Crypto Tax Calculator

Thirty thousand of tax on a one-lakh gain

A sale of ₹2,00,000 against an acquisition cost of ₹1,00,000 produces a taxable gain of ₹1,00,000, tax of ₹30,000 at the flat 30% rate, and ₹2,000 of TDS at 1% — leaving net proceeds of ₹1,68,000.

The 30% figure is not a slab rate. It applies to everyone, at every income level, on every crypto gain, with no exemption threshold and no reduction for holding period.

The rules, precisely

Section 115BBH, introduced by the Finance Act 2022, governs income from the transfer of virtual digital assets — cryptocurrencies, NFTs and similar tokens.

Tax = 30% of (sale consideration − cost of acquisition), plus surcharge where applicable and 4% cess on top.

Four features make this regime unusually strict:

No deduction except cost of acquisition. Exchange fees, brokerage, gas fees, transfer costs, infrastructure, electricity for mining — none are deductible. Unlike every other head of income, you cannot deduct the expenditure incurred in earning the gain.

No holding-period benefit. A coin held five years and one held five minutes are taxed identically at 30%. There is no long-term capital gains treatment.

No set-off of losses. A loss on one virtual digital asset cannot be set against a gain on another, against any other income, or carried forward to a future year. A year with ₹5 lakh of gains and ₹5 lakh of losses across different coins is taxed on the ₹5 lakh of gains.

No basic exemption. The 30% applies from the first rupee of gain, even for someone whose total income is below the taxable threshold.

The 1% TDS under Section 194S

Separately from the tax, 1% TDS applies on the transfer consideration — the sale value, not the gain — deducted by the exchange at the point of sale.

Here that is 1% of ₹2,00,000 = ₹2,000.

Two points worth understanding:

It applies to the gross transfer value, so a loss-making sale still suffers TDS. Someone trading actively at a loss can have substantial TDS deducted across the year with no tax liability against which to set it, recoverable only by filing a return.

Thresholds are modest — ₹50,000 a year for specified persons and ₹10,000 otherwise — so most active traders are covered.

TDS is creditable, not additional. The ₹2,000 here reduces the ₹30,000 payable to ₹28,000 at filing.

Reporting

Crypto gains are reported in Schedule VDA of the income tax return, which requires transaction-level detail: date of acquisition, date of transfer, cost and consideration for each disposal.

This makes record-keeping non-optional. Exchanges provide statements, but wallet-to-wallet transfers, DeFi interactions and transactions on exchanges that have since closed are frequently missing from them. Reconstructing a year of activity afterwards is considerably harder than recording it as you go.

Note also that receiving crypto as a gift is taxable in the recipient's hands above ₹50,000, and airdrops and mining rewards are taxable as income at receipt, with that value becoming the cost base for a later disposal.

Reading the result

The net proceeds figure shows what you retain after tax and TDS. Compare it against the gross gain to see the effective drag: on a ₹1,00,000 gain, ₹30,000 goes in tax, so you keep 70% before considering that fees were not deductible.

This calculator handles a single transfer. Multiple disposals across a year each need computing, with no netting of losses between them — which is precisely what makes the regime punitive for active traders and why the tax on a year's trading can exceed the year's net economic result.

Common mistakes

Expecting fees to be deductible. Only acquisition cost is.

Netting a loss against a gain. Not permitted, even within crypto.

Assuming TDS is the whole liability. It is 1% of value; the tax is 30% of gain.

Thinking a long hold helps. It does not.

Not keeping transaction records. Schedule VDA requires per-transaction detail.