Estonian CIT vs classic CIT calculator
The Estonian regime is not a lower rate so much as a later one. Set your annual profit, how much of it you actually take out and how long you plan to keep going, and compare what each route leaves in your hands and in the company.
Revenue less every cost, before any income tax.
The rest stays in the company and, under the Estonian regime, stays untaxed.
- Cash to you—
- Still in the company—
- Effective rate—
- Cash to you—
- Still in the company—
- Effective rate—
—
across the whole period
Before you count on it
- Every shareholder is a natural person, and the company owns no shares in other companies.
- At least three employees outside the shareholder group, with a ramp in the first years for a small taxpayer.
- Less than half of revenue is passive — interest, royalties, financial instruments.
- Polish accounting rules, not IFRS.
- Loans to shareholders, private use of company cars and above-market related-party payments are taxed as hidden profits.
How you opt in
Form ZAW-RD to your tax office before the start of the tax year — or by the end of the first month if you close the books and switch mid-year.
A comparison of headline burdens on distributed profit at 2026 rates. It ignores hidden profits, the tax on the profit accumulated before entering the regime, and the effect of leaving it. Not tax advice.
Is that figure right for your case?
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Rates used (2026) — verified
- Ministerstwo Finansów Ustawa o podatku dochodowym od osób prawnych — 19% / 9% and the Estonian CIT regime podatki.gov.pl
Figures are official rates for the tax year shown. They are not advice on your own case.
01 What is the effective tax rate under Estonian CIT?
20% on distributed profit for a small taxpayer and 25% for everyone else, counting both the company’s tax and the shareholder’s. It works out that way because the shareholder’s 19% on the dividend is reduced by 90% of the company’s CIT for a small taxpayer, or 70% otherwise. On the classic route the two layers stack instead: 9% plus 19% comes to 26,29%, and 19% plus 19% to 34,39%.
02 Who can actually use the Estonian regime?
A company whose shareholders are all natural persons, which holds no shares in other companies, keeps its books under Polish accounting rules rather than IFRS, earns less than half its revenue passively, and employs at least three people outside the shareholder group. That last one stops most micro-companies: a two-founder consultancy with no staff does not qualify, and the headcount relief in the first years is a ramp, not an exemption. You notify the tax office on form ZAW-RD before the tax year in which you want it to start.
03 What counts as taking profit out?
More than a dividend. The regime also taxes “hidden profits” — a loan to a shareholder, a car used privately, above-market payments to a related party, a shareholder’s remuneration above five times the average wage — and expenses unrelated to the business. In practice the discipline the regime demands is that the company’s money stays the company’s: a founder used to treating a one-person company account as a wallet will find the Estonian rules unforgiving.
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