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Tax Guide, Dependents
Qualifying Child Test


Five tests must be met for a child to be your qualifying child. The five tests are:

  1. Relationship,

  2. Age,

  3. Residency,

  4. Support, and

  5. Joint return.

If a child meets the five tests to be the qualifying child of more than one person, there are rules you must use to determine which person can actually treat the child as a qualifying child. See Qualifying Child of More Than One Person.

1.  Relationship Test

To meet this test, a child must be:

  • Your son, daughter, stepchild, foster child, or a descendant (for example, your grandchild) of any of them, or

  • Your brother, sister, half brother, half sister, stepbrother, stepsister, or a descendant (for example, your niece or nephew) of any of them.

2.  Age Test

To meet this test, a child must be:

  • Under age 19 at the end of the year and younger than you (or your spouse if filing jointly),

  • A student under age 24 at the end of the year and younger than you (or your spouse if filing jointly), or

  • Permanently and totally disabled at any time during the year, regardless of age.

Student defined.

To qualify as a student, your child must be, during some part of each of any 5 calendar months of the year:

  1. A full-time student at a school that has a regular teaching staff, course of study, and a regularly enrolled student body at the school, or

  2. A student taking a full-time, on-farm training course given by a school described in (1), or by a state, county, or local government agency.

3.   Residency Test

To meet this test, your child must have lived with you for more than half the year. There are exceptions for temporary absences, children who were born or died during the year, kidnapped children, and children of divorced or separated parents.

A person is considered to live with you as a member of your household during periods of time when one of you, or both, are temporarily absent due to special circumstances such as:  Illness, education, business, vacation, military service or detention in a juvenile facility. 

Children of divorced or separated parents (or parents who live apart):  In most cases, because of the residency test, a child of divorced or separated parents is the qualifying child of the custodial parent. However, the child may be treated as the qualifying child of the noncustodial parent under certain circumstances.

4.  Support Test

To meet this test, the child can't have provided more than half of his or her own support for the year.

This test is different from the support test to be a qualifying relative. If you aren't sure whether a child provided more than half of his or her own support, refer to IRS Publication 501..

5.  Joint Return Test

To meet this test, the child can't file a joint return for the year.

For examples and additional information, please refer to IRS Publication 501