The Most Googled Tax Terms by State

If you’ve ever tried to do your own taxes, you know how confusing they can be. Trying to pay taxes to two states or figure out what you can deduct and what you can’t? Good luck! No matter who you are, you can’t avoid taxes. Whether you’re a small business owner working with an accountant to understand which tax deductions to take advantage of or an employee fretting over their income taxes, you’re probably stressing about if you did your taxes right and if there is anything you’re overlooking.

Tax forms are filled with jargon that is difficult to navigate, which is why most people turn to Google to get their tax questions answered. With all the weird and complicated tax laws out there, we were curious about what the people in the U.S. were asking, and if their questions varied by region. To find out, we turned to SEMrush to provide us with the most searched tax phrases. In addition to the most searched phrases, we took into account niche tax laws in each state that people were likely to inquire about.

Once we compiled our list of tax questions and queries, we ran them through Google Trends to figure out which state searched these phrases more than any other state. Note that the phrases highlighted below are listed exactly as people search them (e.g. self-employed). Results were unique, surprising, and sometimes even comical — and they shed light on all the things we pay taxes on that we may not even think about!

After reading about all those unique tax queries, are you curious about which queries are actually searched the most? It’s no surprise that people want to check on how much money they’ll get back. Popular tax-related searches include tax refund calculator, where is my tax refund, where’s my refund, when are taxes due, and where’s my state tax refund.