Crypto Tax Calculator

An estimate, not tax advice. This calculation is for an Australian resident for tax purposes for the whole of the 2026–27 income year (1 July 2026 to 30 June 2027), or 2025–26 if you choose it, holding crypto in their own name. For the ATO a crypto asset is property, not money: selling it, swapping it for another crypto, converting it to dollars or spending it are all CGT events, valued in Australian dollars. There is no separate crypto tax and no separate capital gains tax: your net capital gain is added to your taxable income and taxed at your marginal rate plus the Medicare levy. The rules modelled here cover disposals up to 30 June 2027. Check with a registered tax agent before you lodge.

What is an Australian crypto tax calculator?

An Australian crypto tax calculator is a tool that works out the extra income tax and Medicare levy that disposing of a crypto asset adds to your tax bill, under the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) rules for the 2026–27 income year. It measures the gain as your proceeds in Australian dollars less the cost base and the fees on disposal, takes off your capital losses, applies the 50% CGT discount when you have held the crypto for at least 12 months, and prices what is left at your marginal rate.

Crypto is not currency for the ATO. Every crypto asset is property subject to capital gains tax, and each distinct crypto is a separate asset: bitcoin and ether are two assets, not two balances of the same thing. A disposal happens whenever you sell it, swap it for another crypto, convert it into Australian dollars or a foreign currency, use it to buy goods or services, or give it away. Each disposal is a CGT event, and the gain on it joins your other income at the resident tax rates, from nil on the first $18,200 to 45% above $190,000, plus the 2% Medicare levy.

The calculator takes six visible inputs, “Other taxable income”, “Cost base (AUD)”, “Proceeds (AUD)”, “Fees on disposal”, “Held 12 months or more” and “Capital losses”, and two advanced fields, “Income year” and “Tax treatment”. It returns “Tax on this disposal” as the headline figure, then “Income tax” and “Medicare levy” separately, “Net capital gain”, “Effective rate”, “After-tax gain” and, when the discount applies, “The CGT discount saves you”, together with a notice that reads “A swap is taxed even if you received no dollars”. It prices one disposal at a time, and it needs no exchange connection: you enter the figures yourself.

Why is the crypto tax calculator important for crypto investors in Australia?

The crypto tax calculator is important for Australian crypto investors because the tax arrives at moments that do not feel like a sale. Swapping bitcoin for ether puts no dollars in your account, yet for the ATO it is a disposal valued at the Australian dollar price of what you received. An investor earning $40,000 who swaps bitcoin bought for $5,000 less than 12 months earlier into ether worth $13,000 owes $2,105, with nothing cashed out to pay it.

The ATO also knows more than many investors assume. It already matches tax returns against data from Australian crypto exchanges, and Australia has committed to start the international exchange of crypto data under the Crypto-Asset Reporting Framework (CARF) from 1 January 2027, with the first exchanges in 2028.

The holding period works for crypto exactly as it does for shares. Held for at least 12 months, only half the gain is taxed: on $75,000 of other income a $12,000 gain costs $1,920, an effective rate of 16.00%, against $3,840 when the whole gain is taxed. That difference is worth checking before you sell or swap a position that is close to its first year.

Use the calculator before a disposal rather than at tax time: before you sell, before you swap one coin for another, before you spend crypto, when a holding is approaching the 12-month mark, and when you are unsure whether the ATO would see your activity as investing or as a business. The figure matters most for anyone managing a crypto portfolio actively, because every move between coins is a taxable event.

How do you use the Australian crypto tax calculator?

To use the Australian crypto tax calculator, enter your other taxable income, the cost base and the proceeds of the disposal in Australian dollars, any fees on disposal and capital losses, and say whether you held the crypto 12 months or more; press Calculate and the tool returns the tax on the disposal, split into income tax and Medicare levy.

The steps to use the Australian crypto tax calculator are listed below:

1. Enter your other taxable income. This is your 2026–27 taxable income without this disposal, already after deductions. That includes the work-related standard deduction of up to $1,000, which applies automatically if you have labour income and is reduced by any work-related expenses you claim.
2. Enter the cost base in Australian dollars. This is the value in Australian dollars of the crypto when you acquired it, plus the fees you paid to buy it.
3. Enter the proceeds in Australian dollars. This is what you received, in Australian dollars. In a crypto-to-crypto swap, it is the market value in Australian dollars of the crypto you received, at the time of the swap; if that value cannot be worked out, use the value of the crypto you gave up.
4. Enter the fees on disposal. These are the exchange fees charged on the sale or the swap.
5. Choose whether you held it 12 months or more. The rule is the same as for shares: the 12 months are counted without the day you acquired the crypto and without the day you disposed of it.
6. Enter your capital losses. These are losses on other crypto or other assets in this income year, plus any net capital losses from earlier years that you have not used yet.

