H&R Block 2023 Deluxe + State Tax (PC/Mac Digital) + $20 eGC (Select Stores) Expired

This is a good deal for sure, and the download version of H&R Block/TurboTax are more powerful than their online counterparts. Comparison of H&R Block/TurboTax download to online. [thefinancebuff.com] Five federal e-files are included in the package, and you can print/mail many more. One common point of confusion - the state software included here is only the software to prepare the taxes, but does not include state e-file. That's an additional $20 or you can print/mail it for almost nothing (also see below).

One major advantage of H&R Block & TurboTax is that they support importing 1099 forms from banks and brokerages. While this is definitely useful and can save some time, you often have to enter your passwords in their software, which some people are not comfortable with. With 1099 investment income, you can often enter aggregate data [hrblock.com] and not list each trade individually, which makes this much less painful that you might think.

However, there are also free or low cost options that don't require you to share your information and do support the common investor forms. Tax prep companies are required by law to get your consent before they can share your personal information with 3rd parties.

FreeTaxUSA [freetaxusa.com]and OnLineTaxes [olt.com] are 100% free federal, regardless of income, and $10-15 per state if your AGI is > $45k. Both do not share your personal information with 3rd parties and both support nearly all tax forms.

Cash App Taxes [cash.app] is 100% free federal and state, regardless of income. Their privacy policy [cash.app] is less explicit, but I don't think they share your information with 3rd parties. There are more scenarios that they don't support [cash.app], the biggest being multi-state taxes. But they do support [cash.app] most of what most people need, including investments, rentals, self-employment, etc.

H&R Block and TurboTax online DO sell your personal information with your consent...but you can opt-out. See here [washingtonpost.com] for more details. Their free versions are quite limited and they also use deceptive marketing practices to try to upsell you to more expensive products.

New this year is IRS Direct File [irs.gov], where you can file your taxes directly with the IRS. This is a pilot of their new online software that uses the typical interview process to generate your tax forms. The pilot is limited to 13 states and only supports limited tax scenarios. They will likely expand the functionality in the future.

Last, but not least is IRS Free Fillable Forms [irs.gov]. This is free for anyone and supports all forms, but is not interview-based software. This is basically an electronic version of the old paper forms.

Bonus: some states allow you to e-file for free directly on their department of revenue website. You either have to transcribe the numbers from your software of choice into their system, or just use their system in the first place. Quality of this software varies by state. List of states that support this [thefinancebuff.com].