You can download Form 8962 free from the IRS website at irs.gov, and most tax software fills it in automatically once you enter your Form 1095-A. The form has one job: calculate your Premium Tax Credit for the year and reconcile it against any advance payments your insurer already received on your behalf.1Internal Revenue Service. About Form 8962, Premium Tax Credit For returns covering 2026, getting this right matters more than it used to, because the caps that limited how much excess advance credit you had to repay have been eliminated.
Where to Download Form 8962
The official PDF lives at irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f8962.pdf, linked from the form’s main page.1Internal Revenue Service. About Form 8962, Premium Tax Credit Print it if you’re filing on paper. The IRS also publishes a separate instructions document that walks through every line and includes the worksheets you need to figure your contribution percentage and credit amount.2Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Form 8962
Most filers never open the standalone PDF. TurboTax, H&R Block, TaxAct, and similar programs build Form 8962 in the background once you enter the numbers from your 1095-A, handle the monthly math, and attach the finished form to your e-filed return. A paid preparer does the same thing through their own software. If your income qualifies, IRS Free File offers guided preparation at no cost with participating software that supports the form, and VITA sites can help in person, though more complex situations involving shared policies may be beyond what some VITA sites take on.
Who Has to File It
Two groups file Form 8962. The first is anyone whose Marketplace insurer received advance Premium Tax Credit payments during the year, even for a single month. The reconciliation is mandatory regardless of the dollar amount involved.1Internal Revenue Service. About Form 8962, Premium Tax Credit
The second is anyone who paid full price for a Marketplace plan all year and wants to claim the credit as a lump sum on their return instead. You can do that by filing Form 8962 with your 1040.3Internal Revenue Service. Eligibility for the Premium Tax Credit
If you had a Marketplace plan but took no advance payments and don’t qualify for the credit based on income, you don’t file the form. The credit itself is limited to households with income between 100% and 400% of the federal poverty level for 2026; the temporary expansion that removed the 400% ceiling expired at the end of 2025.4Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 36B – Premium Tax Credit You also can’t claim it for months when you were eligible for affordable employer coverage meeting minimum value, or for Medicare, Medicaid, or TRICARE.3Internal Revenue Service. Eligibility for the Premium Tax Credit
What You Need Before You Start
The form runs on numbers from Form 1095-A, the Health Insurance Marketplace Statement. It carries the three figures that drive every calculation: your monthly enrollment premium, the premium for the second-lowest cost silver plan (the benchmark), and the advance credit paid to your insurer each month.5Internal Revenue Service. About Form 1095-A, Health Insurance Marketplace Statement The Marketplace sends 1095-A by January 31 for the prior year’s coverage.6Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Form 1095-A (2025) It comes from the Marketplace, not from your insurance company. If it hasn’t arrived by mid-February, log into your Marketplace account and download it there.
You’ll also need the usual household income records: W-2s, 1099s, and any business income on Schedule C or K-1. Household income on this form includes your spouse’s income if filing jointly and any dependent’s income if the dependent is required to file their own return.
How to Fill It Out, Part by Part
Form 8962 has four parts, each building on the one before.
Part I establishes your annual and monthly contribution amount. You enter your modified adjusted gross income and family size, locate yourself relative to the federal poverty level, and the form produces the percentage of income you’re expected to pay toward your premium.
Part II is the reconciliation itself. You carry the three monthly figures from Form 1095-A onto the form, and it calculates your actual credit for each month. The gap between the advance payments made during the year and the credit you earned determines whether you owe additional tax or get more back.
Part III handles mid-year changes that require allocating credit amounts across different months.
Part IV handles shared policy allocations, covered below.
Two narrow exceptions let people with income below 100% of the poverty level claim the credit anyway: when the Marketplace projected your income at 100% or more at enrollment, advance payments were made on that basis, and your actual income fell short; and for lawfully present immigrants who are ineligible for Medicaid because of their immigration status.2Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Form 8962 You still file Form 8962 to claim the credit in either case.
Shared Policy Allocations
A shared policy situation comes up whenever one Marketplace plan covers at least one person on your return and at least one person who files on a different return. The common triggers are divorce or legal separation during a year when former spouses shared a plan, and a dependent enrolled in a plan purchased by someone outside the tax family.
You and the other taxpayer agree on an allocation percentage from 0% to 100%. The same percentage applies to all three 1095-A amounts (enrollment premium, benchmark premium, and advance payments) for each month involved, and the percentages across returns must add to 100%. If you can’t agree, the IRS default splits the amounts based on how many people from each return were enrolled.
Software usually won’t do this part for you. You multiply the allocation percentage by each month’s amounts and enter the adjusted figures by hand.
The 2026 Change: No More Repayment Caps
Previously, if your advance payments exceeded the credit you qualified for, your repayment was capped based on income, so a lower-income filer with a large overpayment might owe only a few hundred dollars back. That cap is gone.7Internal Revenue Service. One, Big, Beautiful Bill Provisions For tax years beginning after December 31, 2025, you repay the full excess amount. If advance payments exceeded your actual credit by $3,000, you owe the full $3,000.8Internal Revenue Service. Updates to Questions and Answers About the Premium Tax Credit
And if your household income exceeds 400% of the poverty level for your family size, you get no credit at all and must repay every dollar of advance payments received.
The practical response is to report income changes to the Marketplace as they happen during the year. A raise, a new job, or a spouse returning to work can push you past the estimate you gave at enrollment. Updating the Marketplace in real time lets it adjust your advance payments and reduces the chance of a surprise bill when you reconcile.
How to Submit the Form
Form 8962 is filed with your federal income tax return. E-filing attaches it automatically. If you’re filing on paper, include the completed form behind your Form 1040 and mail everything to the IRS service center for your area.1Internal Revenue Service. About Form 8962, Premium Tax Credit Electronic filing is worth doing here because the monthly calculations are easy to miscompute by hand, and processing is faster.
What Happens If You Skip It
If you received advance payments and don’t include Form 8962, the IRS sends Letter 12C saying the Marketplace reported advance credit payments but your return didn’t include the reconciliation.9Internal Revenue Service. Reconciling Your Advance Payments of the Premium Tax Credit Your refund is held until you respond.
To respond, send the IRS a completed Form 8962 together with your Form 1095-A. Don’t file an amended return; the IRS uses your response to finish processing the original one.9Internal Revenue Service. Reconciling Your Advance Payments of the Premium Tax Credit The letter includes a fax number for faster delivery. If reconciliation produces a refund, expect it roughly six to eight weeks after the IRS receives everything.
Skipping the form also costs you forward: you lose eligibility for advance payments and cost-sharing reductions for the following calendar year’s Marketplace coverage, so your monthly premiums go to full price until you clear up the reconciliation.9Internal Revenue Service. Reconciling Your Advance Payments of the Premium Tax Credit
If Your 1095-A Is Wrong
Errors on Form 1095-A flow straight into Form 8962, so check it before you file. The usual problems are incorrect coverage dates, wrong credit amounts, or premiums that don’t match what you paid. Contact the Marketplace for a corrected form before filing.
If you’ve already filed using an incorrect 1095-A and a corrected one shows up later, you aren’t required to amend, though you may choose to amend if the correction would lower your tax. If the Marketplace tells you the form was issued in error because you never actually enrolled or because the plan doesn’t qualify for the credit, you should file an amended return.10Internal Revenue Service. Corrected, Incorrect or Voided Form 1095-A Minor issues like a misspelled name or wrong address don’t require a corrected 1095-A; fix those directly on Form 8962 when you file.