Business vs. Charity vs. Medical vs. Moving Mileage Rates (2026): Which One Goes Where for Freelancers

Published: October 30, 2026 · Reading time: 11 min

TL;DR: The IRS lists four 2026 mileage rates, and they are not interchangeable. Business is 72.5 cents from January 1 to June 30 and 76 cents from July 1, and it goes on Schedule C line 9. Medical is 20.5 cents, then 23.5 cents, and it is a Schedule A item that counts only above 7.5% of AGI. Charity is 14 cents all year because the statute says so, and it is a Schedule A item too. Moving (the medical rate) is limited to certain people, not self-employed people in general. Only business miles reduce Schedule C profit and self-employment tax. A trip has one purpose, so one log cannot be re-labeled across categories. In the worked example, 9,200 business miles are worth $6,852.00, while 420 medical miles and 300 charity miles add up to $91.50 and $42.00 and may be worth nothing on the return.

Freelancers hear "the mileage rate" as if there were one. There are four, they come from different places, and they land on different parts of your return. The temptation is to take a year of driving and ask which label gives the biggest number. That is the wrong question, because a trip is not a pile of miles waiting for a label. It has a purpose, and the purpose decides the rate, the form and whether it is worth anything at all.

This guide is for U.S. freelancers and independent contractors who file Schedule C and drive their own vehicle. It covers federal income tax only. It compares the four rates side by side, shows what each one is and is not worth, and walks through a year with three kinds of trips so you can see the dollars.

If you want deeper dives first, see our 2026 mileage rate guide, the Schedule C line 9 guide, our earlier business vs. medical vs. charity rates overview (which predates this guide and uses a single 2026 business rate rather than the July 1 split), and the guides on commuting vs. business miles, mileage reimbursement vs. deduction and motorcycles, e-bikes and scooters.

The Four 2026 Rates at a Glance

The IRS standard mileage rates page I checked (last reviewed July 28, 2026) lists these figures for 2026:

Two things jump out. The business rate was revised mid-year, so a single annual figure is wrong for 2026. And the medical and moving rate is a different number from the business rate in both halves, and it moved too. Charity is the only one that did not change.

Side-by-Side: Who Sets It, Where It Goes, What It Saves

Line numbers come from the 2025 forms and instructions I fetched, so confirm them against the 2026 forms. For the Schedule A versus standard deduction decision, see our standard vs. itemized guide.

Business Miles: The Only Category That Touches Your Business Return

Business mileage under the standard method is a Schedule C expense. Publication 463 says that if you use the standard mileage rate for a year, you can't deduct your actual car expenses for that year, so you pick one method per vehicle and keep to its rules. The deduction is subtracted from gross receipts, which lowers net profit, and net profit is the base for self-employment tax (how SE tax works).

That is why business miles are worth more than their rate suggests. A mile reduces two taxes: the income tax on your profit and the 15.3% self-employment tax on 92.35% of net earnings (up to the Social Security wage base). Charity and medical miles reduce neither SE tax nor Schedule C profit.

What does not count

If you have no regular place of work, Publication 463 says:

"You can't deduct daily transportation costs between your home and temporary work sites within your metropolitan area. These are nondeductible commuting expenses."

It also gives an example that if your principal place of business is in your home, you can deduct the cost of round-trip transportation between your qualifying home office and your client's or customer's place of business. Publication 463 also has a separate rule for someone with a regular work location away from home who travels to a temporary work location, so the commuting guide matters here. Whether your home office qualifies is its own question; see the commuting guide. The point here is that "I drove for work" is not the test. The trip has to be a deductible business trip first, and only then do you value it.

Value each trip at the rate for its date

For 2026 that means 72.5 cents for trips through June 30 and 76 cents for trips from July 1. A trip on June 30 and a trip on July 1 are valued differently, and your log has to show the date.

