France Tax Residency: The 183-Day Rule, Foyer Fiscal, and the Exit Tax
If you live, work, or spend significant time in France, French tax law may consider you a tax resident — and that changes what you must declare. The short answer: you are a French tax resident if any one of four criteria in article 4 B of the Code général des impôts is met — your foyer (family home) is in France, you spend at least 183 days there in a year, your main professional activity is in France, or France is the center of your economic interests. One criterion is enough. And if you leave France after years of residency holding substantial shares, the exit tax can tax your unrealized gains.
The four criteria of article 4 B
French domestic law lists four tests, and meeting just one makes you fiscally domiciled in France:
- Your foyer is in France. The foyer is the place where you habitually live and where the center of your family interests lies. For a married or PACS couple, it is where the spouse or partner and children habitually live; if you are single with no children, it is the place where you habitually reside apart from professional travel.
- France is your main place of stay. As a rule of thumb, you are considered to stay mainly in France if you are physically present there more than six months — at least 183 days — in a given year. Temporary stays elsewhere for professional reasons or exceptional circumstances do not count as breaking that presence.
- You carry out your main professional activity in France, whether employed or self-employed, unless you can show the French activity is only ancillary.
- The center of your economic interests is in France — where your main investments sit, where your business is headquartered, or where most of your income comes from.
Note the hierarchy: the Conseil d'État has held that the "main place of stay" test only applies when there is no foyer. And your family staying in France keeps your foyer there even if your work takes you abroad for most of the year.
The 183-day rule in practice
The 183 days do not need to be consecutive — they are counted cumulatively over the calendar year. Physical presence is what matters: the tax administration looks at where you actually are, not at the length of your leases or visa stamps. Short business trips or vacations outside France do not erase French presence.
Because the foyer test comes first, the 183-day count matters most for people without a family base in France — for example, a single consultant splitting the year between Paris and London. If your spouse and children remain in France while you work elsewhere, the foyer criterion alone makes you a resident regardless of day counts.
What residency changes
A French tax resident is taxable on worldwide income (revenus mondiaux): salaries, business profits, dividends, rental income, and capital gains from every country must be declared in France. Tax treaties generally prevent double taxation through credits or exemptions, but they do not exempt you from declaring. Bilateral treaties can also override domestic criteria — if a treaty's tie-breaker assigns your residency to another country, France follows the treaty.
A non-resident, by contrast, is taxed only on French-source income (a French salary, French rental income, French capital gains) and files the non-resident return.
Arriving in France
Your first year is split: you file for the part of the year you were resident, and for any non-resident period in which you earned French-source income. Notify the tax administration of your arrival and new address through your espace particulier on impots.gouv.fr, which also lets you set up your prélèvement à la source (pay-as-you-earn) rate. Newcomers who have never filed before can file a first declaration to be registered in the system.
Leaving France: the exit tax
When you transfer your tax domicile out of France, article 167 bis of the Code général des impôts may tax your unrealized (latent) capital gains on shares as if you had sold them the day before leaving. You fall in scope if you were a French tax resident for at least six of the last ten years before departure and either:
- the total value of your shares and securities reaches at least €800,000 at the date of departure, or
- you hold, directly or together with family members, at least 50% of a company's shares.
The latent gain is taxed like an ordinary capital gain under the prélèvement forfaitaire unique regime (the exact 2026 rate [NEEDS VERIFICATION]). Payment can be deferred (sursis de paiement) — automatically within the EU/EEA — and the charge can be cancelled if you keep the shares for the required holding period after departure (2 or 5 years depending on the situation [NEEDS VERIFICATION]).
Separately, when you leave France you must signal your departure to the tax office, file a final return covering the year of departure, and — if you move outside the EU/EEA — generally appoint a tax representative (représentant fiscal) in France.
Frequently asked questions
Q: Do the 183 days have to be consecutive?
A: No. They are counted cumulatively over the calendar year; short trips abroad do not reset the count.
Q: My spouse and children stay in France while I work in another country most of the year. Am I still a French tax resident?
A: Yes. The foyer criterion is enough on its own — your family home remaining in France keeps you fiscally domiciled there.
Q: I work remotely from France for a foreign employer. Does that make me a resident?
A: Possibly on two grounds: your main place of stay, if you spend over 183 days in France, and your professional activity, which is carried out in France even if the employer is foreign.
Q: Can a tax treaty override French residency rules?
A: Yes. Treaties take precedence over domestic law, and their tie-breaker rules (permanent home, center of vital interests, habitual abode) determine which country taxes you as a resident.
Sources
- https://www.service-public.gouv.fr/particuliers/vosdroits/F62
- https://www.impots.gouv.fr/particulier/suis-je-bien-non-resident
- https://www.impots.gouv.fr/particulier/questions/je-quitte-la-france-suis-je-concerne-par-lexit-tax
- https://bofip.impots.gouv.fr/bofip/1911-PGP.html/identifiant=BOI-IR-CHAMP-10-20160728