There are many events that may reduce your refund, including:
- Starting an additional job (especially self-employment)
- Getting a significant raise, but your W-4 staying the same
- Selling stock, crypto, or other investments
- A change in filing or marital status
- Receiving unemployment benefits, but not having taxes withheld
- Taking an early withdrawal from your retirement account
- Having your child age out of the Credit for Other Dependents or the Child Tax Credit
- Started receiving Social Security benefits or Roth IRA distributions
- Paying off your mortgage, so you can no longer deduct mortgage interest
- Paying off your student loan, so you can no longer deduct the interest
- Finishing school, so no longer eligible for certain education credits
- Earning little or no income and not qualifying for the Earned Income Credit
You can access your personalized refund information in TurboTax:
Note: If your TurboTax navigation looks different from what’s described here, learn more.
- Open or continue your return.
- Select Federal in the left menu.
- Choose Federal Review.
- Under the Explain Why section of the Federal Review screen, select Why am I getting a refund of $? to see more details on your refund and how it was calculated.
If your refund seems extremely off, double-check the amounts you entered. A typo of just one dollar can have a big impact on your refund.
