Who must file Form 1099-NEC
File Form 1099-NEC for each person to whom you paid, in the course of your trade or business, $2,000 or more during the year for services performed by someone who is not your employee (including parts and materials), or as attorneys' fees. Nonprofits, government agencies, trusts of qualified plans and exempt cooperatives count as trades or businesses for this purpose. Personal payments are never reportable.
You must also file a 1099-NEC for anyone from whom you withheld federal income tax under the backup withholding rules, regardless of amount. That is the rule that turns a $300 vendor with no W-9 into a required return.
Directors' fees, commissions to non-employee salespeople, prizes and awards for services, fees to lottery sales agents, golden parachute payments to non-employees and, from 2026, excess golden parachute payments (box 3) all go here. Payments by a federal executive agency for services are reportable even to corporations.
Threshold: $2,000, per payee per year, for payments made after 2025 (previously $600); indexed for inflation from 2027.
What is reported, box by box
| Box | What it reports | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 1a | Nonemployee compensation | The $2,000 test applies to this box. Includes fees, commissions, prizes and awards for services, and attorneys' fees. |
| 1b | Cash tips | New for 2026 (P.L. 119-21): cash tips included in box 1a. |
| 1c | Treasury Tipped Occupation Code | New for 2026: the code for the tipped occupation. |
| 1d | Overtime compensation | New for 2026: qualified overtime compensation included in box 1a. |
| 2 | Direct sales of $5,000 or more | Checkbox for consumer products sold for resale; may be reported here or on 1099-MISC box 7. Using the NEC pulls the whole filing to January 31. |
| 3 | Excess golden parachute payments | Moved to the 1099-NEC from the 1099-MISC for 2026. |
| 4 | Federal income tax withheld | Backup withholding at 24%. Must tie to Form 945. |
| 5 to 7 | State information | State tax withheld, payer state number, state income. Convenience boxes for the state copy; not read by the IRS. |
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 1099-NEC
- Payments to a corporation, including an LLC taxed as a C or S corporation, except attorneys' fees and payments by federal executive agencies for services.
- Payments for merchandise, freight, storage, telephone and similar items.
- Payments made with a credit card, debit card or through a third-party network: the payment settlement entity reports them on Form 1099-K, not you.
- Wages, bonuses and prizes to employees (Form W-2); scholarships; canceled debt (1099-C); rent (1099-MISC box 1).
- Payments to tax-exempt organizations, governments, IRAs and similar trusts; difficulty-of-care payments within the section 131 limits.
Due dates and extensions
| Copy | Due | For 2026 returns |
|---|---|---|
| To the IRS, paper | January 31 | Monday, February 1, 2027 (January 31 is a Sunday) |
| To the IRS, electronic | January 31 | Monday, February 1, 2027 (January 31 is a Sunday) |
| To the recipient | January 31 | Monday, February 1, 2027 (January 31 is a Sunday) |
No automatic extension. Form 8809 grants an extension for the 1099-NEC (and W-2) only on a showing of one of the listed hardships, and it must be filed by January 31. 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.
Backup withholding and TIN matching
Nonemployee compensation is a section 6041A reportable payment, so backup withholding at 24% applies the moment a payee fails to furnish a TIN, and again when the IRS tells you (on a CP2100) that the name/TIN pair is wrong. There is no awaiting-TIN grace: the 60-day exemption is for interest and dividends only, so a contractor who "applied for" an EIN is withheld on from the first payment. Report the tax in box 4 and on Form 945; the EIN on the 945 must be the EIN on the 1099-NECs.
1099-NEC payers may use the IRS TIN Matching program, and should: the form has the highest mismatch rate of any information return because its payees are individuals and single-member LLCs who put the business name on line 1.
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 1099-NEC:
- Sole proprietors and disregarded LLCs. The individual's name goes on the first name line and the business or LLC name on the second. A 1099-NEC filed as "Riverside Landscaping LLC" with the owner's SSN mismatches every time. See which name goes on the W-9.
- Attorneys. An attorney must supply a TIN even as a corporation, and you must backup withhold if they refuse; the corporate exception does not apply to legal services.
- Deceased contractors. Payments after death go on 1099-MISC box 3 to the estate or beneficiary with that person's TIN, not on the NEC under the decedent's SSN.
- Second TIN notice box. Check it when the IRS has notified you twice in three years about the same payee; the IRS then stops sending notices for that account. Two notices in the same year, or for the same tax year, count as one.
- Same TIN, different payer. A contractor paid through both your operating company and a subsidiary needs a return from each EIN, each above its own $2,000.
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 1099-NEC 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.
Corrections and state copies
A wrong amount, code or checkbox is a Type 1 correction: one corrected return with the CORRECTED box checked. A wrong or missing payee TIN, a wrong payee name, or the wrong form type is a Type 2 correction: a zeroed-out copy of the original plus a new original, in that order. 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 1099-NEC is a Combined Federal/State Filing program form: e-file it with the CF/SF election and the IRS forwards it to participating states. Whether that satisfies a given state, or the state wants a direct filing with its own transmittal, is on each state pages.
Questions people ask about Form 1099-NEC
Is the $2,000 threshold for 2025 or 2026 payments?
Payments made after December 31, 2025. The 1099-NECs filed in January 2027 for 2026 use $2,000; the ones filed in January 2026 for 2025 used $600. From 2027 the amount is indexed for inflation.
We paid a contractor $1,500 by check and $3,000 by card. Do we file?
No. Card and third-party-network payments are excluded from the NEC (the processor files a 1099-K), and the remaining $1,500 is under the threshold. Keep the W-9 anyway.
Can we get an extension for the 1099-NEC?
Not automatically. Form 8809 gives no automatic 30 days for the 1099-NEC (or W-2); an extension is granted only for specified hardships. Plan for January 31.
Is an LLC exempt?
Only if it is taxed as a C or S corporation, which the W-9 tells you. A single-member or partnership LLC is reportable.
Other federal forms
1042-S · 1097-BTC · 1098 · 1098-C · 1098-E · 1098-F · 1098-Q · 1098-T · 1098-VLI · 1099-A · 1099-B · 1099-C · 1099-CAP · 1099-DIV · 1099-G · 1099-INT · 1099-K · 1099-LS · 1099-LTC · 1099-MISC · 1099-OID · 1099-PATR · 1099-Q · 1099-QA · 1099-R · 1099-S · 1099-SA · 1099-SB · 3921 · 3922 · 5498 · 5498-ESA · 5498-SA · 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 1099-MISC and 1099-NEC (Rev. December 2026); Pub 1099 (2026) Guide to Information Returns; IRC 6041A, 3406; P.L. 119-21 sections 70201, 70202 and 70433. Threshold amounts are indexed for inflation from calendar year 2027; check IRS.gov/InflationAdjustment for the current year.