Fill Out Form 8843 Online (International Students & Scholars, 2025)

Short answer: Form 8843 is a short statement that international students, scholars, teachers and trainees in the United States file so that their days in the country do not count toward the substantial presence test, which would otherwise make them U.S. tax residents. You file it even if you had no U.S. income: attached to Form 1040-NR if you file one, or mailed on its own to the IRS in Austin. The blank form is free on irs.gov; you can also fill it on screen here.

PDFConverter2 is an independent website. It is not affiliated with the IRS or any government agency. This guide summarizes the 2025 Form 8843 and its instructions and is not tax advice. Your school's international office and Publication 519 are the right places for questions about your residency status.

Who files it

The instructions say an alien individual files Form 8843 to explain why days in the United States can be excluded, because they:

• were an exempt individual: a student on an F, J, M or Q visa, a teacher or trainee on a J or Q visa, or a professional athlete in a charitable sports event; or
• could not leave because of a medical condition that arose while they were in the United States.

Foreign-government-related individuals on most A or G visas do not need to file it. Holders of A-3 and G-5 visas count all their days.

Being exempt has limits. A student generally cannot exclude days after being exempt as a teacher, trainee or student for more than 5 calendar years, unless they show they do not intend to reside permanently in the United States. A teacher or trainee generally cannot exclude days if they were exempt for any part of 2 of the 6 prior years, with an exception explained in the instructions.

How the form is laid out

• Top: name, U.S. taxpayer identification number if you have one (SSN or ITIN), and your addresses in your home country and in the United States. Fill the addresses only if you file Form 8843 by itself.
• Part I, general information: line 1a visa type and date of your most recent entry (your electronic I-94 record at i94.cbp.dhs.gov shows it); 1b current status and any change of status; 2 citizenship; 3a–3b passport country and number; 4a days physically present in 2025, 2024 and 2023; 4b days in 2025 you exclude.
• Part II, teachers and trainees: the institution or program, your visa type in each of the previous six years, and whether you were exempt in 2 of those years.
• Part III, students: the school and the program director, your visa type in each of the previous six years, whether you were exempt for more than 5 years, and whether you applied for permanent residence.
• Part IV, professional athletes and Part V, medical condition (a physician completes line 18).

If you attach the form to Form 1040-NR, you may skip lines 1a to 4a when that information is already on the 1040-NR, and write "Information provided on Form 1040-NR" on line 1a.

Common mistakes

• Not filing because you had no income. The form is about days of presence, not income.
• Counting days wrongly on line 4a. Any part of a day you were physically present counts as a day.
• One form for the whole family. Each person excluding days fills their own form.
• Completing the wrong Part. Students use Part III, J-1 scholars and teachers Part II.
• Mailing it to the 1040-NR address when filing it alone. The stand-alone address is the Austin one below.
• Forgetting to sign a stand-alone form.

Where to send it and when

• With a tax return: attach Form 8843 to your 2025 Form 1040-NR and mail both to the address in the 1040-NR instructions by the return's due date, including extensions.
• On its own: mail it to Department of the Treasury, Internal Revenue Service Center, Austin, TX 73301-0215 by the due date for Form 1040-NR. Under the 1040-NR instructions this is generally April 15 if you had wages subject to U.S. withholding, and June 15 if you did not. Check the current year's dates before mailing.

The IRS does not send a confirmation. Keep a copy and proof of mailing, because the form is your record that those days were excluded.

Related forms

• Form W-7: ITIN application; reason f is for nonresident students, professors and researchers.
• Form W-8BEN: what you give a U.S. payer, such as a bank or a scholarship payer, to certify foreign status.

Filling it here

Press Fill out the form at the top of this page to open the official IRS PDF in our editor, in a new window. Fill the top block, Part I and your category's Part, sign, and print it for mailing. Filling is free. Downloading the completed PDF requires a paid plan, the same as our other tools. Files are processed in memory and are not stored beyond the short window described in our privacy policy.