Medical Miles: Real, but Small and Conditional

Publication 502 says you can include out-of-pocket costs such as gas and oil when you use a car for medical reasons, and that you can't include depreciation, insurance, general repair or maintenance expenses. If you don't want to use actual expenses, you can use the standard medical mileage rate, and the Publication (the 2025 edition I fetched, which cites 21 cents for 2025) adds that you can include parking fees and tolls either way. For 2026, the IRS rates page lists 20.5 cents for January 1 to June 30 and 23.5 cents from July 1.

Then comes the filter. Publication 502 says:

"Generally, you can deduct on Schedule A (Form 1040) only the amount of your medical and dental expenses that is more than 7.5% of your AGI."

So a medical mile does nothing unless two things are true. First, you itemize instead of taking the standard deduction. Second, your total medical and dental costs for the year, not just mileage, exceed 7.5% of AGI. For a freelancer with a $62,000 AGI, that floor is $4,650 before a single mile counts. Our medical expense guide for the self-employed walks through how the floor and the self-employed health insurance deduction interact.

Publication 502 also lists travel you can't include, among them going to and from work, travel for purely personal reasons to another city for care, and travel that is merely for the general improvement of one's health. Driving to a client is never a medical mile.

Charity Miles: 14 Cents, Fixed by Statute

The charitable rate is set by Congress. The statute says:

"For purposes of computing the deduction under this section for use of a passenger automobile, the standard mileage rate shall be 14 cents per mile."

(IRC section 170(i), as shown on the Cornell Legal Information Institute copy of the U.S. Code.) Publication 526 puts it in plain language:

"If you don't want to deduct your actual expenses, you can use a standard mileage rate of 14 cents a mile to figure your contribution."

and adds that you can deduct parking fees and tolls under either method. Publication 526 also says you must keep reliable written records of your car expenses, and that with the standard rate your records must show the miles you drove for the charitable purpose. It is reported on Schedule A (the 2025 instructions say to enter on line 11 the total value of gifts made in cash or by check, including out-of-pocket expenses).

The non-itemizer deduction does not change the mileage math

Section 170(p) now lets a taxpayer who does not itemize deduct up to $1,000 ($2,000 on a joint return) of charitable contributions. The statutory text limits it to "contributions made in cash." I did not find an IRS source that says unreimbursed volunteer mileage counts as a cash contribution, so do not assume your 14-cent miles qualify. See our non-itemizer charitable deduction guide for what does, and ask a CPA or EA about mileage specifically.

Our charitable giving guide for freelancers covers why donating your time or services is never deductible and why sponsorships you buy for marketing are a different, business question.

Moving Miles: Who Can Still Use Them

This is the category freelancers most often assume they can use, because a move can feel like a business decision. The Form 3903 instructions for 2025 say:

"For tax years beginning after 2017, you can no longer deduct moving expenses unless you are a member of the Armed Forces on active duty and, due to a military order, you move because of a permanent change of station."

The IRS rates page labels the moving rate "military only," and the Form 3903 instructions say to use that form to figure the deduction. The deduction is not a Schedule C expense and not a Schedule A item. It is claimed on Form 3903 and carried to Schedule 1 (Form 1040), line 14 in the 2025 instructions.

Congress also made the suspension permanent. The current text of IRC section 217(k) says that, except for an individual to whom subsection (g) (the Armed Forces rule) applies, the section does not apply to any taxable year beginning after December 31, 2017, and a new paragraph (2) treats an employee or new appointee of the intelligence community, other than an Armed Forces member, who moves under a change in assignment that requires relocation the same way. The 2025 Form 3903 instructions I fetched do not mention that second group, and I did not verify an effective date, so a person who thinks they fit it should confirm with a CPA or EA before claiming anything.

A freelancer moving a studio, a home or an office does not qualify on that basis. If you relocate a business, ask whether any cost is a business expense on its own terms, not whether it is a moving deduction.

Why One Trip Log Cannot Be Re-Labeled

Here is the problem in one sentence: each mile has to be driven for one reason. If you drove to a client, the miles are business (if the trip qualifies). If you drove to a pantry to deliver food, the miles are charity. If you drove to a clinic, they are medical. If you drove to the grocery store, they are personal. The same odometer clicks do not serve two purposes at once.

