You must have had enough tax liability to use most of the credit. Preview Form 1040 look on Line 18 - that is your tax liability before child credits. If there is any tax liability left over there, you can see them being applied on Schedule 3, Line 5 (energy credit) or Line 6 (adoption credit).
Non-refundable credits can't take your tax liability past $0. A nonrefundable credit essentially means that the credit can’t be used to increase your tax refund or to create a tax refund when you wouldn’t have already had one. You had withholdings that could still be refunded, but your refund is not more than your withholdings. A refundable credit allows you to get more refunded than you had withheld.
In other words, your savings cannot exceed the amount of tax you owe. For example, on your 2023 tax return, if the only credit you’re eligible for is a $500 Child and Dependent Care Credit, and the tax you owe is only $200—the $300 excess is nonrefundable. This means that the credit will eliminate the entire $200 of tax, but you don’t receive a tax refund for the remaining $300. For 2021, the Child and Dependent Care Credit is fully refundable so not only would you reduce your tax to $0, you would be eligible for a $300 refund.
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