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Qualifying Person: Filing Status and Dependents (2025 IRS Guide)

This guide covers “Qualifying Person” within filing status and dependents. The following material presents the IRS treatment of this topic, including the qualifications, exceptions, and examples in the source section. Read the rules alongside the facts of your own situation before deciding what to report, deduct, or document.

Adapted from Publication 501 (2025), Dependents, Standard Deduction, and Filing Information, published by the Internal Revenue Service. This guide retains the source edition’s years, amounts, deadlines, and examples. It is guidance for that edition, not a statement that the same figures apply to every tax year.

Context for these rules

You may be able to file as head of household if you meet all the following requirements.

.If you qualify to file as head of household, your tax rate will usually be lower than the rates for single or married filing separately. You will also receive a higher standard deduction than if you file as single or married filing separately..

Qualifying Person

See Table 4 to see who is a qualifying person. Any person not described in Table 4 isn’t a qualifying person.

Example 1—child.

Your unmarried child lived with you all year and was 18 years old at the end of the year. Your child didn’t provide more than half of their own support and doesn’t meet the tests to be a qualifying child of anyone else. As a result, this child is your qualifying child (see Qualifying Child, later) and, because this child is single, this is your qualifying person for head of household purposes.

Example 2—child who isn’t qualifying person.

The facts are the same as in Example 1, except your child was 25 years old at the end of the year and your child’s gross income was $6,000. Because your child doesn’t meet the age test (explained later under Qualifying Child), your child isn’t your qualifying child. Because the child doesn’t meet the gross income test (explained later under Qualifying Relative), the child isn’t your qualifying relative. As a result, this child isn’t your qualifying person for head of household purposes.

Example 3—your friend.

Your friend lived with you all year. Even though your friend may be your qualifying relative if the gross income and support tests (explained later) are met, your friend isn’t your qualifying person for head of household purposes because your friend isn’t related to you in one of the ways listed under Relatives who don’t have to live with you, later. See Table 4.

Example 4—friend’s child.

The facts are the same as in Example 3, except your friend’s 10-year-old child also lived with you all year. Your friend’s child isn’t your qualifying child and, because the child is your friend’s qualifying child, your friend’s child isn’t your qualifying relative (see Not a Qualifying Child Test, later). As a result, your friend’s child isn’t your qualifying person for head of household purposes.

Home of qualifying person.

Generally, the qualifying person must live with you for more than half of the year.

Special rule for parent.

If your qualifying person is your parent, you may be eligible to file as head of household even if your parent doesn’t live with you. However, you must be able to claim your parent as a dependent. Also, you must pay more than half the cost of keeping up a home that was the main home for the entire year for your parent.

If you pay more than half the cost of keeping your parent in a rest home or home for the elderly, that counts as paying more than half the cost of keeping up your parent’s main home.

Death or birth.

You may be eligible to file as head of household even if the qualifying person who qualifies you for this filing status is born or dies during the year. To qualify you for head of household filing status, the qualifying person (as defined in Table 4) must be one of the following.

  • Your qualifying child or qualifying relative who lived with you for more than half the part of the year they were alive.

  • Your parent for whom you paid, for the entire part of the year your parent was alive, more than half the cost of keeping up the home your parent lived in.

Example.

You are unmarried. Your parent, who you claim as a dependent, lived in an apartment alone. Your parent died on September 2. The cost of the upkeep of the apartment for the year until your parent’s death was $6,000. You paid $4,000 and your sibling paid $2,000. Your sibling made no other payments toward your parent’s support. Your parent had no income. Because you paid more than half of the cost of keeping up your parent’s apartment from January 1 until your parent’s death, and you can claim your parent as a dependent, you can file as head of household.

Temporary absences.

You and your qualifying person are considered to live together even if one or both of you are temporarily absent from your home due to special circumstances such as illness, education, business, vacation, military service, or detention in a juvenile facility. It must be reasonable to assume the absent person will return to the home after the temporary absence. You must continue to keep up the home during the absence.

Adopted child or foster child.

You may be eligible to file as head of household if the person who qualifies you for this filing status was an adopted child or foster child and you kept up a home for this person in 2025, the person was lawfully placed with you for legal adoption by you in 2025, or the person was an eligible foster child placed with you during 2025. The person is considered to have lived with you for more than half of 2025 if your main home was this person’s main home for more than half the time since the child was adopted or placed with you in 2025.

Kidnapped child.

You may be eligible to file as head of household even if the child who is your qualifying person has been kidnapped. You can claim head of household filing status if all the following statements are true.

  1. The child is presumed by law enforcement authorities to have been kidnapped by someone who isn’t a member of your family or the child’s family.

  2. In the year of the kidnapping, the child lived with you for more than half the part of the year before the kidnapping.

  3. In the year of the child’s return, the child lived with you for more than half the part of the year following the date of the child’s return.

  4. You would have qualified for head of household filing status if the child hadn’t been kidnapped.

This treatment applies for all years until the earlier of:

  1. The year there is a determination that the child is dead, or

  2. The year the child would have reached age 18.

Using the guidance

Keep the documents that establish the dates, amounts, and circumstances described above. References to other chapters, forms, worksheets, or earlier and later sections refer to the linked IRS publication. Check the full publication and its updates before relying on a rule for a different tax year or a situation not addressed here.

Sources and further reading

The cited U.S. government text is in the public domain. Source accessed October 28, 2026. Fynoptic has organized this material for educational use and is independent of, and not endorsed by, the IRS.

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