A few weeks before the IRS accepted tax returns on January 27, 2025, taxpayers and tax experts – including me – expected a relatively normal registration season. But when things began to change – the former IRS commissioner submitted his resignation, freezing, and IRS employees were offered the chance to go early – the tax registration season began a little less predictable. This could explain why early figures indicate that taxpayers do not rush to submit.

Early submission data reflects a downturn in the tax returns of 14% compared to the previous year. However, the IRS is not concerned and states on its website that “(l) percentage changes to the registration season numbers are usually observed at the beginning of every tax season” and that “(h) these numbers are also even in the future if there are more Tax declarations. “

The IRS made it clear that the IRS expects the IRS to make up for the tax returns in the following weeks, since many taxpayers were still waiting for important tax documents (the due date was January 31).

I am not entirely convinced. There was a lot of chattering when the tax season opened and the confusion among taxpayers was reflected. Why? As already mentioned, the IRS is currently without a constant commissioner (and the incumbent commissioner has not published a message to the taxpayers). A Trump management that sets freezing the tax authority has started, with existing job offers being lifted. President Trump proposed to dismiss some current IRS employees or to move those who were authorized to implement the immigration authority to bring weapons to the border.

All of this asked taxpayers how different the tax season could be. When the season was opened, Adam Markowitz, a enrolled agent in Winderme, Florida, put on Bluesky: “This week I had three talks this week who have informed people that they still have to submit tax returns this year. Are we really at that time? “

As a result, I finally published an article in which the taxpayers still had to submit.

And apparently those in DC were also a little worried about the registration season. This week, the administration declined its earlier efforts to bring IRS employees to resign. The IRS confirmed that specific positions of the critical registration season are now freed from the postponed cancellation program (DR) until after the end of the tax season. It is unclear who suits these criteria, but the memo notes that it contains those in taxpayers, information technology and the taxpayer service.

Whatever the reason may be, the early numbers in 2025 are sluggish. In 2024, the IRS received 15,318,000 individual income tax returns compared to 13,177,000 in 2025. As already mentioned, this is a decrease of 14.0% – and think they do these potentially retrospective tax benefits (it has never happened) . The drop is quite significant if you compare the 2025 registration season with the 2023 (30%) registration season.

(About 2/3 of these returns were prepared themselves, which is not unusual, to see at the beginning of the tax season.)

The data show that the IRS processed 11,727,700 individual income tax returns in comparison to 13,928,000 by February 2, 2024. This is a decline of 15.8%.

The web visits to Irs.gov had also dropped greatly and took back 34.8% compared to 2024. As of January 31, 2025, 68,287,000 visits compared to the 104,788,000 visits until February 2, 2024.

The downturn in web visits can reflect the fact that the website has not been updated regularly – only four press releases have been published since the opening of the season.

There is a ray of sunshine: the average tax refund has increased. So far, the IRS has issued 3,231,000 tax returns in 2025, compared to 2,616,000 in 2024, a thrust of 23.5%. The average reimbursement of tax has also increased: $ 1,928 per taxpayer on January 31, 2025, compared to $ 1,395 on February 2, 2024, an increase of 38.2%. The average refund from direct deposit is even higher in 2025: $ 2,069 (compared to $ 1,543 in 2024).

We assume that the figures for tax refund will change in the next few weeks. The law obliges that the IRS has reimbursements (eiceded ercoled tax credit (eitc) and actc by mid -February. Designable credit, you have to wait until the IRS can publish it. At processing times and enables the President’s day, which is a federal and banking holiday.

As soon as these EITC/ACTC returns are entitled to process, we should see an increase in a number of categories, including the reimbursements issued and the average reimbursement amounts. However, it will be interesting to see exactly how much these numbers increase. Will taxpayers be submitted or waiting and seeing now?

So far it has been an unpredictable season. Take a look over the course of the season Forbes continues to pursue these IRS numbers.

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