Know exactly what tax your business pays

How business tax works, country by country

Working out how much tax you actually pay as a freelancer, sole trader or small company is rarely simple. The rate on paper is only the starting point. What lands in your pocket depends on your legal form, your country, your social-security contributions, the deductions you can claim, and even whether you are in your first year of activity. BizTaxCalc exists to turn that tangle into a clear, step-by-step number you can trust, for 13 countries and their real tax regimes.

Self-employed vs company: two different tax worlds

Most tax systems treat the self-employed and companies very differently. As a self-employed worker (a sole trader in the UK and Ireland, an autónomo in Spain, a micro-entrepreneur in France, a forfettario or ordinario in Italy, a Freiberufler in Germany), your business profit is usually taxed as personal income. That means progressive income-tax brackets, plus social-security contributions that fund your pension and healthcare. In several countries a simplified or flat-rate scheme lets you swap real bookkeeping for a fixed coefficient or a percentage of turnover, which can dramatically lower both the paperwork and the tax bill.

A company (an SRL in Italy or Belgium, a Ltd in the UK and Ireland, a GmbH in Germany and Switzerland, an LLC or C-corp in the United States, a BV in the Netherlands) is a separate taxpayer. It pays corporate income tax on its profit, and when it distributes what is left to you as dividends, that distribution is often taxed a second time. Incorporating can save tax at higher profit levels, but it adds cost and complexity, and the real saving depends heavily on how you pay yourself. Our LLC vs S-corp vs C-corp guide and sole trader vs limited company comparison walk through exactly when the switch pays off.

Flat-rate and simplified regimes

One of the biggest levers for a small business is the special regime. Italy's forfettario applies a single substitute tax of 5% (for the first five years) or 15% to a profit figure derived from your revenue and an ATECO profitability coefficient. France's micro-entrepreneur regime charges social contributions as a straight percentage of turnover. Portugal's regime simplificado uses coefficients much like Italy's. These schemes trade deductions for simplicity and low rates, which is why they are so popular, and why the effective rate they produce can be far below the headline income-tax scale.

Why the effective rate is what matters

Two freelancers earning the same amount in two countries can keep wildly different sums. At a €50,000 income level, an effective tax-and-contribution rate can sit near 10% in Switzerland, around 19% in the UK, roughly 20-25% under Italy's flat-rate scheme, and close to 48% in Belgium. That is why our country comparison tool converts a single income into every country's typical regime and ranks them from the least to the most taxed, with the option to model your first year, the following years, or the position at regime.

Set the right money aside

Because tax and contributions are usually paid months after you invoice, the single most useful habit for any freelancer is to set aside a slice of every payment. The right percentage depends on your regime, but it typically lands between 20% and 35% of income. The set-aside calculator tells you exactly how much to keep from a given invoice, so a tax bill never comes as a surprise.

Built on official sources, updated for 2026

Tax is a "Your Money, Your Life" subject: a wrong figure can cost you real money. Every rate on BizTaxCalc is based on official sources, the national tax authority for each country cross-checked against PwC Worldwide Tax Summaries, and dated to the 2025 and 2026 tax years. We show the sources on each calculator, keep the rules versioned by year, and state clearly what is and is not included (local, regional, state and cantonal taxes vary by location and are flagged where relevant). BizTaxCalc gives you a transparent estimate to plan with. It does not replace advice from a licensed tax professional, and for any binding decision you should confirm the figures with an accountant qualified in your country.

Ready to see your own numbers? Pick your country above, or jump straight to the comparison to see where you would pay the least.