Federal estate tax estimate

The Form 706 arithmetic from the gross estate down to the tax, with the year’s exclusion, adjusted taxable gifts and a spouse’s unused exclusion. A first look for a planning meeting or the first weeks of an estate.

Your figures · results update as you work.

The year and the exclusion

Year of death (or of the planning assumption)

Basic exclusion amount (leave blank to use the IRS figure)

The estate

Gross estate, at date-of-death values

Funeral and administration expenses

Debts, mortgages and losses

Marital deduction

Charitable deduction

State estate or inheritance tax

Gifts, the spouse’s exclusion and credits

Adjusted taxable gifts after 1976

Taxable gifts not already counted in the gross estate.

Gift tax payable on those gifts

Deceased spouse’s unused exclusion (DSUE)

From the spouse’s Form 706, if portability was elected.

Other credits

Foreign death taxes, tax on prior transfers.

Enter the gross estate.

A first look, not a return. The § 2001(c) rates and the IRS basic exclusion for 2013–2026 are built in; every value, deduction and gift is yours. No state estate or inheritance tax is worked out here, and valuation discounts, the generation-skipping tax and § 2032 alternate valuation are left to the lawyer.

How it is worked

Deductions come off the gross estate to give the taxable estate. Adjusted taxable gifts are added back, and the tentative tax on that sum comes from the rate schedule in 26 U.S.C. § 2001(c). Gift tax payable on those gifts comes off, and so does the applicable credit: the tentative tax on the basic exclusion plus any deceased spouse’s unused exclusion, which is capped at the basic exclusion.

The basic exclusion for each year from 2013 to 2026 is the figure the IRS published; 2026’s is the $15 million set by Public Law 119-21. For a later year, enter the amount yourself. State estate and inheritance taxes are not worked out here; what one costs goes in as a deduction. Nothing you type is saved or sent anywhere.

Keep it with the file

In a Fylely workspace an estate keeps its assets at date-of-death values, its federal tax dates, its accounts and its court forms together.

Start free for 14 days Look inside first

No credit card. The calculators on this site stay free either way.

Other calculators

Executor commission by state · The statutory commission and attorney-fee scales on file, worked band by band on a figure you type, each with its citation.
Date calculator · Count calendar days or court days, weeks, months or years forward or back from a date, skipping US federal holidays if you want.
Fee estimator · A percentage of the estate next to hours at an hourly rate. You supply every rate.
Sharing child expenses by income · Split child care, medical, school and activity costs in proportion to two incomes, after subsidies, credits and the child's own share.
Lump-sum value of support · What a run of support payments is worth today at your rate, and the life insurance needed each year to secure what is left.
Equalization payment · Each spouse's net property side by side, and the payment that would leave the two equal.
Judgment interest calculator · Interest between two dates at your rate, through rate changes and part payments, with what accrues each day after.
Contingency fee closing statement · The recovery, the fee, each cost and lien, and the client's net, laid out to print and sign.