Two advanced fields refine the result. “Income year” switches between “2026–27”, the default, and “2025–26”. “Tax treatment” switches between “Investor (CGT)”, the default, and “Trader (business)”, which is for people who carry on a business of crypto trading: the ATO looks at volume, regularity and organisation, not at intention alone. In trader mode the whole gain is taxed, and “Held 12 months or more” and “Capital losses” are ignored, with a notice on screen.

Moving crypto between wallets you own is not a disposal, as long as you remain the owner, so it has no place in the calculator. Enter one disposal per calculation. Each press of Calculate refreshes every row together, so a sale and a swap of the same coin can be compared before either happens.

What formula does the Australian crypto tax calculator use?

The Australian crypto tax calculator uses the same two-step formula as the capital gains tax calculation: it turns the disposal into a net capital gain, taking off capital losses before the 50% discount, then prices that gain incrementally, as the tax on your income with the gain minus the tax on your income without it.

In these formulas, the discount factor is 50% for an investor who held the crypto 12 months or more and 100% otherwise, including always in “Trader (business)” mode, where capital losses are not used either. Capital losses reduce the gain down to zero at most. Income tax is the resident tax table of the year you chose, shown below. LITO is the low income tax offset, worth up to $700 up to $37,500 of taxable income and nil above $66,667, which can reduce income tax to zero but never reduces the Medicare levy. The Medicare levy is nil up to $28,011 and above that is the lower of 2% of your taxable income and 10% of the part over $28,011; the 2026–27 threshold has not been set yet, so the calculator uses the 2025–26 figure.

For example, crypto bought for $3,000 plus a $30 fee has a cost base of $3,030; sold for $13,000 with $50 of fees after more than 12 months, it leaves a $9,920 gain and a $4,960 net capital gain, which on $120,000 of other income costs $1,488 of income tax and $99.20 of levy, or $1,587.20.

The formula prices one disposal by one resident in one income year: it stops at 30 June 2027 and needs every value already in Australian dollars.

What is an example of a crypto tax calculation?

An example of a crypto tax calculation is an investor earning $75,000 who sells crypto for $20,000 that cost $8,000, after holding it for more than 12 months, with no fees and no capital losses, which produces $1,920 of tax on the disposal, worked out as follows:

1. Work out the gain. $20,000 less $8,000 = $12,000.
2. Take off capital losses. There are none, so the whole $12,000 remains.
3. Apply the CGT discount. The crypto was held 12 months or more and the treatment is “Investor (CGT)”, so half the gain is taxed: the net capital gain is $6,000.
4. Add it to your income. Taxable income rises from $75,000 to $81,000, which stays inside the 30% bracket.
5. Price the income tax. 30% of $6,000 is $1,800, and the low income tax offset is nil at both levels.
6. Add the Medicare levy. 2% of $6,000 is $120.
7. Read the result. Tax on this disposal is $1,920, an effective rate of 16.00% of the $12,000 gain, which leaves an after-tax gain of $10,080.

These are the calculator’s starting values, so pressing Calculate without changing anything reproduces the example. The effective rate is half of the 32% that the next dollar of salary pays at this income, 30% plus the 2% levy, because only half the gain is taxed.

How do you read the Australian crypto tax calculator’s result?

You read the Australian crypto tax calculator’s result by starting from “Tax on this disposal”, the extra tax the disposal adds to your year, then checking how it splits between “Income tax” and “Medicare levy”. “Net capital gain” is the amount that enters your taxable income, “Effective rate” is the tax divided by the whole gain, and “After-tax gain” is what the disposal leaves you with, whether or not you received any dollars.

Amounts are shown to the cent and percentages to two decimals, rounded half up; the calculation runs at full precision. In investor mode a loss works as it does for shares: it carries forward with no time limit and can only reduce future capital gains, never your salary. In “Trader (business)” mode a loss follows the trader rule instead: it can reduce tax on your other income only if the non-commercial loss rules are met, so the calculator presents that saving as conditional and gives none when your other taxable income is $250,000 or more.

