VAT

Value-added tax (VAT) — called goods and services tax (GST) in some countries — is a consumption tax collected in stages across production and sale, ultimately borne by the final consumer. It applies to most goods and services, though almost every country that levies it carves out reduced rates or exemptions for categories such as food, books or healthcare.

The rate shown on this page is the standard VAT rate: the default rate that applies to most goods and services. It is not the rate charged on every purchase — reduced rates, zero rates and category exemptions are common and are not shown here — and it does not exist everywhere: the United States, for example, levies no national VAT.

We currently track verified standard VAT rates for 181 countries, each sourced to its own national tax authority or statutory text where fetchable, or a big-four tax guide (PWC Worldwide Tax Summaries, EY) otherwise, and dated to its source — sometimes recent, sometimes years old where a source’s rate has simply never changed since. A small set of countries is excluded: some levy a sales or turnover tax instead of a credit-invoice VAT (the United States among them), and for a few others no source meeting this site’s bar could be confirmed.