For Brazilians

How tax residency works

Brazil taxes residents on worldwide income. Non residents pay only on Brazilian source income, mostly through definitive withholding at source, and stop filing the annual return (Declaração de Ajuste Anual).

Residence does not end when you board a plane. If you leave permanently and file the Comunicação de Saída Definitiva do País, the exit communication, you are non resident from your departure date. Without it, Receita Federal, the Brazilian tax authority, treats you as resident for your first 12 consecutive months abroad, taxed on worldwide income, and non resident only from the day after.

You become resident again on arrival if you return intending to live in Brazil, or once you spend more than 183 days in Brazil within 12 months.

The stakes rose with Law 14.754/2023. Since 1 January 2024, residents pay 15% each year on income from offshore investments and, in many cases, on the profits of foreign companies they control, whether or not those profits are paid out. A Brazilian who leaves without a proper exit can stay inside that regime.

Leaving properly

Leaving properly takes two filings with Receita Federal and some housekeeping with everyone who pays you in Brazil.

1. 01

   Send the exit communication

   File the Comunicação de Saída Definitiva do País online, from your departure date until the end of February of the following year.

2. 02

   File the exit return

   File the Declaração de Saída Definitiva do País by the normal annual return deadline the following year, usually the end of May. It covers 1 January to your departure and lists your assets on leaving, and any tax due is paid in a single instalment by the filing date.

3. 03

   Bring earlier years up to date

   Any annual returns you still owe for earlier years must be filed as well, or the exit is not complete.

4. 04

   Tell every Brazilian payer

   Inform employers, the INSS, tenants, brokers and financial institutions in writing that you are now non resident, so they withhold at non resident rates. Brazilian accounts are usually converted to non resident accounts.

5. 05

   Keep your CPF in order

   Your CPF, the individual taxpayer number, stays with you. Update it with your address abroad and keep it free of pending items, because an irregular CPF can block property sales, investments and banking.

6. 06

   Appoint a representative

   If you keep property, investments or income in Brazil, a procurador, a representative holding your power of attorney, makes sales, tax payments and registrations far simpler.

Exit tax, property and investments

Brazil has no general exit tax for individuals. Leaving does not trigger tax on unrealised gains; what matters is that the exit filings are made so you stop being taxed as a resident.

After you leave, Brazilian income is taxed at source. Interest and gains on Brazilian investments are withheld, with reduced or zero rates for some portfolio investments registered under the Central Bank’s rules for foreign investors. Since 1 January 2026, Law 15.270/2025 also applies a 10% withholding tax to dividends paid to non residents, with transition relief for profits earned up to 2025.

Where you live matters. Residents of jurisdictions on Brazil’s list of low tax jurisdictions generally pay a flat 25% on Brazilian income instead of the usual rates. Panama is on that list; the UAE was removed from it in May 2025, and Paraguay, Uruguay and Georgia are not on it.

Brazilian property can be kept. Rent is taxed through withholding, and a gain on sale is taxed at the progressive capital gains rates of 15% to 22.5%, or 25% for residents of listed jurisdictions, collected through your representative or the buyer.

Pensions and social security

Pensions from the INSS, Brazil’s National Social Security Institute, can be paid to you abroad. You keep up the periodic proof of life (prova de vida), which can be done from abroad.

Tax on those pensions changed in 2024. In October 2024 the Supreme Federal Court ruled (Tema 1174) that the flat 25% withholding on pensions paid to Brazilians living abroad is unconstitutional, so the progressive table applies instead. People overcharged in earlier years may be able to reclaim.

You can keep building INSS entitlement while abroad by contributing voluntarily as a segurado facultativo. Brazil’s social security agreements, including the Mercosur agreement covering Paraguay and Uruguay, also let contribution periods in some countries count together.

Private pension plans such as PGBL and VGBL stay in Brazil and are taxed at source under non resident rules when you draw on them.

Dual citizenship

Since Constitutional Amendment 131 of October 2023 (EC 131/2023), Brazilians no longer lose their nationality by acquiring another. Nationality is lost only on an express request to the Brazilian authorities, or when a naturalisation obtained by fraud is cancelled, and a renounced original nationality can be reacquired.

A second residency or a second passport is therefore fully compatible with remaining Brazilian.

Brazilians already travel without a visa to the Schengen area, the United Kingdom, Japan and most of Latin America. For most Brazilians, a second passport is less about travel and more about a Plan B, residence rights and a lawful tax position. The United States still requires a visa.