The dollar amount to claim for a dependent on your federal return is either $2,200 or $500 per person, depending on the dependent’s age and relationship to you. A qualifying child under 17 is worth up to $2,200 through the Child Tax Credit. Anyone else who qualifies as your dependent — an older teen, a college student, an elderly parent, a disabled sibling — is worth $500 through the Credit for Other Dependents. Those are the direct per-dependent numbers, but they’re not the whole story. Claiming a dependent can also unlock the Earned Income Tax Credit, the Child and Dependent Care Credit, and Head of Household filing status, and those benefits can add thousands more.
The $2,200 Child Tax Credit
For the 2026 tax year, the Child Tax Credit is worth up to $2,200 for each qualifying child.1Internal Revenue Service. Child Tax Credit It’s a credit, not a deduction, so it comes off your tax bill dollar-for-dollar.
To get the full $2,200, the child has to be under 17 at the end of the year, pass the dependent tests, and have a Social Security number valid for employment issued before the due date of your return, including extensions.1Internal Revenue Service. Child Tax Credit An ITIN doesn’t work here. The age-17 cutoff catches many parents off guard: the day your child turns 17, the credit drops from $2,200 to $500.
How Much Can Come Back as a Refund
The CTC has two layers. The non-refundable portion can zero out your tax bill but won’t send you a refund on its own. The refundable portion, called the Additional Child Tax Credit, can generate an actual refund. For 2026 that refundable amount is capped at $1,700 per qualifying child, and you need at least $2,500 in earned income to claim any of it.1Internal Revenue Service. Child Tax Credit
Say your total tax liability is $800 and you have one qualifying child. The non-refundable portion wipes out the $800. The remaining $1,400 of the credit can come back to you as a refund, under the $1,700 cap. If your liability were already zero, you could still receive up to $1,700 as a refund with enough earned income.
When the Credit Shrinks
You get the full $2,200 if your income is at or below $200,000, or $400,000 for married couples filing jointly. Above those lines, the credit drops by $50 for every $1,000 of income over the threshold.1Internal Revenue Service. Child Tax Credit A married couple with two children and $440,000 of income is $40,000 over. That’s 40 increments of $50, or $2,000 off their combined $4,400 credit, leaving $2,400.
You claim the CTC and its refundable portion on Schedule 8812, attached to Form 1040.2Internal Revenue Service. About Schedule 8812 (Form 1040), Credits for Qualifying Children and Other Dependents
The $500 Credit for Other Dependents
Any dependent who doesn’t qualify for the $2,200 CTC is worth $500 through the Credit for Other Dependents. That covers a 17- or 18-year-old still living at home, a college-age child you support, an aging parent, and other qualifying relatives.3Internal Revenue Service. Understanding the Credit for Other Dependents
The $500 is non-refundable. It can reduce what you owe down to zero, but it won’t put money back in your pocket beyond that. One thing that’s easier here: the dependent can have either a Social Security number or an ITIN, so this credit reaches dependents who can’t get an SSN.3Internal Revenue Service. Understanding the Credit for Other Dependents
The phase-out mirrors the Child Tax Credit exactly: full amount up to $200,000 ($400,000 joint), then $50 less for each $1,000 over.4Internal Revenue Service. Here’s How the Credit for Other Dependents Can Benefit Taxpayers The ODC goes on the same Schedule 8812.
The Earned Income Tax Credit
For lower- and moderate-income working families, the EITC is often the biggest single benefit on the return, and the number of qualifying children directly drives the amount. For the 2025 tax year, the maximum EITC was $4,328 with one qualifying child, $7,152 with two, and $8,046 with three or more.5Internal Revenue Service. Earned Income and Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) Tables The 2026 figures adjust for inflation but the structure holds.
The EITC is fully refundable. You receive the whole amount whether or not you owe any tax. You need earned income from a job or self-employment to qualify, and your investment income has to stay under a threshold — $11,950 for the 2025 tax year.5Internal Revenue Service. Earned Income and Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) Tables You can’t claim it filing married filing separately, and the child needs a valid SSN.
