The Beckham Law in practice: how to qualify, apply and file in Spain

The Beckham Law lets you move to Spain and be taxed at a flat 24% on employment income up to 600,000 EUR, instead of the progressive rates that reach 47%. For most people arriving on a decent salary, that is the difference between keeping and losing a substantial part of their income for six years.

This guide is organised around what you actually have to do: check whether you qualify, pick the route that matches your situation, file on time, and avoid the handful of mistakes that cost people the regime. Every answer here is backed by a binding consultation (consulta vinculante) from Spain's Directorate General for Taxes, the DGT, which the tax administration is obliged to follow.

1. Do you qualify? Check these three things first

Everything starts with three conditions, and all three must hold. First, you must not have been a Spanish tax resident in the five tax years before your move. Second, your move must be caused by one of the qualifying reasons set out below, which is a stricter test than simply having a reason. Third, you must not obtain income through a permanent establishment in Spain.

That second condition is where most cases turn. The DGT looks for a genuine causal link between the reason and the relocation, not a convenient label applied afterwards. If you are already living in Spain and then find a job, the causation runs the wrong way.

2. Which route in applies to you

There are four ways in, and picking the right one matters because each carries different evidence requirements.

An employment contract. The classic route: a Spanish employer hires you, or your foreign employer posts you to Spain.

Becoming a company administrator. This route works, but with a limit that catches people out: if the company is an asset holding entity, you cannot hold 25% or more of it. We covered how the DGT applies this in its ruling on company administrators, and the related question of a spouse who becomes an administrator.

Remote work for a foreign employer. Since the Startups Law, you can qualify while working remotely for a company with no presence in Spain, typically through the digital nomad visa. See the DGT's answers on working remotely for a foreign employer and on the digital nomad route.

Entrepreneurship or qualified investment. Founders can qualify, but the activity has to be genuinely entrepreneurial and, in practice, certified as such. The detail is in the ruling on startup founders.

3. Can you keep a second job, or a foreign one?

This is one of the most common worries, and the answer is more generous than people expect. Holding a second job does not automatically break the regime. What matters is that the qualifying reason for your move remains intact and that you do not end up generating income through a permanent establishment in Spain. The DGT set this out in its ruling on holding two jobs.

The practical warning: a side activity that grows into a genuine business presence in Spain is exactly what the permanent establishment condition is aimed at. The risk is not the second job itself, it is what it becomes.

4. Bringing your family in

Your spouse and children under 25 can be brought into the regime with you, which for a family often doubles the value of the whole exercise. But they enter as dependants of your application, on your timeline, and their own income is subject to limits. The conditions are set out in the DGT's ruling on family members.

Get this wrong at the start and it is difficult to fix later, so decide who is applying before you file, not after.

5. What you will actually pay

Employment income is taxed at a flat 24% up to 600,000 EUR, and 47% above that threshold. There is no progressive scale in between and no personal allowance to reduce it.

Two consequences people miss. Your employer must withhold at these rates, not the ordinary ones, which we covered in the ruling on employer withholding. And most personal deductions and credits available to ordinary residents simply do not apply to you, as set out in the ruling on excluded deductions. The flat rate is the benefit; the deductions are the price.

On benefits in kind, the treatment is not automatic either. See the ruling on benefit in kind exemptions.

6. What Spain taxes, and what it leaves alone

This is the heart of why the regime is worth having. Broadly, Spain taxes your employment income worldwide, but leaves your other foreign income outside the Spanish net for the duration. Foreign investment income, foreign rental income and foreign capital gains generally stay outside.

The boundaries are where care is needed. On selling a home, the ordinary reinvestment exemption does not work the way residents expect, which we covered in the ruling on the home sale exemption.

And your nationality is not a barrier at any point: holding Spanish nationality, or dual nationality, does not exclude you, as confirmed in the ruling on dual nationals. What matters is the five year residence history, not the passport.

7. How to apply: Modelo 149 and the six month deadline

You opt into the regime by filing Modelo 149. The deadline is six months from the date you register with Spanish Social Security, or from the date your posting documentation begins where that applies.

This deadline is the single most expensive detail in the whole regime. It is not extendable and there is no equitable relief for missing it. People who would have qualified comfortably lose six years of benefit because nobody told them the clock had started.

If you take one thing from this guide, take this: the six month Modelo 149 window starts when you register with Social Security, not when you decide to look into the regime. DPLL, Beckham Law specialists

8. How to file each year: Modelo 151

Once you are in the regime, your annual return is Modelo 151, not the ordinary Modelo 100 that residents file. It runs on the standard Spanish tax calendar and it is where the flat rate is actually applied to your year.

We keep a working guide to the mechanics in our Modelo 151 filing instructions, including how the AEAT expects the form to be completed.

9. How long it lasts, and how it ends

The regime covers the year of arrival plus the following five, so six tax years in total. It is not renewable. The counting and the edge cases are covered in the ruling on regime duration.

It can also end early. If you stop meeting the conditions, for example by acquiring a permanent establishment in Spain, the regime ends and you move to ordinary resident taxation. Plan the exit before it arrives, because the year you leave the regime is usually the year with the most tax at stake.

10. The mistakes that cost people the regime

Key takeaways

If you are weighing whether the regime applies to your situation, our free eligibility test takes a couple of minutes and tells you which route, if any, fits your case.