France tax residency: the 183-day rule and the other tests
You’re tax domiciled in France if your home or your main place of stay is there, you work there, or the centre of your economic interests is there — any one is enough. Your main place of stay is generally where you spend more than six months of the year: 183 days or more in France.
France 183-day calculator
Staying in France for 183 days or more in a calendar year makes it your main place of stay, one of the tests for French tax residency. Any part of a day counts.
France tax residency: four tests, any one is enough
Under article 4 B of the French tax code, as the tax administration explains it, you’re domiciled in France for tax if:
- your home (foyer) is in France — where you and your family normally live — or your main place of stay is there;
- you work in France, employed or self-employed, unless only as a sideline; or
- the centre of your economic interests is in France.
Domiciled in France, you’re taxed there on your income from all sources, French or foreign, subject to tax treaties.
| At a glance | France |
|---|---|
| The day test | your main place of stay: 183 days or more — more than six months |
| Over | the calendar year |
| Not the only test | your home, your work or your economic interests in France make you resident too |
| The year you move | the six-month rule isn’t used |
The 183 days: your main place of stay
Your main place of stay is in France when you’re personally and effectively present there for most of the year, wherever your family lives — even in a hotel or a home lent to you. As a general rule, that means more than six months in a year: Service-Public counts 183 days or more.
It isn’t absolute. The courts have also found a main stay in France for someone who spent far longer there than in any other country, and none for someone who spent 65 to 70 days a year in a French hotel. In the year you settle in France or leave it, the six-month rule isn’t used at all.
Worked example
You spent 1 May to 8 August in France: 100 days. Arriving again on 1 September, you can stay until 21 November — your 182nd day this year. Staying on 22 November would be day 183, and France your main place of stay for the year. That’s the day test alone: a home or work in France would count first.
Other countries count their days their own way: Spain, Switzerland and the rest in the 183-day rule by country.
How FlySee counts it
FlySee has no France tracker built in; a tax tracker of your own counts the main-stay test: France, fewer than 183 days, the calendar year, any part of a day. The other tests — your home, your work, your economic interests — aren’t counted, and any one of them makes you resident whatever the days.