The Child and Dependent Care Credit
If you pay someone to care for a child under 13 or for a dependent of any age who can’t care for themselves, so that you can work or look for work, the Child and Dependent Care Credit offsets part of what you spent.6Internal Revenue Service. Child and Dependent Care Credit FAQs
The credit is a percentage of your qualifying expenses, and the percentage depends on your AGI. At $15,000 or less, you get 35%. It drops as income climbs and bottoms out at 20% once AGI passes $43,000.6Internal Revenue Service. Child and Dependent Care Credit FAQs Qualifying expenses cap at $3,000 for one dependent or $6,000 for two or more. The biggest possible credit is $2,100 (35% of $6,000).
Daycare, nursery school, in-home sitters, and summer day camps count. Overnight camps don’t, and neither does tuition for first grade and up.6Internal Revenue Service. Child and Dependent Care Credit FAQs You report the provider’s name, address, and taxpayer ID on Form 2441. If the provider won’t share their TIN, you can still claim the credit by attaching a statement about your efforts to obtain it.7IRS. Instructions for Form 2441 – Child and Dependent Care Expenses
If You Also Use a Dependent Care FSA
Employers offering a Dependent Care Flexible Spending Account let you set aside up to $7,500 pretax per household in 2026.8FSAFEDS. New 2026 Maximum Limit Updates Every dollar you route through the DCFSA reduces the $3,000 or $6,000 expense cap for the care credit by that same dollar.9FSAFEDS. FAQs Put $5,000 through the FSA with two qualifying dependents and your credit expense cap drops from $6,000 to $1,000. For most higher-income households, the FSA’s pretax savings beat the credit, but the numbers deserve a look either way.
Head of Household Filing Status
A dependent can also qualify you to file as Head of Household, which pairs a bigger standard deduction with wider tax brackets. The 2026 standard deduction for HOH is $24,150, versus $16,100 for a single filer. That $8,050 gap saves most filers between $960 and $1,770 in tax before credits.10Internal Revenue Service. IRS Releases Tax Inflation Adjustments for Tax Year 2026, Including Amendments From the One, Big, Beautiful Bill
To file HOH, you must be unmarried or considered unmarried on the last day of the year, have paid more than half the cost of keeping up your home, and have a qualifying dependent who lived with you more than half the year. A qualifying parent can trigger HOH even if they don’t live with you, as long as you paid more than half the cost of their home.
The brackets add more. In 2026, a single filer hits the 22% bracket at $50,401 of taxable income; a Head of Household filer stays in the 12% bracket up to $67,451. That extra $17,050 taxed at 12% rather than 22% is worth another $1,705.
Who Actually Counts as a Dependent
None of these numbers matter until the person passes the IRS’s dependent tests. Federal law recognizes two categories: a qualifying child and a qualifying relative.11Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 26 USC 152 – Dependent Defined
A qualifying child has to be your child, stepchild, foster child, sibling, or a descendant of one, under 19 (or under 24 if a full-time student, or any age if permanently and totally disabled), living with you more than half the year, not providing more than half of their own support, and not filing a joint return except to claim a refund of withholding.12Internal Revenue Service. Dependents
A qualifying relative can be a parent, grandparent, sibling, aunt, uncle, in-law, or an unrelated person who lived with you all year. Their gross income has to be under $5,300 for 2026, and you have to have provided more than half of their total support for the year.13Internal Revenue Service. Publication 501, Dependents, Standard Deduction, and Filing Information Support includes housing measured at fair rental value, not what your mortgage actually costs — which is where the calculation trips people up most often.
What This Looks Like in Real Numbers
The total dollar value of a dependent depends on the person’s age, your income, and your filing status. A single parent with one child under 13 earning $30,000 could see the full $2,200 CTC (up to $1,700 refundable), several thousand dollars of EITC, part of the Child and Dependent Care Credit, and the Head of Household benefit. That combination easily clears $7,000 in tax savings and refundable credits.
A higher-earning married couple claiming an elderly parent gets $500 through the Credit for Other Dependents and, if the parent needs supervised care so both spouses can work, a modest care credit on top of that. Roughly a dozen states and the District of Columbia run their own child tax credits ranging from $75 to several thousand dollars, so the federal numbers are the floor rather than the ceiling.