Do podcasters outside the US need an ITIN?

Where podcast income comes from, and what each payer asks for

Each payer decides for itself what it needs from you, so the answer depends on who’s paying.

If you publish video episodes on YouTube, that income follows Google’s rules. See the YouTube tax form guide.

Spotify: only US listening is withheld on

Spotify pays creators through Spotify Payouts and splits them by market. It says “all earnings from the US market are paid by Spotify USA Inc,” while earnings from every other market are paid by Spotify AB, its Swedish company. Spotify says it doesn’t withhold tax on the Spotify AB payments.

For the US part, non-US creators must submit an IRS Form W-8. Spotify’s wording: “Earnings you generate from consumption in the U.S. may be subject to U.S. withholding tax at a rate between 0-30% depending on the tax documentation you provide.” Until you submit the form, your payouts stay on hold. Spotify sends a Form 1042-S for US-sourced earnings on or before April 15 of the following year.

The Spotify Partner Program, which pays for video podcast engagement, is open only to creators with a legal address in a short list of countries: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Monaco, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden, Switzerland, the UK and the US.

Apple Podcasts Subscriptions

Apple says all partners “must complete a U.S. tax form to meet the requirements of the Podcasts agreement.” You add it in Apple Podcasts Connect: click Business, select your legal entity, then under Tax Forms click Add Tax Info. For partners outside the US, Apple says “the W-8BEN, W-8BEN-E, or W-8ECI may be required.”

Apple’s podcast tax page doesn’t say whether it withholds US tax on subscription sales to non-US partners, or at what rate. It does mention ITINs, but only in its section on the W-9 for US-based partners. That section doesn’t apply to you if you’re not a US person.

Patreon: a W-8BEN, but no US withholding

Patreon is the simplest of the three. “All creators who are not US citizens must submit a W-8BEN or W-8BEN-E in order to pay out their funds,” it says, and it describes the form as a way to prove you’re not a US citizen. Its EU tax FAQ is direct: “Patreon doesn’t withhold any taxes from your funds earned on Patreon.”

Patreon’s form asks for the tax number your own country issued you, not a US one. Two things to know:

• Patreon adds VAT and similar taxes to patron payments where the law requires it, and remits them itself.
• Local rules can still apply. From October 2025 Patreon withholds Mexican income tax from creators based in Mexico. That’s Mexican tax, not US tax.

Sponsors and where you record

A sponsor that pays you for an ad read is paying for a service. IRS Publication 519 says compensation for services performed in the United States is US-source income, and the reverse holds too: a read you record at home, outside the US, is foreign-source. The US doesn’t tax nonresidents on foreign-source income, although a US sponsor may still ask for a W-8BEN for its records.

Two exceptions are worth watching. If you record episodes while in the US, pay for that work is US-source. And if a deal licenses your recordings for the sponsor to reuse in the US, that part can be a royalty, which is taxed where it’s used.

When an ITIN is worth getting

For the forms above you can normally use your own country’s tax number. The IRS W-8BEN instructions require an ITIN for a treaty claim only if you don’t give a tax number from your country of residence. An ITIN becomes useful if:

• your country doesn’t issue tax numbers and you want a treaty rate on Spotify or YouTube earnings
• you want to reclaim over-withheld US tax, which needs a Form 1040-NR and an SSN or ITIN
• you earned US-source income, for example by recording in the US, that withholding didn’t cover

If one of those applies, How to apply for an ITIN covers Form W-7. You can file it yourself for free, or have it prepared. The content creators overview compares the other creator platforms.