That has practical consequences.

• You cannot pick the category after the year ends. A log is evidence of what you did and why. The purpose is recorded at or near the time of the trip. Publication 463 says a timely kept record has more value than a statement prepared later, when there is generally a lack of accurate recall.
• A day can have legs. A drive from your office to a client, a drive from the client to a food bank, and a drive home are three legs. Log the mileage of each with its own purpose. Do not label the whole day business because the first stop was.
• The direct-route cap still applies. A personal or charity stop in the middle of a business day does not turn the whole detour into business miles. See our guide to personal errands between clients.
• A higher rate is not an excuse. Writing a 14-cent charity mile as a 76-cent business mile overstates Schedule C and understates your net profit and your SE tax. It is also the kind of mismatch a reviewer notices.

A good log has a purpose column with four values (business, charity, medical, personal), plus the date, start and end points and miles. See our guide to a contemporaneous mileage log.

A Text Flowchart: Which Rate Applies to This Trip?

1. Was the trip for your self-employment (a client, supplies, a job site, a business errand)?
   • Yes: check that it is not commuting. If it is a deductible business trip, use the business rate for the trip's date on Schedule C line 9. Stop.
   • No: go to 2.
2. Was the trip to get medical care for you, your spouse or a dependent?
   • Yes: it is a medical mile (20.5 cents through June 30, 23.5 cents from July 1). It is a Schedule A item and counts only above 7.5% of AGI if you itemize. Stop.
   • No: go to 3.
3. Was the trip to serve a qualified charity as a volunteer?
   • Yes: it is a charity mile at 14 cents, plus parking and tolls. It is a Schedule A item and helps only if you itemize, and in 2026 only above the 0.5% contribution-base floor. Stop.
   • No: go to 4.
4. Was it a military move under orders (or another situation named in section 217(k))?
   • Yes: it may be a moving mile, claimed on Form 3903. Confirm eligibility with a CPA or EA. Stop.
   • No: it is personal. No deduction.

If a trip seems to fit two boxes, split it into legs. Do not pick the box with the higher rate.

Worked Example: One Freelancer, Three Kinds of Trips

Dana is a single freelance designer filing Schedule C. She has no other income, her AGI is $62,000, and she takes the standard deduction because her itemized deductions would not exceed it. Her net earnings from self-employment are under the Social Security wage base. She drives one car and logs every trip with a purpose.

Business miles. She drives 4,000 business miles from January 1 to June 30 and 5,200 from July 1 to December 31.

• January to June: 4,000 × $0.725 = $2,900.00
• July to December: 5,200 × $0.76 = $3,952.00
• Total for 9,200 miles: $6,852.00 on Schedule C line 9

Using 72.5 cents all year would give 9,200 × $0.725 = $6,670.00, so the July 1 rate adds $182.00. Because this reduces her net profit, it also reduces self-employment tax: $6,852.00 × 0.9235 × 0.153 = about $968.16 of SE tax, before any income-tax effect. The income-tax saving depends on the rest of her household's return, so this guide does not put a figure on it.

Medical miles. She drives 240 miles to appointments in the first half and 180 in the second, plus $36 of parking.

• January to June: 240 × $0.205 = $49.20
• July to December: 180 × $0.235 = $42.30
• Mileage: $91.50, plus $36.00 parking = $127.50

She also paid $1,900 in other out-of-pocket medical costs, so her total medical expenses are $1,900.00 + $127.50 = $2,027.50. The floor is 7.5% of $62,000, or $4,650.00. She is $2,622.50 short, and because she takes the standard deduction anyway, her medical deduction is $0. The medical miles earned nothing.

Charity miles. She drives 300 miles delivering meals for a food bank: 300 × $0.14 = $42.00. Because she does not itemize, there is no Schedule A to put it on. Her deduction for it is $0, and as noted above, do not assume it counts toward the cash-only non-itemizer deduction.

Total miles logged: 9,920. The business line is the only one that moved her tax bill, and it did so through both income tax and SE tax.