Why does a crypto-to-crypto swap count in the crypto tax calculation?

A crypto-to-crypto swap counts in the crypto tax calculation because for the ATO a crypto asset is property, not money: exchanging one coin for another is a disposal of the first, and its proceeds are the market value in Australian dollars of the coin you receive at the time of the swap.

Every swap counts. Selling crypto, swapping it for another crypto, converting it to dollars or spending it are all CGT events, valued in Australian dollars at the time. Moving crypto between your own wallets is not. Staking rewards are taxed separately, as ordinary income when you receive them.

The swap is the case that catches people, because no money moves. Take an investor with $40,000 of other income who swaps bitcoin with a cost base of $5,000 for ether worth $13,000 in Australian dollars, less than 12 months after buying the bitcoin:

1. The gain. $13,000 less $5,000 = $8,000, all of it taxed, because there is no discount before 12 months.
2. Income without the swap. On $40,000, income tax is $3,270 less a $575 offset, plus $800 of Medicare levy: $3,495.
3. Income with the swap. On $48,000, income tax is $4,920 less a $280 offset, plus $960 of levy: $5,600.
4. The tax on this disposal. $5,600 less $3,495 = $2,105, an effective rate of 26.31%.

The income tax part, $1,945, is $5,000 taxed at 15%, $3,000 taxed at 30% and $295 of offset lost, because the low income tax offset shrinks from $575 to $280 as income rises from $40,000 to $48,000. The levy adds $160. The investor received no dollars and owes $2,105, which is why the calculator shows its swap notice: it is the number one misunderstanding among people who swap.

One exemption is often misread. A gain on a personal use asset is exempt if the crypto cost less than $10,000 and was used mainly to buy things for personal use. It is not a $10,000 tax-free allowance: the ATO warns that people who hold crypto as an investment, or who convert it to dollars before buying, normally do not qualify. The calculator mentions the exemption and does not apply it.

When does the crypto tax calculation treat you as a crypto trader?

The crypto tax calculation treats you as a crypto trader only when you select “Trader (business)” in “Tax treatment”, because the ATO decides that question from the facts, and the calculator does not decide it for you. Trader only if you carry on a business of crypto trading: the ATO looks at volume, regularity and organisation, not at intention alone.

For a trader, crypto is trading stock and the profits are ordinary income. That means no 50% discount, however long a coin was held, and the whole profit sits on top of your other income. Run the starting example again as a trader, with $75,000 of other income and a $12,000 profit, and taxable income rises to $87,000: income tax of $3,600 plus $240 of levy gives $3,840, an effective rate of 32.00%. That is exactly double the $1,920 an investor pays, but only because the whole profit stays in the 30% bracket; when a full gain crosses a bracket, the doubling stops, so it is not a rule to apply by hand.

The trade-off sits in a losing year. An investor’s capital loss only waits for future capital gains. A trader’s loss can reduce tax on salary, but only if the non-commercial loss rules are met, including taxable income below $250,000 and at least one of four tests; otherwise the loss is deferred to later years of the business. That is where the treatment decides most of the result, and it is the subject of a calculator of its own. Trading often? Check whether the ATO could treat you as a trader.

What changes in the crypto tax calculation from 1 July 2027?

From 1 July 2027 the crypto tax calculation changes for gains that build up from that date, because crypto held as an investment is a CGT asset and a law passed in June 2026 changes how capital gains are taxed. Disposals in 2026–27 are not affected.

What changes from 1 July 2027. A law passed in June 2026 replaces the 50% CGT discount with indexation of your cost base to inflation, plus a minimum 30% tax on capital gains, for gains that build up from 1 July 2027. Any sale up to 30 June 2027 follows the rules in this calculator. The part of a gain that has built up before 1 July 2027 keeps the 50% discount even if you sell later, so you don’t need to sell before that date just to keep it. This calculator does not model the new rules yet.

The law is the Treasury Laws Amendment (Tax Reform No. 1) Act 2026, Act No. 49 of 2026, given assent on 26 June 2026. The split between the part of a gain built up before 1 July 2027 and the part built up after is made with the market value at 1 July 2027, or with a method the Minister will set in a separate instrument, which has not been published yet. A crypto trader’s profits are ordinary income, which gets no discount today either, so the change in the discount concerns investors. As for any CGT event, the date that counts is the contract date, so a disposal agreed on 30 June 2027 belongs to 2026–27.

