Fill out a W-9 online — free fillable IRS Form W-9

No. You never file a W-9 with the IRS. The form is a request from a payer to you, so once you complete and sign it you send it back to whoever asked for it — your client, the business that hired you, your bank, your brokerage, or your property manager. They keep it on file (usually for about 4 years) and use the Taxpayer Identification Number on it to prepare your year-end information return, such as a Form 1099-NEC. The IRS only ever sees the resulting 1099, not your W-9.

Yes. You can fill out the official IRS Form W-9 (Rev. March 2024), type your TIN, pick your tax classification, sign and download a flattened PDF for free, with no credit card; the free version adds a watermark, removed on paid plans. There is no Docusign-style 30-day trial wall and no forced account just to access the form. iFillPDF runs 100% in your browser for this form, and your SSN is processed on EU servers in Frankfurt — not a US datacenter.

Enter your personal legal name on Line 1 (as it appears on your income tax return). Leave Line 2 blank unless you operate under a registered trade name (DBA), in which case put that on Line 2. Check "Individual/sole proprietor or single-member LLC" as your federal tax classification on Line 3a. Enter your address. In Part II, provide your Social Security Number — or your EIN if you have obtained one. Then sign and date Part III. Even if you invoice under a business name, the IRS matches reporting to the legal name on Line 1.

It depends on how your LLC is taxed, not how it is registered with your state. For a single-member LLC treated as a disregarded entity (the default), enter the owner's legal name on Line 1, the LLC name on Line 2, check "Individual/sole proprietor or single-member LLC," and provide the owner's SSN or the LLC's EIN. For a multi-member LLC taxed as a partnership, put the LLC's registered name on Line 1, check the LLC box and enter "P" for partnership, and provide the LLC's EIN. If the LLC elected C- or S-corporation taxation, check LLC and enter "C" or "S" and use the corporate EIN. Picking the wrong classification is one of the most common W-9 errors.

Backup withholding is a flat 24% the IRS requires a payer to hold back from your payments and send to the IRS when there is no valid, signed W-9 with a correct TIN on file (26 U.S. Code §3406). It also kicks in if the name and TIN you give do not match IRS records — the payer receives a CP2100 or CP2100A notice and may start withholding until you correct it. Providing an accurate, signed W-9 is how you tell the payer no backup withholding is needed, so you get paid in full.

A W-9 is for non-employees — independent contractors, freelancers, vendors and consultants — and simply gives a payer your TIN so they can report payments to you on a 1099. A W-4 (Employee's Withholding Certificate) is for employees and tells your employer how much federal income tax to withhold from each paycheck. A W-9 does not adjust any withholding. If a company treats you as an employee, you complete a W-4; if it treats you as a contractor, you complete a W-9.

No. A W-9 is only for US persons (US citizens, resident aliens, and US entities such as US LLCs and corporations). If you are a foreign individual or non-resident alien, you give the payer a Form W-8BEN instead; foreign entities use Form W-8BEN-E. These forms certify your non-US status and let you claim any tax-treaty benefits. Filling out a W-9 when you should use a W-8BEN can cause incorrect reporting and withholding, so confirm your status first.

Yes. The IRS explicitly permits electronic completion and signature of Form W-9 under IRS Announcement 98-27, as long as the electronic system preserves the exact information the paper form would contain, identifies and authenticates the signer, keeps the perjury statement, and lets the payer produce a hard copy if the IRS asks. iFillPDF meets these conditions — you can draw, type or upload your signature, and we keep a SHA-256 record of the signed document. A W-9 does not require a wet-ink signature.

Use the IRS Form W-9 marked Rev. March 2024. That is the most recent revision the IRS issued and it remains the current version for all succeeding tax years, so it is the right one to use in 2026. iFillPDF always serves the current Rev. 03/2024 form, so you never submit an outdated version — submitting an old revision is a common reason a requester asks you to redo the form.

Yes. Your W-9 — including your SSN or EIN — is processed on Hetzner Falkenstein eu-central-1 in Germany, under the EU-US Data Privacy Framework, which keeps your data outside the reach of the US Cloud Act 50 U.S. Code §3024 and FISA Section 702. We use AES-256-GCM encryption at rest, TLS 1.3 in transit, purge files within 24 hours, and never use your document to train AI. By contrast, common US-based W-9 tools route your SSN through AWS US infrastructure. When you send the completed W-9 to a requester, use a secure channel rather than plain email.