Form 1098-T: Tuition Statement

VOIDPaper only: marks a form on a sheet that should be ignored. It is not a correction; a filed return is undone with a corrected return.How corrections workCORRECTEDChecked on a return that replaces one already filed. Which fields to repeat, and whether two returns are needed, depends on the error.Type 1 vs Type 2 correctionsFiler's nameWhat goes hereYour name, address and telephone number as the filer: an eligible educational institution, or an insurer that made refunds or reimbursements of qualified tuition and related expenses.Watch forIf another person receives or collects tuition payments for you, that person files, unless it lacks the information needed. You may add a third-party service provider in the box below the student's name and address.Check the filer blockBox 1: Payments received for qualified tuition and related expensesWhat goes herePayments received from all sources during the year for qualified tuition and related expenses, less refunds made this year of this year's payments. Include past-due amounts from an earlier year only if you billed them.Watch forDo not reduce it by the scholarships in box 5. Room, board, insurance, student health fees and transportation are not qualified expenses.Click to open the row in the box tableCalendar yearThe year the payment was made, not the year you file. The 2026 forms cover payments in 2026 and are filed in 2027.The 2027 calendarFiler's street addressStreet or P.O. box of the filer, where the recipient can write about the form. Not matched against IRS records.Filer's room or suiteSecond address line, optional.Filer's city or townCity of the filer's address. A foreign filer gives the city and leaves the state blank.Filer's state or provinceTwo-letter state code for a U.S. address; the province for a foreign one.Filer's countryBlank or US for a domestic address; the country for a foreign filer.Filer's ZIP or postal codeFive or nine digits for a U.S. address; the foreign postal code otherwise.Filer's telephone numberWhat goes hereThe telephone number of the information contact at the institution, generally an administrative office or department.Watch forDo not give the institution's general telephone number.Filer's employer identification no.The EIN the returns are filed under; it must match the filer name on the first line. A sole proprietor may use an SSN, with the owner's name first.Check the filer blockStudent's TINWhat goes hereThe student's TIN from Form W-9S or another form. Check the TIN box if you asked for it in writing this year, or got it earlier with no reason to doubt it. With no TIN on record, check it only if you asked in writing by December 31.Watch forYou may truncate it on the student's statement, never on the IRS copy. The filer's TIN may not be truncated on any form.Match it before you fileBox 4: Adjustments made for a prior yearWhat goes hereRefunds or reimbursements made this year of qualified expense payments reported for any prior year after 2002, and reductions in charges billed and reported for such a year.Watch forThis also applies to a nonresident alien student for whom you filed and furnished a Form 1098-T for the prior year.Click to open the row in the box tableBox 5: Scholarships or grantsWhat goes hereScholarships or grants you administered and processed during the year for the student's costs of attendance: generally all third-party payments, such as from the VA, the Defense Department and civic or religious groups. A Pell Grant always counts.Watch forPayments from family members and loan proceeds are not scholarships or grants.Click to open the row in the box tableStudent's nameThe name the IRS has for this TIN: an individual's own name for an SSN, the legal name for an EIN; a DBA goes on the second line. This is what TIN matching compares.Which name goes firstStudent's street addressWhat goes hereThe student's permanent address: a home or other long-term address where the student can receive forwarded mail.Watch forUse a temporary address only if you do not know the permanent one.Student's apartment or suiteSecond address line, optional. Keep it on its own line rather than appended to the street.Box 6: Adjustments to scholarships or grants for a prior yearWhat goes hereReductions this year to scholarships or grants that were reported for any prior year after 2002.Click to open the row in the box tableBox 7: Checkbox: box 1 includes amounts for an academic period beginning January to March of the next yearCheck it whenAny payments in box 1 for 2026 relate to an academic period that begins in January through March 2027.Click to open the row in the box tableStudent's city or townCity of the mailing address, from the W-9 line 6.Student's state or provinceTwo-letter state code; it also drives which state copies are needed when there is no withholding.State filing requirementsStudent's countryBlank or US for a domestic address. A foreign address is a flag to check whether a W-8 and Form 1042-S were the right documents instead.Foreign payeesStudent's ZIP or postal codeFive or nine digits for a U.S. address, or the foreign postal code.Box 8: Checkbox: at least half-time studentCheck it whenThe student carried at least half the full-time academic workload during any academic period that began in 2026.Watch forYour half-time standard must equal or exceed the Department of Education standard in 34 CFR 668.2(b).Click to open the row in the box tableBox 9: Checkbox: graduate studentCheck it whenThe student was enrolled in a program leading to a graduate-level degree, graduate-level certificate or other recognized graduate-level credential.Click to open the row in the box tableBox 10: Insurance contract reimbursements or refundsWhat goes hereInsurers only: the total refunds or reimbursements of qualified tuition and related expenses you made to the student during 2026.Click to open the row in the box table

Hover over a box for what goes in it; click to open its row in the table below. On a touch screen, tap the box to jump to the row.

Who must file Form 1098-T

File Form 1098-T if you are an eligible educational institution, a college, university, vocational school or other postsecondary institution eligible for federal student aid, including one that is a governmental unit or its instrumentality, for each student enrolled for whom a reportable transaction (payments received for qualified tuition and related expenses, or a reimbursement or refund) is made during the calendar year. An insurer that makes refunds or reimbursements of qualified expenses under an insurance arrangement also files, reporting in box 10. If another person (a third-party servicer) has the information, it may file for you.

Amounts are reported on the payments-received method: box 1 is what the institution received during the year for qualified tuition and related expenses, net of reimbursements, whatever academic period it covers.

Threshold: All amounts, every student for whom a reportable transaction is made during the year; exceptions for noncredit courses, nonresident aliens (unless requested), full scholarship students and formal billing arrangements.

