A tattoo artist who rents a station and is paid by clients is usually self-employed and reports every payment, tips included, on Schedule C, the form for a business you run yourself. You subtract rent and supplies, then pay income tax and self-employment tax, the Social Security and Medicare tax on your profit, partly through estimated payments during the year.

Am I self-employed or the shop's employee?

You are self-employed if the shop controls only the result of your work and not when, where and how you do it. The IRS weighs three categories of evidence (behavioral control, financial control and the type of relationship), and its worker-status rules say no single factor decides it. Publication 15-A, the IRS guide to worker status for businesses, lists factors such as who decides when and where the work is done, who supplies the tools and whether the worker can make or lose money. A tattoo artist who sets her own hours, books her own clients, uses her own machines and buys her own ink and needles fits the self-employed side of those factors, and one whose shop sets the schedule, supplies the equipment and directs the work fits the employee side.

A flat booth rent and a percentage split are both ways of measuring payment, and Publication 15 says how payments are measured or what they are called does not decide the relationship. If you are not sure where you land, you or the shop can file Form SS-8, the form that asks the IRS to rule on your status, and the answer can take at least six months.

Do I report cash and payment-app income with no 1099?

You report every client payment on Schedule C line 1, cash, card and payment apps alike, whether or not any form reports it to you. A payment app sends a Form 1099-K, the form that reports payments a platform processed for you, only when 2026 payments pass $20,000 and 200 transactions, though it may send one for less, while a card processor you take payments through sends one at any amount. The 1099-K shows the gross before fees and refunds, so you report the gross and deduct the fees as a business expense. Publication 583 tells businesses to keep a daily record of cash received, deposit the day's receipts and keep deposit slips and receipt books. I would keep tattoo fees and tips on separate lines of that daily record, because only tips a 1099 shows separately count for the tips deduction.

Can I deduct the booth rent or the shop's percentage?

The flat rent you pay for your station, or the percentage you pay the shop out of what you collect, is rent for space you use in your business and goes on Schedule C line 20b, the line for rent on other business property such as space in a building. Publication 334 defines rent as any amount you pay for the use of property you do not own, and it does not treat rent as unreasonable just because it is figured as a percentage of gross receipts.

I'm a tattoo artist working for a shop. I pay the shop 50% of what I make. Do I give the shop a 1099 or do they give me one?

— a tattoo artist on TurboTax's community forum, 2019

The answer depends on who collects from the client. If you paid a shop that is not a corporation $2,000 or more of rent in 2026, you owe the shop owner a 2026 Form 1099-MISC, the form that reports rent paid, by February 1, 2027, because January 31, 2027 falls on a Sunday. If the shop instead collects from your clients and pays you your share, the shop owes you a Form 1099-NEC, the form that reports pay to a nonemployee, when it pays you $2,000 or more in 2026, and you report your share as income. The same rent rules, written for stylists who rent a booth, are in my post on booth rent deductions.

How do I write off ink, needles and tattoo machines?

Ink, needles, gloves and other disposables are supplies, deducted on Schedule C line 22 in the year you use them, or in the year you pay for them if you make the de minimis election described below. The IRS treats an item as materials and supplies when it is used up within 12 months or costs $200 or less under its tangible property rules. A machine, power supply or chair costing $2,500 or less per item or invoice can be deducted in full in the year you pay for it under the de minimis safe harbor, an election for small equipment purchases that you make each year with a statement attached to your return, and the Schedule C instructions put those amounts in Part V, Other Expenses, not on line 22. Equipment over $2,500 goes through Form 4562, the depreciation form, where it is either depreciated, meaning deducted in parts over several years, or expensed under section 179. Expensing under section 179 means deducting the cost in full in the year you start using it, and the result goes on Schedule C line 13.

Are my tips taxed, and does no tax on tips cover tattoo artists?

Tips are income that go in your gross receipts on Schedule C with your tattoo fees and carry self-employment tax, and tattoo artists are on the Treasury tipped occupations list as code 609. The no-tax-on-tips deduction is an income tax deduction of up to $25,000 a year for 2025 through 2028, and for a self-employed person it cannot exceed the net profit of the business the tips came from. For 2026, only tips that a Form 1099-NEC, 1099-MISC or 1099-K shows separately count, so cash tips a client hands you are not eligible even though they are still income. Tips charged on a card can show in box 1c of a 2026 Form 1099-K, so check that box when the form arrives.

How much should I set aside, and when do I pay?

My rule of thumb is to set aside 25 to 30 percent of your profit for taxes, and the payments toward 2026 tax are due on four dates, the last of them Jan. 15, 2027. Part of that money is self-employment tax, the Social Security and Medicare tax on your own profit, which is 15.3% of 92.35% of net profit, the share of profit the tax applies to, and you figure it on Schedule SE.

You owe estimated tax for 2026 if you expect to owe $1,000 or more after subtracting withholding and refundable credits, the credits paid to you even when they exceed your tax. The four 2026 due dates are April 15, June 15 and Sept. 15, 2026 and Jan. 15, 2027, and you can skip the January payment if you file your 2026 return by February 1, 2027 and pay the full balance. Anything still owed for 2026 is due with the return by April 15, 2027, for most people.

What else do tattoo artists ask about taxes?

N&T Tax & Advisory Group is based in Santa Clarita and prepares tax returns for nail techs, barbers, stylists and lash techs remotely anywhere in the US.