IFTA Tax Rates in District of Columbia (2026)

Key numbers at a glance

Thousands of trucks cross the District of Columbia every day on I-95's Capital Beltway spur, I-295 and New York Avenue, yet DC breaks the pattern every other jurisdiction on your fuel tax paperwork follows: it is not part of the International Fuel Tax Agreement. The official IFTA Inc. tax rate matrix carries no District of Columbia row, and the California CDTFA's IFTA guide (Pub 50) lists the U.S. non-members plainly: Alaska, Hawaii and the District of Columbia. That changes both the math and the fueling strategy. The figures below are from the DC Office of Tax and Revenue — as of Q4 2026 — always confirm the current quarter's official IFTA matrix and DC OTR amounts before filing. See member-state rates on the IFTA rates by state hub.

IFTA tax rates in District of Columbia

DC taxes fuel at the pump through two stacked components per the DC Office of Tax and Revenue — a flat base tax plus a CPI-indexed surcharge:

So the honest answer to "what is DC's IFTA rate" is: there isn't one. The 23.5-cent base tax applies to gasoline, diesel and other combustible fuels under DC Code Title 47, Chapter 23, and vendors remit it with the surcharge monthly to DC OTR on Form FR-400M. For interstate carriers, that pump tax is essentially sunk — because the District sits outside IFTA, fuel tax paid at a DC pump is generally not creditable against your quarterly IFTA return the way Maryland or Virginia tax is. Treat the combined 35.7 cents as a cost of buying fuel inside the District, and treat DC miles as non-IFTA miles (keep them in your ELD records — total miles still need to reconcile).

How District of Columbia IFTA affects your filings

Even without a DC line, the District shapes your return through its neighbors. Take a Richmond to DC to Baltimore run at 6.5 MPG:

Three things follow. First, the 30 DC miles disappear from the tax base — you still burned about 4.6 gallons crossing the city, but no jurisdiction's IFTA line collects for them. Second, Virginia's structure needs care: its diesel rate spans two lines (a base rate plus an additional tax line reported separately on the IFTA schedule), which together run about 47.9 cents — leaving any of it off understates your biggest line. Third, the fueling flip: buy those 58.5 gallons in Maryland and you prepaid $27.71 against $25.68 owed, nearly a wash. Buy them at a DC pump and you paid 35.7 cents a gallon with no IFTA credit — the effective worst outcome in the region. Run your own lane mixes in the IFTA calculator, and if DC miles are routine on your lanes, confirm their reporting treatment with your base state rather than guessing.

The uniform IFTA mechanics still apply around the District: quarterly deadlines of April 30, July 31, October 31 and January 31, late penalties typically $50 to $100 plus interest, and receipts matched to per-state ELD miles. The DC wrinkle simply moves from the return itself to the pump.

Fueling strategy around DC: the non-member gap

The rule for the District is blunt: buy fuel before or after, not inside. Maryland diesel carries a 47.4-cent IFTA rate and Virginia roughly 47.9 cents across its two lines — high, but creditable, meaning the tax comes back to you at settlement. DC's 35.7-cent combined pump tax looks cheaper on the sticker and is the most expensive in practice, because none of it is recoverable through IFTA. On I-95 through the corridor, the Virginia side of the Beltway or Maryland stops outside the District line beat any pump inside DC by the full 35.7 cents of recoverability. If drayage or deliveries force a DC fill, keep the receipt for your own cost records — just do not book it as IFTA credit. Then recover the fuel spend the legitimate way: through your rates, using the fuel surcharge guide so the surcharge line, not the tax return, absorbs corridor diesel prices.