What is reported, box by box

Box titles follow the current revision of the form. The IRS reads the payer and recipient name, TIN, address, account number and the money boxes; the state boxes are for the state copy only.

Payments that are not reported on Form 1098-T

• Courses for which no academic credit is offered, even if the student is otherwise enrolled.
• Nonresident alien students, unless the student requests the form.
• Students whose qualified expenses are entirely waived or paid by scholarships, and students whose expenses are covered by a formal billing arrangement with the student's employer or a governmental entity.

Due dates and extensions

An automatic 30-day extension is available on Form 8809, filed by the due date on paper or through IRIS; a second 30 days requires a hardship showing. Recipient statements can be extended 30 days on Form 15397, online or by fax only. 10 or more information returns of any type in aggregate must be e-filed (T.D. 9972); IRIS is the only IRS intake system from filing season 2027, FIRE having been retired. A payer who e-files the originals must e-file the corrections.

For 2026 forms filed in 2027: January 31 falls on a Sunday, so that deadline moves to Monday, February 1, 2027; February 28 also falls on a Sunday, so the paper deadline moves to Monday, March 1, 2027. March 31 (electronic) and March 15 are weekdays. February 28 does not become February 29 in a leap year. The compliance calendar has every date with the weekend shifts applied.

Withholding and TIN matching

Tuition payments flow to the institution, so backup withholding is not in play and the form is outside the IRS TIN Matching program. The TIN rules are specific to 1098-T: the institution solicits the student's TIN in writing (Form W-9S or a substitute; not by telephone), and under the regulations an institution that certifies under penalty of perjury that it complied with the solicitation rules is not penalized for a missing or incorrect student TIN. The student's TIN checkbox on the form records that certification. Electronic W-9S systems must meet the requirements in Pub 1099 part J.

Name and TIN errors on this form

Every information return is matched by the IRS on the first four characters of the payee's name (the name control) against the TIN. A mismatch produces a CP2100 line the following autumn and, unless the solicitation record is in order, a 972CG penalty the year after: $340 per return for 2026 forms filed in 2027 that are late or wrong, $690 for intentional disregard, with annual maximums of $4,191,500 ($1,397,000 for small filers) under Rev. Proc. 2025-32. The errors that recur on Form 1098-T:

• Student, not parent. The form goes to the student under the student's SSN even when a parent pays and will claim the credit.
• Application names. Admissions systems capture preferred names; the 1098-T needs the legal name the SSA holds. Reconcile at enrollment, not at year end.
• ITINs and nonresident aliens. A nonresident alien is excepted unless they ask; a resident alien with an ITIN is reported under the ITIN.
• Certification checkbox. Checking it without an actual solicitation record is the wrong kind of exposure; keep the W-9S request and any response with the student file.

The name control calculator shows what the IRS will derive from a name line, and the CP2100 guide covers what to do when the notice arrives.

Recipient statements and substitutes

The recipient statement for Form 1098-T need not be a copy of the official form: a substitute may be combined with other account statements or reports, provided every required item is numbered and titled as on the official form, the tax year, form number and form name appear together, the recipient instructions are included, and, for the forms Pub 1099 lists, a telephone number with direct access to someone who can answer questions is shown. Publication 1179 (Rev. Proc. 2026-18) has the specifications; logos, slogans and advertising are not permitted on the statement itself. Statements may be furnished electronically only to a recipient who has affirmatively consented in a way that shows they can access the format, after the disclosures in Pub 1099 part M, and must stay posted through October 15. Copy B may show a truncated TIN (xxx-xx-1234); the IRS copy never may. The consent rules for furnishing statements electronically are under review: Notice 2026-4 asked for comments (due May 23, 2026) on whether the broker rules, and then the rules for every other payee statement, should change.

Corrections and state copies

A wrong amount, code or checkbox is a Type 1 correction: one corrected return with the CORRECTED box checked. The wrong form type is a Type 2 correction: a zeroed-out copy of the original plus a new original, in that order. A wrong or missing payee TIN or name is also Type 2 on paper, but IRIS corrects it in one step on the original record (Publication 5717). Publication 1099 also says you are not required to file a correction for a missing or incorrect TIN if you meet the reasonable-cause standard, only to use the right TIN on the next return, although the IRS encourages the correction. Details and the paper error charts are on the 1099 corrections page.

Form 1098-T is not in the Combined Federal/State Filing program, so any state that requires it must receive it directly. Requirements by state are on the state pages.

Questions people ask about Form 1098-T

Other federal forms

1042-S · 1097-BTC · 1098 · 1098-C · 1098-E · 1098-F · 1098-Q · 1098-VLI · 1099-A · 1099-B · 1099-C · 1099-CAP · 1099-DIV · 1099-G · 1099-INT · 1099-K · 1099-LPS · 1099-LS · 1099-LTC · 1099-MISC · 1099-NEC · 1099-OID · 1099-PATR · 1099-Q · 1099-QA · 1099-R · 1099-S · 1099-SA · 1099-SB · 3921 · 3922 · 5498 · 5498-ESA · 5498-QA · 5498-SA · 5498-TA · W-2G · 1099-DA · Comparison table

Sources: IRS Publication 1099 (2026), General Instructions for Certain Information Returns, which replaced the separate General Instructions starting with tax year 2026; Instructions for Forms 1098-E and 1098-T (2026); Pub 1099 (2026) parts J and O; Publication 1586 Part V; IRC 6050SIRC 6050SInternal Revenue Code, Cornell LII; Regulations 1.6050S-1. Threshold amounts are indexed for inflation from calendar year 2027; check IRS.gov/InflationAdjustment for the current year.