Form 26AS vs AIS: What Each Statement Shows and Why You Need Both at Tax Time

For years, salaried taxpayers treated Form 26AS as the single source of truth before filing their income tax return. That habit is now risky. Since assessment year (AY) 2023-24, the Annual Tax Statement in Form 26AS on the TRACES portal carries only your TDS and TCS data, while everything else the tax department knows about you — savings interest, dividends, share sales, mutual fund redemptions, foreign remittances — sits inside the Annual Information Statement (AIS). File from 26AS alone and you will almost certainly under-report income that the department has already captured, inviting a mismatch notice under Section 143(1).

This guide explains what each statement legally shows, walks through a worked reconciliation for a salaried filer, and lists the scrutiny pitfalls our tax desk sees every July. Both documents are free to download from the income tax e-filing portal, and reading them together is the fastest way to file a return that matches the department's records on the first attempt.

What the Section Says

Form 26AS draws its authority from Section 285BB of the Income-tax Act 1961, inserted by the Finance Act 2020 and effective from 1 June 2020. That provision empowered the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) to notify an "Annual Information Statement" and led to the redesigned Form 26AS under Rule 114-I of the Income-tax Rules, replacing the older Rule 31AB. The statute is reproduced on indiacode.nic.in, the government's authoritative repository of central legislation.

In its current shape, the division of labour is precise. Per the Income Tax Department's official AIS FAQ, from AY 2023-24 onwards the Annual Tax Statement (Form 26AS) on TRACES displays only TDS and TCS-related data of the taxpayer. Every other category of information — high-value transactions reported through the Statement of Financial Transactions (SFT), interest, dividend, securities and mutual fund activity, foreign remittances, GST turnover, and details of tax demand or refund — now lives in the AIS.

The AIS is a far wider document, organised into two parts: Part A holds your general identity details (PAN, Aadhaar, masked, name, date of birth, contact information), and Part B aggregates the financial information by category. Crucially, the AIS also generates a Taxpayer Information Summary (TIS) — a category-wise aggregation at the information-source level that gives you a single processed value for each income head, which then pre-fills your return. The full AIS can be downloaded in PDF, JSON and CSV formats, while the TIS is the quick-glance summary most filers should reconcile first.

The table below sets out the practical split between the two statements.

The headline takeaway: Form 26AS confirms how much tax was deducted in your name and is therefore your TDS-credit ledger; AIS reports how much income was reported against your PAN and is therefore your income-disclosure checklist. You need both. Use the TDS glossary entry if you are new to how deduction credits flow into your return.

Worked Example

Consider Riya, a salaried professional in Pune for the financial year (FY) 2025-26 (AY 2026-27). When she opens Form 26AS on TRACES, she sees two TDS entries and nothing more.

If Riya filed from this statement alone, she would report salary and FD interest, claim Rs 1,08,500 of credit, and assume she was done. But when she downloads her AIS, four extra lines appear that never touch Form 26AS because no tax was deducted on them:

• Savings bank interest: Rs 12,000 (banks do not deduct TDS on savings interest)
• Dividend from listed shares: Rs 8,000
• Sale of an equity mutual fund (SFT-018): consideration Rs 2,50,000
• Interest on income tax refund: Rs 1,300

Form 26AS captured none of these. Relying on it alone, Riya would have omitted Rs 12,000 + Rs 8,000 + Rs 1,300 = Rs 21,300 of taxable income outright, plus the capital gain on her mutual fund redemption. Because the AIS pre-fills the return, the e-filing system would flag the gap the moment she submitted, and a Section 143(1) intimation would follow within weeks.

The reconciliation also surfaces a deduction she can legitimately use. Under Section 80TTA, an individual on the old regime can deduct savings bank interest up to Rs 10,000, so Rs 10,000 of her Rs 12,000 savings interest is deductible and only Rs 2,000 is taxable (the deduction is unavailable in the new regime). For the capital gain, long-term gains on listed equity are taxed at 12.5% beyond the Rs 1,25,000 annual exemption under the post-Budget 2024 rules, so the mutual fund sale needs schedule-level disclosure even though no TDS was withheld. Run the numbers through the income tax calculator, check your deduction credits against the TDS calculator, and model the equity redemption in the capital gains calculator before you finalise the return.

