Indian tax residency turns on day counts, not on where you feel you live. Enter your figures and every statutory test is shown — including the two most people miss, the 120-day rule and deemed residency.
Residency is a chain of statutory tests rather than one rule. This is which of them you met.
| Test | Section | Your figures | Result |
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Two day-count tests in section 6(2) decide whether you are resident. You are resident if you spent 182 days or more in India during the tax year, or if you spent 60 days or more in India during the tax year and 365 days or more across the four preceding tax years. Meeting either one makes you resident; meeting neither makes you non-resident, unless deemed residency catches you. Citizenship does not enter the basic tests at all — a foreign national who spends enough time here is resident, and an Indian citizen who does not is non-resident.
"NRI" is not actually a category in the Act — the Act says non-resident, and that means India taxes only income received, accruing or arising here. Residents split in two. A Resident and Ordinarily Resident pays Indian tax on worldwide income, including a salary earned abroad and interest on a foreign bank account. A Resident but Not Ordinarily Resident pays Indian tax on Indian income, plus foreign income only where it comes from a business controlled in or a profession set up in India — the rest of their foreign income is outside the Indian net entirely. That distinction is worth a great deal of money to someone returning to India with foreign assets, which is why the RNOR window matters so much.
Usually two or three tax years, occasionally more. You stay RNOR while either section 6(13) test holds: non-resident in nine or more of the ten preceding tax years, or present in India for 729 days or fewer across the seven preceding tax years. Someone who was abroad for a decade and returns mid-year typically satisfies both at first, then the 729-day count catches up with them as full years in India accumulate. The practical consequence is a limited window in which foreign income can be realised without Indian tax attaching to it — and it closes on a schedule you can calculate in advance, which is what the day-count fields on this page are for.
An Indian citizen or person of Indian origin visiting India normally has the 60-day limb relaxed to 182 days, which is generous — it means ordinary visits home cannot make you resident. Section 6(5) withdraws part of that generosity for high earners: if your total income other than income from foreign sources exceeds ₹15,00,000, the relaxation drops from 182 days to 120. So a well-paid NRI who spends four months in India and was here 365 days or more over the preceding four years becomes resident, where a lower-paid one on the identical itinerary does not. The consolation is that residency acquired by this route is always RNOR, never ROR, so foreign income still escapes.
Section 6(7) deems an Indian citizen resident regardless of day count if their income other than foreign-source income exceeds ₹15,00,000 and they are not liable to tax in any other country by reason of domicile, residence or any similar criterion. It was written for people who kept moving so as to be tax resident nowhere at all. Two limits matter in practice. It applies to Indian citizens only, so a person of Indian origin on a foreign passport is outside it however they arrange their affairs. And "liable to tax" means being within another country's tax net, not necessarily paying anything — which is why someone in a zero-tax jurisdiction can be caught while someone in a high-tax one with a nil bill is not. Anyone caught by it is RNOR, so the consequence is narrower than it first sounds.
Count every day any part of which you were physically in India, so the day you arrive and the day you leave both count in full. The tax year runs 1 April to 31 March. The days need not be continuous, and the purpose of the visit is irrelevant to the count — a family holiday counts the same as a client trip. Keep passport stamps and boarding passes, because the count is a question of fact and the burden of proving it sits with you. Where a status turns on one or two days, that evidence is the whole case.
Yes, and this is the most common reason a correct calculation still gives the wrong final answer. India has Double Taxation Avoidance Agreements with most major countries, and where both countries claim you as resident, the treaty's tie-breaker decides — running through permanent home, then centre of vital interests, then habitual abode, then nationality. A person can be resident under Indian domestic law and still be treaty-resident elsewhere, which changes what India may tax. This page computes the domestic-law position, which is where the analysis starts, not where it ends. If two countries both claim you, the treaty is the next thing to read.
Not in substance, which is worth saying plainly because a great deal of guidance written before April 2026 is still accurate on the rules while being wrong on the citations. Every test survived the rewrite intact: 182 days, 60-plus-365, the employment and visiting relaxations, the 120-day rule, deemed residency and both not-ordinarily-resident tests. What changed is that they now sit in sections 6(2) to 6(13) rather than section 6(1) to 6(6) and 6(1A), and that the Act replaced "previous year" and "assessment year" with a single "tax year". If you are checking this against an older article, expect the section numbers to disagree and the answer to match.
Worked example: An Indian citizen working in Dubai visits India for 150 days in 2026-27, was here 400 days across the preceding four years, and has Indian income of ₹18,00,000. Because the income exceeds ₹15,00,000, the visiting relaxation is 120 days rather than 182 — and 150 days plus 400 days over four years meets section 6(2)(b) as modified. She is resident, but RNOR, so her Dubai salary stays outside Indian tax. Had she stayed 119 days, she would have been non-resident — assuming she is liable to tax in the UAE; if she is not, section 6(7) makes her a deemed resident whatever her day count.
Status settled, the next question is which regime to file under — compare both in the Old vs New Regime Calculator, or read where the crossover actually falls in the old vs new regime study. Section numbers on this page follow the rewrite explained in what changed under the Income-tax Act 2025. Residents claiming rent relief should see the HRA Calculator, and the filing dates that apply once status is known are in the split ITR deadlines for AY 2026-27. Status feeds straight into which return you file — RNOR and non-resident both rule out ITR-1 and ITR-4 outright — so the ITR Form Selector is the natural next step. India-specific money rules are worked through end to end in our book, Paisa Playbook.