Taxes: the filing routes, honestly

1 · IRS Free File (guided software)

The IRS's own partnership with tax-software companies: guided software at no cost for taxpayers with adjusted gross income of $89,000 or less (threshold for the 2026 filing season, per IRS News Release IR-2026-38). The trap is the doorway: you must start from the Free File page on IRS.gov — walking in through a partner's own site can quietly break the free offer. Some partners include a free state return; Free File Fillable Forms are available at any income. Partners set extra criteria of their own (one fetched example: TaxAct's Free File offer adds an age 20–60 window outside military filers, and its free state return covers only ten listed states — Texas is not among them, so a Texan on that route pays $39.99 for the state return).

2 · VITA / TCE — free human help

Volunteer Income Tax Assistance and Tax Counseling for the Elderly: free basic return preparation by IRS-certified volunteers, every return quality-reviewed, at sites run by IRS partners. The IRS sets no program-wide income limit; VITA generally serves people making about $70,244 or less, people with disabilities, and limited-English-speaking taxpayers. TCE focuses on people 60 and older and retirement questions. Find a site with the IRS VITA Locator or call 800-906-9887; most TCE sites run through AARP Foundation Tax-Aide (888-227-7669), generally January–April. Houston: enter your Houston ZIP in the locator — sites open across Harris County each filing season, and the locator is the live list.

3 · Cash App Taxes

$0 federal and $0 state, "no matter your tax situation" — including 1099 income, self-employment, and stock or crypto sales — per the company's own taxes page. The catch is the doorway, not the price: you must have (or download) Cash App and file inside it. The company says 12M+ returns have been filed for $0.

4 · FreeTaxUSA

Federal filing is $0 for all tax situations — simple or complex, no forced upgrades — per the company's own published product file. The honest asterisk: a state return costs $15.99, and the add-on menu is printed plainly (Deluxe $7.99, Pro Support $64.99, Audit Defense $19.99, pay-with-refund fee $24.99). Optional means optional.

5 · H&R Block Free Online

$0 federal and state for filers who qualify — simple returns: students, W-2 employees, unemployment income. Block's own guidance says about 52% of filers qualify for its free tier. The ladder is printed on its site: child/dependent care or itemizing moves you to Deluxe; rentals, investments, or crypto to Premium; rideshare, delivery, and marketplace selling to Self-Employed.

6 · TurboTax Free Edition

$0 federal and $0 state if you qualify — and by Intuit's own blog, only about 37% of taxpayers do: Form 1040 with no schedules beyond a short list (EITC, Child Tax Credit, student-loan interest). Itemizing, gig work, investments, or rental income moves you to a paid tier. (Enlisted military E1–E9 file free at any complexity.) Paid-tier list prices were not verified from Intuit's own pricing page in this pass, so we print none.

7 · TaxAct Free

The asterisk shelf: $0 federal, but $54.99 per state return — on the company's own free-filing page. Its free tier covers W-2, unemployment, retirement income, EITC, the Child Tax Credit, and student-loan interest; investments, home sales, rentals, business income, itemizing, HSAs, and self-employment are not covered free. For a Texan there is no state income tax to file — which makes TaxAct's paid-state model less relevant here, and the IRS Free File route above strictly better when you qualify.

For years, the biggest name in tax software advertised "free" while steering filers who qualified for the genuinely free IRS Free File program into paid products. The record, carefully, because this house prints records, not vibes:

• In May 2022, Intuit settled with all 50 state attorneys general and DC for $141 million over that steering. (You will see this retold as an "FTC settlement" — it wasn't; the states brought it.)
• The FTC's own case was separate: an administrative law judge ruled in September 2023 that Intuit's "free" advertising was deceptive (about two-thirds of 2020 filers couldn't use the free product), and the FTC's January 2024 order barred advertising a product as free without clear eligibility disclosure — with no financial penalty.
• And then: in March 2026, the Fifth Circuit vacated the FTC's order on separation-of-powers grounds, holding such claims must proceed in federal court. We print the order and its vacatur — an honest shelf doesn't keep the half of the story it likes.

Citations: state settlement reporting and the FTC case record as collected in SOURCES.md; the FTC's own page was not fetched in this pass and the narrative rests on the reputable secondary sources listed there.

The IRS's own free filing system ran for the 2024 and 2025 seasons. In the IRS's own words, as reported in November 2025: "IRS Direct File will not be available in Filing Season 2026. No launch date has been set for the future." The Congressional Research Service (Oct 19, 2026) records Treasury's stated reasons: high costs, limited participation, and focusing resources elsewhere. Whether Direct File returns for the 2027 season is not verified — no fetched IRS page says. Bills to restore it and bills to ban it both sit in committee. When the IRS speaks, this shelf updates.