India taxes Virtual Digital Assets at a flat 30% with no loss offsets or deductions. Learn how TDS, reporting rules, and new 2025 changes affect your crypto investments.
Crypto Tax India: What You Owe, How to Track It, and What Really Matters
When you trade, earn, or spend crypto tax India, the legal requirement to report cryptocurrency gains and income under Indian tax law. Also known as cryptocurrency taxation in India, it applies to every trade, airdrop, staking reward, and even gifts—if they have value in rupees. Since 2022, India has treated crypto as a taxable asset class, not currency. That means every time you sell Bitcoin for INR, swap Ethereum for Solana, or earn rewards from a DeFi protocol, you’ve triggered a taxable event.
The crypto income tax India, the 30% flat tax on profits from crypto transactions. Also known as cryptocurrency gains tax, it applies regardless of how long you held the asset. There’s no distinction between short-term and long-term gains like with stocks. Even if you held Bitcoin for five years, selling it still triggers 30% tax. Plus, you can’t offset losses against other income—your losses disappear unless you use them to reduce future crypto profits. And don’t forget the 1% TDS: every time you sell on an exchange like WazirX or CoinDCX, they automatically withhold 1% of the sale value as tax deducted at source. That’s money gone before you even see your balance.
What about airdrops? If you got free tokens from a project like WLBO or BIRD, the moment you sell them, they become taxable income. Same with staking rewards from SunContract or yield farming on EquityPay. The government doesn’t care if you didn’t buy them—you still owe tax on their value in INR when you received them. And yes, even if you sent crypto to a friend as a gift, the recipient may owe tax when they sell it. There’s no gift tax exemption for crypto in India.
Tracking this isn’t hard, but it’s messy. You need to record every transaction: buy price, sell price, date, platform, and INR value at the time. Most people use spreadsheets or free tools like Koinly or CoinTracker—but you’re still responsible for the math. The Income Tax Department doesn’t ask for your wallet addresses, but they can demand records from exchanges. Binance, Coinbase, and others are now required to share user data with Indian authorities under FATCA and CRS rules. If you didn’t report, you’re risking penalties, interest, or worse.
There’s no gray area here. Crypto isn’t banned in India—it’s just heavily taxed. The rules are clear, and enforcement is growing. What you’ll find below are real, practical guides on how to handle crypto taxes in India: how to calculate what you owe, which platforms report what, how to prove your numbers, and what to do if you missed a year. No fluff. No theory. Just what works when the tax man comes knocking.
