Technical article

Which Countries Have a US Estate and Gift Treaty, and Why It Matters for My Heirs

Switzerland's cantonal gift taxes are not covered by any tax treaty, even though the country has an estate-only treaty with the United States.

By Neil Solomon · 3 min read

Imagine a US citizen whose children live in two different countries. One lives in Germany and the other in Spain. The family has heard that a treaty can protect heirs from being taxed twice on the same death. Does either country have one with the United States?

The IRS publishes the list. Its page was last reviewed on 8 September 2026, and it names fifteen countries. That makes it a tier A source. Seven of the treaties cover both estate and gift tax. Eight cover estate tax only.

Canada's estate rules sit inside its income tax treaty. In the example, the child in Germany lives in a country on the first line. The child in Spain lives in a country with no listed treaty.

What a treaty changes. The sources say treaties can narrow what counts as US-situs. That matters for a non-resident who is not a citizen, since the United States taxes such a person only on assets in the US, such as real estate, tangible property and US company stock. A non-resident files Form 706-NA if those assets are over US$60,000.

What it matters for. The United States taxes its citizens and people domiciled there on assets everywhere, with an exclusion of US$15 million per person for 2026. Germany taxes the heir if the heir is a German resident. France taxes the heir if the heir has lived in France 6 of the last 10 years. Spain taxes residents on what they acquire anywhere. These rules can reach the same estate.

Estate only is not the same as both. Italy shows the difference. Its inheritance and gift tax is 4% above EUR 1 million (approximately US$1.1 million) per heir for a spouse or child, and the same rates apply to gifts. The treaty with the United States covers the estate side only. A family with a child in France and another in Italy has one country on the first line of the table and one on the second. The same is true for the Netherlands, which taxes heirs at 10% to 40% and sits in the estate-only group.

Without a treaty. Some countries give relief on their own. Germany has few inheritance treaties and gives a unilateral credit for foreign inheritance tax. Turkey, with no US treaty listed, allows tax paid abroad on inherited property to be deducted from its base. Switzerland's cantonal gift taxes are not covered by any tax treaty, even though the country has an estate-only treaty with the United States.

You might say: "No treaty means my heirs will be taxed twice." The list says there is no treaty. It does not say the heirs pay twice. Whether a second country gives a credit depends on that country's own rule, as Germany and Turkey show. And a treaty only helps with the taxes it covers. The Swiss cantons, for example, are outside it for gifts.

You could use the list as a first filter. For each child's country, you could ask whether it is on the list, and if so, which type. Then you could ask what that country does for tax paid elsewhere, treaty or not.

If you have an heir in a country on this list, or off it, what did their tax office say about a US estate? Share it here, because someone facing the same question may benefit from your story.

Figures are estimates for planning, based on public data. Date read: October 2026.