What are the limits of the Australian crypto tax calculator?

The main limit of the Australian crypto tax calculator is that it prices one disposal of a crypto asset, by an Australian resident for tax purposes in the 2026–27 or 2025–26 income year, from values you enter in Australian dollars, so it is only as accurate as the cost base you have reconstructed.

The following points sit outside the calculation:

• Staking, DeFi and lending. Staking rewards are ordinary income at their Australian dollar value on the day you receive them, and that value becomes the cost base of the new crypto. Returns from DeFi and lending are income too. The calculator prices disposals, not income.
• Wrapping. Sending crypto to a smart contract to wrap it is a CGT event at the moment you send it.
• Airdrops. The ATO published a draft ruling, TR 2026/D1, on 19 August 2026; it is not final.
• Mining, NFTs and lost or stolen crypto, each with rules of its own.
• The personal use asset exemption, which the tool mentions and never applies.
• Cost base reconstruction across many trades and the choice of which parcel you disposed of: the tool uses the cost base you enter.
• Exchange reporting. The ATO’s data matching and the CARF exchange from 1 January 2027 are reasons to keep records, not inputs to the calculation. The domestic law to implement CARF has not been confirmed yet.
• Crypto ETFs listed on an exchange, which follow the rules for shares: use the capital gains tax calculator. GST is irrelevant for a private investor.
• Super, non-residents and temporary residents, the Medicare levy surcharge, family and senior Medicare thresholds, HELP and HECS repayments and PAYG instalments, as for any capital gain.
• The rules that apply from 1 July 2027.

Two practical points complete the picture. The 2026–27 Medicare levy low-income threshold has not been set yet, so the calculator uses the 2025–26 figure of $28,011; only total incomes between $28,011 and about $36,000 are affected. And the calculator works out the tax, not the lodgement: capital gains go at item 18 of the individual tax return, and for 2026–27 a return you lodge yourself through myTax is due by Monday 1 November 2027, because 31 October falls on a Sunday, with the tax due by 21 November; through a registered tax agent the dates are later.

What is the difference between a crypto tax calculation and a capital gains tax calculation?

The difference between a crypto tax calculation and a capital gains tax calculation in Australia is what counts as a disposal and how it is valued, not the tax itself: both are CGT calculations with the same 50% discount after 12 months and the same marginal rates plus Medicare levy, but crypto is taxed on swaps and spending as well as sales, always at the Australian dollar market value of the moment.

Choose by what you disposed of. Coins and tokens belong on this page, including every swap between them. Shares and ETFs belong on the capital gains tax calculator, which follows the same engine with the share rules: the contract date, the choice of parcel and the brokerage on both sides of the trade.

Which calculators are related to the Australian crypto tax calculator?

The calculators related to the Australian crypto tax calculator produce the figures this calculation starts from, or measure the crypto income that the ATO taxes in a different way.

The related calculators are listed below:

• Crypto Profit Calculator: works out the profit or loss on a crypto position, the gain to convert into Australian dollars for this calculation.
• Crypto Staking Calculator: projects staking rewards, which the ATO taxes as ordinary income when you receive them rather than as a capital gain.
• Capital Gains Tax Calculator: prices a sale of shares or ETFs with the same engine and the same 50% discount.

FAQ

This calculator is an educational estimate and does not replace tax advice. It applies the ATO’s 2026–27 resident tax rates, or 2025–26 if you choose them, the tax-free threshold, the low income tax offset, the Medicare levy with its low-income reduction for a single person, the 50% CGT discount for crypto held at least 12 months by an investor, capital losses applied before the discount and the trader treatment as an option, for an Australian resident for tax purposes, on disposals up to 30 June 2027. It leaves out staking, DeFi, lending, airdrops, mining, NFTs, lost or stolen crypto, the personal use asset exemption, cost base reconstruction, super, non-residents and temporary residents, the Medicare levy surcharge and family or senior thresholds, HELP and HECS repayments, PAYG instalments and the rules that apply from 1 July 2027. The 2026–27 Medicare levy low-income threshold has not been set yet: we use the 2025–26 figure ($28,011). Sources: resident tax rates, low income tax offset, Medicare levy thresholds, CGT rules and crypto asset guidance published by the Australian Taxation Office. Data last checked: 21 October 2026. Check with a registered tax agent before you lodge.