Cryptocurrency Taxes in Austria (2026): What You Pay and What Stays Tax-Free

Last reviewed: November 2026 · Reviewed by Stéphane Gombauld, tax expert, technologist and digital nomad

You hold Bitcoin, Ethereum or a few hundred tokens, and you live in Austria or plan to. This guide explains what the 27.5% rule covers in 2026, what stays tax-free, how losses work and what happens when you move abroad with your wallet.

Austria cryptocurrency taxes in 2026: the key figures

Is this guide for you?

Read on if you…

• live in Austria (or will soon) and hold or trade cryptocurrencies privately
• earn staking, lending or mining income and wonder when it is taxed
• plan to leave Austria and want to know what happens to your unrealised crypto gains

Probably not your case if you…

• trade crypto through a company (business income rules apply, see corporate income taxes in Austria)
• are a non-resident with no Austrian home and no Austrian income

How does Austria tax crypto in 2026?

Since the eco-social tax reform of 2022, crypto sits in the Income Tax Act (EStG, section 27b) next to shares and bonds. Austria treats cryptocurrencies as digital representations of value that are not issued by a central bank.

Two things count as taxable income from new holdings:

1. Current income: interest from lending your coins, and mining rewards where you provide hashing power. These are taxed at 27.5% when you receive them.
2. Realised gains: the difference between your sale price in euros and your acquisition cost. Taxed at 27.5% when you sell for fiat, pay for goods or services, or swap into a stablecoin pegged to a fiat currency, since this counts as a disposal.

The special rate is the same 27.5% that applies to dividends and gains on shares. It does not depend on your salary. You can opt for progressive rates instead (the Regelbesteuerungsoption), which only helps if your total income is low.

What is not taxable

• Crypto-to-crypto swaps. Trading ETH for SOL is not a disposal. Your original acquisition cost simply moves to the new coin.
• Staking rewards, airdrops, hard forks and bounties. You pay nothing when you receive them. Their acquisition cost is zero, so you pay 27.5% on the full amount when you later sell.
• Transfers between your own wallets. Moving coins from an exchange to a hardware wallet is not a sale.

Old holdings: coins bought before 1 March 2021

Coins you acquired before 1 March 2021 are old holdings (Altvermögen). They stay under the old rules. Sell them more than one year after purchase and the gain is tax-free. Sell within one year and the gain is a speculative gain, taxed at your progressive rate, which in 2026 runs from 0% to 55%. Speculative gains up to EUR 440 a year are exempt.

Here's the catch. If you staked or lent old coins after March 2021, the rewards are new holdings. Keep the two pools separate in your records.

How much tax will you actually pay? Calculating cost basis and losses

Your gain is sale proceeds minus acquisition cost, minus directly linked costs such as trading fees. Austria uses a moving average price per coin and per wallet or depot. If you bought BTC three times at different prices, the acquisition cost of each unit is the weighted average.

Costs you cannot deduct: hardware wallets, subscriptions to portfolio trackers, electricity for mining (if you take the 27.5% rate). The special rate comes with a ban on deducting expenses (section 20(2) EStG).

Losses

Losses on new holdings can be offset against other capital income taxed at 27.5% in the same calendar year: gains on shares, ETFs, dividends, and other crypto. They cannot be offset against salary or freelance income, against bank interest at 25%, or carried forward to next year. So if you realise a big loss in December, consider realising matching gains in the same year.

Who files and pays

If you trade on an Austrian platform (Bitpanda, an Austrian bank's broker), the platform withholds 27.5% KESt on your gains and current income since 1 January 2024. The tax is then settled, like with an Austrian stock broker, though you can still file to use losses across platforms.

If you trade on a foreign exchange or hold your own keys, you declare everything in your income tax return (form E1, annex E1kv) via FinanzOnline. Deadline: 30 June 2027 for the 2026 tax year when you file online, 30 April 2027 on paper. A tax adviser's filing quota can push this to spring 2028.

What if you earn crypto as a freelancer or run a node?

Getting paid in crypto for freelance work is ordinary business income, taxed at progressive rates (plus SVS social insurance). The value in euros on the day you receive the coins is your revenue. From that moment, the coins are a business asset. If you move them into your private wallet, the later gain follows the 27.5% rule as a new holding.

Mining as a business, operating a validator professionally, or trading with the structure of a dealer (leverage, high frequency, borrowed capital) can also be classified as a business. Then the 27.5% rate still applies to the crypto itself, but you lose the ban-on-expenses rule in your favour: electricity and hardware become deductible.

