tax ID if you are resident and remitting. See registering a tax ID number in Thailand. Filing without one is not possible, and the absence of one is not a defence.
Thai personal income tax runs on progressive rates to a top marginal rate of 35 percent, and returns for a calendar year are filed in the following January to March window. Deliberate non-declaration is a separate and more serious matter, as our page on tax evasion and money laundering in Thailand explains.
Related regulatory shifts
Two other changes are moving at the same time and affect many of the same people. Thailand’s visa exemption framework is being cut back, which changes how long you can stay without a visa and therefore how easily you cross the 180-day tax line. See our companion article on the 2026 visa rule changes. Separately, proposals to raise the foreign condominium quota continue to circulate without becoming law, covered in our piece on the ข้อจำกัดการถือครองหุ้นโดยชาวต่างชาติ that still apply.
คำถามที่พบบ่อย
Is the Thailand foreign income exemption in force in 2026?
No. As at 1 August 2026 the proposed exemption has not been published in the Royal Gazette, so it has no legal effect. The regime introduced by Por. 161/2566 and Por. 162/2566 continues to apply to the 2026 tax year. Plan on the current law and treat any future relaxation as a bonus.
Do I pay Thai tax on money I bring in if I stay under 180 days?
Not on foreign-sourced income. The remittance charge under Section 41 applies only to Thai tax residents, and residence requires 180 days or more in the calendar year. Income from Thai sources is taxable regardless of how long you stay. Read more in our guide to ภาษีเงินได้บุคคลธรรมดาในประเทศไทย.
Can I still bring in savings from before 2024 tax free?
Yes. Por. 162/2566 places income earned before 1 January 2024 outside the reinterpretation, whenever you remit it. The practical requirement is evidence. Keep account statements dated 31 December 2023 and avoid mixing that capital with income earned afterwards.
Does a double tax agreement mean I pay nothing in Thailand?
Rarely. Most of Thailand’s treaties give relief as a credit for foreign tax paid rather than a full exemption, so you pay the higher of the two rates overall. A minority of treaty articles, notably some covering government-service pensions, do assign exclusive taxing rights. The answer depends on your specific treaty and the specific category of income.
Is money I transfer to buy a condominium taxable?
The purpose of the transfer is irrelevant. What matters is whether the money is assessable foreign income earned while you were a Thai tax resident from 2024 onward. Pre-2024 capital remains protected. Keep the bank’s Foreign Exchange Transaction form, which you need in any event to register ownership under the foreign quota when การซื้อคอนโดมิเนียมในประเทศไทย.
What happens if the exemption is gazetted later in 2026?
The instrument will state its own effective date, and that date governs. It may or may not reach back over remittances already made. Because that is unknowable in advance, timing a large remittance around an unpublished instrument carries real risk. We re-verify this page against the Royal Gazette and will update the date stamp above when the position changes.
Talk to a Thai lawyer about your remittance position
Serving foreigners in Thailand since 2006, ThaiLawOnline.com gives clear answers on Thai tax residence, remittance planning, and the documents you need before you transfer. We will tell you plainly whether a transfer is exposed and what evidence protects it.
นัดหมายเพื่อขอคำปรึกษา or read more about property taxes in Thailand และ inheritance tax in Thailand.
About the author. ThaiLawOnline.com has advised foreign clients on Thai law since 2006. Our practice covers property, family, business, tax, and immigration matters for Western clients living in or investing in Thailand.
This article is general information, not legal or tax advice. Thai tax treatment turns on your individual residence position, your treaty, and your documents. The regulatory position described here was verified on 1 August 2026 and can change on publication in the Royal Gazette without notice.
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