also called fiscal year · assessment year
The twelve-month period a country uses to calculate income tax, which doesn't always match the calendar year.
A tax year is the twelve-month window a country uses to add up your income and work out what you owe, and it does not always run January to December. Some countries start theirs in the middle of the year, which is why it is not the same as the calendar year. When you move mid-year, these mismatched windows decide when your old country's clock stops and the new one starts.
You leave the UK, whose tax year runs from spring, and settle in a country that uses the calendar year. Your income now falls across two overlapping windows that begin on different dates, and sorting out which country taxes which months is the puzzle that catches you off guard.
Different countries' tax years overlap oddly, complicating day counts and when a move actually breaks residency.
The difference is the whole point, so here is each one in a line.
A tax year is the twelve-month period a country uses to work out income tax, which does not always match the calendar year of January to December that people assume.
Split-year treatment is the rule that divides the year you arrive or leave into resident and non-resident parts so you are not taxed as a resident for the whole of it.
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