Freelancers in Austria should read business expenses in Austria and compare the structures in legal forms of business in Austria before accepting crypto payments.

What happens to your crypto when you leave Austria?

Austria has an exit tax (Wegzugsbesteuerung). When you give up your Austrian residence and Austria loses the right to tax your future gains, new holdings are treated as sold at market value on your departure date. The deemed gain is taxed at 27.5%.

• Moving to an EU or EEA country (Portugal, Spain, Germany): you can apply to pay in seven annual instalments, interest-free.
• Moving to a third country (UAE, Switzerland, Thailand): the tax is due with your departure-year assessment.
• Old holdings held over a year are already tax-free, so no exit tax applies to them.

The reverse also works. If you move to Austria holding crypto, your acquisition cost is stepped up to the market value on the day you become resident. Only growth after your arrival is taxed in Austria. See how residence starts in the guide to obtaining tax residency in Austria and how it ends in ceasing your tax residency in Austria.

Common mistakes (and what they cost)

• Treating every swap as a taxable event → you overpay and create paperwork; Austria only taxes exits into fiat, goods or stablecoins.
• Mixing old and new holdings in one average → you lose the tax-free status of pre-March-2021 coins and pay 27.5% on gains that were exempt.
• Forgetting that staking rewards have a zero cost basis → the full sale price is taxed later; budget for it.
• Leaving Austria without computing the exit tax → the Finanzamt assesses the deemed gain anyway, often with late-payment surcharges of 2% plus interest.
• Assuming a foreign exchange keeps you invisible → Austria receives crypto account data from EU platforms under DAC8 from 2026; undeclared gains fall under the tax fraud rules of Austria.

Frequently asked questions

Is crypto tax-free in Austria after one year?

Only for old holdings bought before 1 March 2021. Those become tax-free once you have held them for more than a year. Coins bought from 1 March 2021 are new holdings and are taxed at 27.5% on sale regardless of holding period. The one-year rule still matters for NFTs and other crypto assets outside the legal definition, which follow speculative-gain rules.

How much tax do I pay on Bitcoin gains in Austria?

A flat 27.5% on the gain for Bitcoin acquired from 1 March 2021. On a EUR 10,000 gain you pay EUR 2,750. Your salary does not change the rate. If your total income is very low, you can opt for progressive rates, where the first EUR 13,539 of income in 2026 is taxed at 0%.

Are stablecoins taxed in Austria?

Swapping into a stablecoin pegged to a fiat currency such as USDC or EURC is treated as a disposal, so it triggers 27.5% tax on the gain. Holding stablecoins and swapping between them produces little or no gain, but the disposal still has to be reported if you use a foreign platform.

Do I pay tax on staking rewards in Austria?

Not when you receive them. Austria treats staking, airdrops, hard forks and bounties as non-taxable acquisitions with a cost basis of zero. When you later sell those coins for euros, the entire sale price is a gain taxed at 27.5%. Lending interest and mining income are different: they are taxed at 27.5% on receipt.

Can I offset crypto losses against my salary in Austria?

No. Losses on new holdings can only be set against other capital income taxed at the 27.5% special rate in the same year, such as gains on shares, ETFs or other crypto, and dividends. They cannot reduce employment or freelance income, cannot be set against bank interest, and cannot be carried forward.

Do I pay Austrian crypto tax as a digital nomad passing through?

If you have no home available to you in Austria and stay under six months, you are not resident and Austria does not tax your private crypto gains. Keep a home there, or stay longer, and you are taxed on worldwide crypto income. Austria has no digital nomad visa; see tax incentives for expats and digital nomads in Austria.

Related guides

• Capital gains tax in Austria: shares, funds and property
• Ceasing your Austrian tax residency and the exit tax
• Obtaining tax residency in Austria
• Tax fraud regulations in Austria
• Austria tax landscape overview
• Cryptocurrency taxes in Germany
• Cryptocurrency taxes in Switzerland
• All country tax guides

Sources

• Austrian Federal Ministry of Finance (BMF) – Taxes
• Income Tax Act 1988 (EStG), sections 27, 27a, 27b – Legal Information System RIS
• oesterreich.gv.at – Taxes and finance
• FinanzOnline
• European Commission – DAC8 administrative cooperation on crypto-assets

This guide is general information, not personalised tax advice. See how we research and review.