Revenue published its 2025 Annual Report last week together with a number of research and statistical papers. The report confirms that in 2025, Revenue collected a total of €157 billion, including €34.9 billion collected on behalf of other government departments, agencies, and EU Member States. Timely compliance rates remained strong in 2025, reaching 99 percent for large and medium cases and 93 percent for all other cases, marking a second consecutive year of improvement.
The report also outlines that the top decile of workers paid 59 percent of all income tax collected and 62 percent of all Universal Social Charge (USC) collected. The income earned by the top decile represents about 39 percent of all income earned. This reflects the highly progressive nature of Ireland’s income tax system but also our disproportional reliance on high income earners.
The concentration of income tax receipts from high income earners needs to be considered as part of a broader recalibration of income tax in Ireland. With almost 30 percent of workers contributing very little to the overall tax take, the Government should consider options to broaden the tax base to ensure we can sustain our tax revenues in a less favourable economic environment.
Some more highlights from the report are included below:
- Interventions: During the year, 237,550 audit and compliance interventions were completed yielding €734 million. In addition, 189 tax avoidance cases were completed with a yield of €41.7 million. A provisional statistical report – Karshan Settlement Opportunity – was also released which outlined that Revenue received relevant submissions from 286 employers with total tax adjustments of circa €26.7 million that involve over 6,600 employees.
- Debt Management: On 31 December 2025 there were 18,653 phased payment arrangements (PPAs) in place, covering debt of almost €1 billion. This included €708 million of debt included in the Debt Warehouse Scheme. As of 31 December 2025, €251 million of warehoused debt was deemed uncollectable for reasons such as liquidation, examinership and bankruptcy, while €32 million is subject to debt collection.
- Compliance: The report outlines that 4.5 million electronic returns were filed and almost 16.5 million transactions were processed across all online platforms. The report notes that 6.7 million payroll submissions were successfully filed, alongside 13.5 million declared reportable benefits. Revenue’s statistical report on Income Tax 2025: Insights on PAYE Taxpayers includes further statistics relating to the ERR submissions.
- Correspondence and Helplines: During 2025 Revenue dealt with over 4.5 million items of correspondence and answered over 1.8 million telephone calls from taxpayers and tax agents. The ‘Hold my Place in Queue’ feature which was introduced in 2024 was expanded across the customer service case base in 2025, and over 27 percent of calls to the PAYE helpline during 2025 were handled by this facility.
- Promoting tax awareness: The public repository of Tax and Duty Manuals (TDM’s) which set out the rules and guidelines on a wide range of tax and duty matters was referenced in the report, noting there were 1,359 TDM’s issued as of 31 December 2025.
- VAT Modernisation: The report includes an article on VAT Modernisation (page 42) which provides a summary of the VAT in the Digital Age (ViDA) package and outlines details of the planned phased rollout in Ireland.
- Property taxes: Another article in the report (page 22) provides information regarding the 2025 Local Property Tax (LPT) revaluation which resulted in 1.5 million LPT returns being filed. Ninety percent of the returns were filed online, with 80,000 returns submitted on 3 November alone. In addition, Residential Zoned Land Tax (RZLT) was charged for the first time during 2025 and over 2,100 RZLT returns were filed in respect of this initial charging period, with associated liabilities of €49.2 million being paid.
The full list of statistical analysis and research reports published alongside the Annual Report is:
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