What mislabeling would have cost her. If she had called the 300 pantry miles business miles in the second half, she would have claimed 300 × $0.76 = $228.00 instead of $42.00, an overstatement of $228.00 on Schedule C, the one form where it reduces both taxes. The whole $228.00 would be improper, because her charity miles are worth $0 on her return. And she would have buried a purpose a reviewer can see in her own log.

This example makes no claim that other households would see the same result. Someone who itemizes because of a mortgage, large state taxes or large medical bills could get value from charity and medical miles (charity miles only above the 0.5% floor, medical only above the 7.5% floor), so the household facts decide, not the mileage.

Common Mistakes

1. Using one rate for all of 2026. Business went from 72.5 to 76 cents on July 1, and medical and moving from 20.5 to 23.5.
2. Putting charity or medical miles on Schedule C. They are Schedule A items.
3. Assuming medical miles help. They count only above 7.5% of AGI and only if you itemize.
4. Treating 14 cents as a typo or "the IRS's number." It is set by statute and does not change with the business rate.
5. Claiming moving mileage for a business relocation. Moving is limited to certain people.
6. Labeling a whole day with one purpose. Log legs separately.
7. Reconstructing a log after the fact. A timely kept record carries more weight.
8. Counting a mile under two categories. One mile, one purpose, one rate.
9. Using the standard rate on a vehicle the IRS rate does not cover. See our motorcycle and e-bike guide.
10. Assuming an employer's reimbursement is also a deduction. See reimbursement vs. deduction.

How CentSense Helps

CentSense keeps receipts and trips in one place, which helps when you need to keep business miles separate from everything else:

• Scan parking, toll and supply receipts with AI the day you pay, so the vendor, date and total are captured. The free tier includes 10 AI scans a month
• Log miles by date on the Solo plan ($5/month) with a destination and business purpose for each trip. CentSense's mileage export applies a single annual rate per category and does not apply the July 1, 2026 split (72.5 cents, then 76 cents) to each trip, and its 2026 medical rate is a single 21 cents rather than the IRS's 20.5 then 23.5, so value each trip at the rate for its date
• On the Solo and Team plans, export your categorized expenses as CSV so your preparer can map them to Schedule C lines

CentSense tracks business expenses and mileage. It does not compute Schedule A, decide whether you should itemize, or judge whether you qualify for the moving deduction. Those are judgment calls for you and your CPA or EA.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the IRS mileage rates for 2026 for business, medical, moving and charity?

The IRS standard mileage rates page lists, for January 1 to June 30, 2026, 72.5 cents per mile for business (IR-2025-128), 20.5 cents for medical or military moving and 14 cents for charity. For July 1 to December 31, 2026 it lists 76 cents for business (IR-2026-29), 23.5 cents for medical and military moving and 14 cents for charity. Only the business rate belongs on Schedule C. Medical and charity miles are Schedule A items that help only if you itemize, and the medical miles help only after total medical expenses pass 7.5% of AGI. Moving is limited to certain people. Ask a CPA or EA how your facts apply.

Can I put charity or medical miles on Schedule C line 9?

No. Schedule C line 9 is for car and truck expenses of your trade or business, and a trip to a food bank, a doctor or a pharmacy is not a business trip. Medical miles are part of the medical expenses you report on Schedule A, line 1, and charitable driving is part of the gifts you report on Schedule A, line 11 (2025 forms; confirm the 2026 line numbers). Both help only if you itemize, and medical expenses count only to the extent they exceed 7.5% of AGI. Putting them on Schedule C would overstate your business deduction and your net profit would be too low, so ask a CPA or EA if you are unsure which bucket a trip belongs in.

Why is the charitable mileage rate still 14 cents when the business rate is 76 cents?