The lesson is structural, not arithmetic: Form 26AS told Riya what tax to claim; only the AIS told her what income to declare.

Common Mistakes

These are the recurring errors our desk sees during ITR scrutiny and Section 143(1) adjustments.

Filing from Form 26AS alone. This is the single biggest cause of mismatch notices since AY 2023-24. Because 26AS no longer carries non-TDS income, a return built on it will under-report savings interest, small dividends, and any sale where no tax was deducted. Always cross-check against the AIS or, at minimum, the TIS summary value.

Treating the AIS figure as final without giving feedback. The AIS is information reported by third parties and can be wrong — a duplicate dividend entry, a sale wrongly tagged to your PAN, or interest double-counted across statements. The portal lets you submit feedback ("Information is duplicate", "Income is not taxable", "Relates to other PAN") against each line. Submitting feedback updates the derived value in the TIS; ignoring an error and simply filing a lower figure invites a query. If your records genuinely differ, file your correct number and lodge feedback so the trail is documented.

Ignoring the TIS and reading only the raw AIS. The raw AIS can run to dozens of lines with duplicates between SFT and TDS sources. The TIS deduplicates and aggregates per information source, giving you the "processed value" the department actually uses. Reconcile the TIS first, then drill into the AIS only where a number looks off.

Forgetting interest on a tax refund. Interest paid by the department on a refund under Section 244A is taxable as income from other sources, and it shows up in the AIS, not in Form 26AS. Riya's Rs 1,300 above is small but routinely missed.

Assuming a missing 26AS credit cannot be claimed. If you have a TDS certificate (Form 16 or 16A) but the credit is absent from Form 26AS, the fault usually lies with the deductor's TDS return. See your Form 16 glossary entry and ask the deductor to file a correction statement rather than dropping the claim.

FAQ

Is Form 26AS still useful now that AIS exists?

Yes. Form 26AS remains the authoritative record of TDS and TCS credited against your PAN, and it is what you reconcile to claim tax credit. Since AY 2023-24 it simply no longer carries non-TDS income — that role moved to the AIS. Treat 26AS as your credit ledger and AIS as your income checklist.

What is the difference between AIS and TIS?

The AIS is the detailed statement listing every piece of financial information reported against your PAN, line by line. The TIS (Taxpayer Information Summary) is a category-wise aggregation of that data at the information-source level, giving one processed value per income head. The TIS value is what pre-fills your return, so reconcile it first.

Which statement should I download to file my return?

Download both. Use Form 26AS from the TRACES link on the e-filing portal to confirm TDS credit, and the AIS (with its TIS) from the "Annual Information Statement" service to confirm every income head. The AIS is available in PDF, JSON and CSV; the JSON imports into most filing software.

What if the AIS shows income I did not earn?

Use the in-built feedback facility against that line — options include "Information is duplicate", "Income is not taxable", and "Relates to other PAN". The derived value in the TIS updates after feedback. File your return with the correct figure and keep evidence; do not simply ignore the entry.

Does the AIS replace my own books and bank statements?

No. The AIS is a cross-check, not a substitute. It can miss income (for example, cash receipts or rent paid directly) and can contain third-party errors. Your bank statements, broker contract notes, and capital gains reports remain primary; the AIS confirms what the department already knows.

How far back does the AIS go?

The AIS was launched by the Income Tax Department on 1 November 2021 and is available for recent assessment years on the e-filing portal. The current split — 26AS for TDS/TCS only — applies from AY 2023-24 onwards.

Will a small mismatch trigger a notice?

Even modest gaps can prompt an automated Section 143(1) adjustment because the return is matched against AIS-derived values electronically. Reconciling the TIS before filing, and submitting feedback on any genuine error, is the simplest way to avoid a query for the relevant assessment year — see the assessment year glossary entry for how filing years are labelled.