Sri Lanka Withholding tax rates
Sri Lanka Withholding tax rates: no single figure applies. The 4 withholding taxes held run from 10% to 15%, cited to Inland Revenue Act No. 24 of 2017 as amended by the Inland Revenue (Amendment) Act No. 2 of 2025; IRD notice PN/IT/2025-01 (26.03.2025) and circulars SEC/2025/E/02 and SEC/2025/E/03 (rates from 1 April 2025): dividends 15%, interest or discount 10% (raised from 5%), royalties 14%, payments to non-residents (service fees, rent, insurance) 14%, in force since 1 Apr 2025. Last checked on 10 Aug 2026 against corroborating sources; the primary instrument itself was not read.
Official source: Inland Revenue Act No. 24 of 2017 as amended by the Inland Revenue (Amendment) Act No. 2 of 2025; IRD notice secondary · Last checked 2026-08-10 · source fingerprint
The withholding taxes Sri Lanka levies on payments to non-residents under the Inland Revenue Act No. 24 of 2017 as amended, most recently by the Inland Revenue (Amendment) Act No. 2 of 2025 (certified 20 March 2025) which reinstated dividend withholding at 15% and raised interest withholding to 10% from 1 April 2025 - dividends, interest, royalties and service fees, each at its domestic statutory rate before any tax-treaty relief. Administered by the Inland Revenue Department (IRD).
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| Current value | 10–15% across 4 withholding taxes — no single rate |
|---|---|
| In force from | 2025-04-01 |
| Official source | Inland Revenue Act No. 24 of 2017 as amended by the Inland Revenue (Amendment) Act No. 2 of 2025; IRD notice PN/IT/2025-01 (26.03.2025) and circulars SEC/2025/E/02 and SEC/2025/E/03 (rates from 1 April 2025): dividends 15%, interest or discount 10% (raised from 5%), royalties 14%, payments to non-residents (service fees, rent, insurance) 14% |
| Last verified | 2026-08-10 |
| Verification | secondary — Corroborated, but the primary instrument was NOT read (usually the publishing host blocks automated access). The IRD's own notice PDFs (PN/IT/2025-01, SEC/2025/E/02) could not be text-extracted during this pass, so the operative words are not quoted verbatim; rates and the 1 April 2025 effective date are corroborated across two independent practitioner summaries that cite those instruments and the Inland Revenue (Amendment) Act No. 2 of 2025 by name. Treat as secondary until the IRD notice text is quoted directly. |
| Provenance | source fingerprint |
What this value means
THERE IS NO SINGLE WITHHOLDING TAX RATE, WHICH IS WHY value IS NULL. Sri Lanka applies 15% to dividends, 10% to interest, and 14% to royalties and to service fees paid to non-residents; a caller wanting a number must name which payment type and read withholding_rates rather than expecting a headline figure. ALL RATES ARE DOMESTIC STATUTORY RATES, BEFORE TREATY RELIEF. A double-tax agreement can reduce them, and treaty relief requires a tax residence certificate; outward remittances to non-residents additionally require a Tax Clearance Certificate from the Commissioner General of Inland Revenue except for negative-list remittances. We do NOT serve treaty rates: they are bilateral, run to thousands of country pairs, and applying one is a legal determination rather than a lookup. HISTORY MATTERS HERE: withholding tax on many payments was abolished from 1 January 2020, partially reinstated from 1 January 2023 (dividends 15% then briefly removed for resident recipients, interest 5%, service fees 14% via the No. 45 of 2022 amendments), and reset again by the Inland Revenue (Amendment) Act No. 2 of 2025 - dividends 15% reinstated as a final tax and interest raised from 5% to 10%, both from 1 April 2025. Sources dated before April 2025 will quote 5% interest; they are stale, not conflicting.
Get it programmatically
curl https://asiaref.dev/v1/lk/withholding-tax
# $0.005 per call — x402 on Base (USDC). No key, no signup.
# History: curl https://asiaref.dev/v1/lk/withholding-tax/history?from=2020-01-01
# Provenance: curl https://asiaref.dev/provenance/lk/withholding-taxOther Sri Lanka series: Overnight Policy Rate (OPR) · VAT standard rate · VAT registration threshold · National minimum wage · Public holidays · CCPI inflation (year-on-year) · Corporate income tax standard rate · Legal interest rate (Civil Procedure Code s. 192) · Personal income tax bands · Statutory social-insurance contributions
The same figure elsewhere: Taiwan · Thailand · Türkiye · United Arab Emirates · Uzbekistan · all 28