Because Congress fixed it in the statute. Section 170(i) says that for purposes of computing the deduction under that section for use of a passenger automobile, the standard mileage rate shall be 14 cents per mile. The IRS does not recalculate it each year, which is why it stays at 14 cents while the business rate moves. Publication 526 says that if you don't want to deduct your actual expenses you can use 14 cents a mile, and you can add parking fees and tolls. The deduction is on Schedule A, so it helps only if you itemize. For 2026, itemized charitable gifts are allowed only to the extent that the total exceeds 0.5% of your contribution base (generally your AGI), so a small mileage amount can be disallowed entirely. Ask a CPA or EA whether itemizing makes sense for you.

Can a freelancer deduct moving mileage in 2026?

Generally no. The Form 3903 instructions for 2025 say that for tax years beginning after 2017 you can no longer deduct moving expenses unless you are a member of the Armed Forces on active duty who moves because of a military order and a permanent change of station. The current text of section 217(k) also treats an employee or new appointee of the intelligence community, other than an Armed Forces member, who moves under a change in assignment requiring relocation the same way. I did not find IRS form instructions describing that second group, so confirm with a CPA or EA before relying on it. A self-employed person moving a home or an office does not qualify just because the move is for the business.

Does medical mileage reduce my self-employment tax?

No. Medical mileage is a Schedule A item, so it never reduces Schedule C net profit, and self-employment tax is figured on net earnings from self-employment. Only business miles on Schedule C lower that base. Medical mileage also helps your income tax only if you itemize and your total medical expenses exceed 7.5% of your AGI, which Publication 502 says is the portion you can deduct on Schedule A. In the worked example in this guide, $2,027.50 of medical costs sits below a $4,650 floor, so the deduction is $0. Ask a CPA or EA how your own AGI and itemizing choice work out.

Can I split one drive between business and charity or medical?

You can split a trip into legs, but you cannot count the same miles twice or relabel them after the fact. A drive to a client is a business leg, a drive from the client to a food bank is a charity leg and a drive home from the food bank is generally a personal or charity leg depending on the purpose, so log each leg with its own purpose. The business leg goes on Schedule C line 9 only if it is a business trip rather than commuting, and the charity and medical legs help only if you itemize. If a trip serves more than one purpose, the safest approach is to record the direct business miles you can support and ask a CPA or EA about the rest.

Do I need a separate log for medical and charity miles?

Keep them in the same log, with a purpose column, but treat them as separate categories. Publication 526 says you must keep reliable written records of your car expenses, and if you use the 14-cent rate your records must show the miles driven for the charitable purpose. Publication 463 says a timely kept record has more value than a statement prepared later. For medical trips, Publication 502 lets you add parking fees and tolls to either method. Because the per-mile value is small, the records matter most for business miles, where the dollars are largest. Ask a CPA or EA what to keep for the Schedule A items.

Authoritative References

• IRS: Standard mileage rates (2026: business 72.5 cents Jan 1 to Jun 30 per IR-2025-128, 76 cents Jul 1 to Dec 31 per IR-2026-29; medical and military moving 20.5 then 23.5 cents; charity 14 cents)
• IRS: Publication 463, Travel, Gift, and Car Expenses (2025 edition)
• IRS: Publication 502, Medical and Dental Expenses (2025 edition)
• IRS: Publication 526, Charitable Contributions (2025 edition)
• IRS: Instructions for Form 3903, Moving Expenses (2025)
• IRS: Instructions for Schedule A (Form 1040) (2025)
• 26 U.S.C. 170, Charitable, etc., contributions and gifts (Cornell LII)
• 26 U.S.C. 217, Moving expenses (Cornell LII)

Stop mixing up your miles. Start a free CentSense account, log each trip with its purpose and date, scan parking and toll receipts with AI, and export a CPA-ready breakdown at tax time. The free tier includes 10 AI receipt scans a month, and the Solo plan ($5/month) adds unlimited scans, mileage tracking and CSV export.

This guide is general education for U.S. self-employed people filing a Schedule C in 2026. It is not personalized tax advice. Whether a trip is business or commuting, whether you itemize, whether medical expenses clear 7.5% of AGI, whether a charity qualifies, and whether anyone qualifies for the moving deduction depend on your facts, so confirm them with a CPA or EA before you file.