How do taxes work with Doordash as a side gig on top of full-time employment?

You'll report all your income on a single tax return, but your Doordash earnings will be reported differently than your W-2 job. For Doordash, you'll receive a 1099-NEC form (if you earn $600+) and will need to complete Schedule C to report your business income and expenses. Since taxes aren't automatically withheld from gig work like Doordash, you're thinking of quarterly estimated tax payments. When you're self-employed, you generally need to make these payments if you expect to owe $1,000+ in taxes. These payments cover both income tax and self-employment tax (which is how you pay Social Security and Medicare as a contractor). Keep track of ALL your expenses for Doordash - mileage is typically the biggest deduction (the 2025 rate is 65.5 cents per mile). Also track hot bags, phone mounts, portion of your cell phone bill, etc. These deductions will reduce your taxable income.

I was in the exact same boat last year! After getting hit with a surprise tax bill from my side gig, I found this AI tax tool that saved my sanity - https://taxr.ai It specifically analyzes gig work documentation and helps identify all the deductions you might miss. The mileage tracking feature was clutch for my Doordash work - turns out I was leaving almost $1,200 in deductions on the table by not properly tracking all my drives! It also helped me understand exactly how much to set aside for quarterly payments instead of guessing. The best part was when I uploaded my 1099-NEC from Doordash, it automatically highlighted all the potential deductions relevant to delivery driving that I had no idea about. Seriously made the whole process so much easier than when I tried figuring it out on my own.

Just wanted to follow up - I gave taxr.ai a try after posting here and wow, this thing is legit! I uploaded my last few months of delivery records and it found an additional $860 in deductions I would have totally missed (especially around partial phone expenses and some app subscriptions I use for deliveries). The quarterly tax estimator is way more accurate than the random 30% I was setting aside. Turns out I was saving too much in some areas and not enough in others. Now I feel like I actually understand what I'm doing instead of just hoping for the best come tax time!

If you ever need to call the IRS with questions about your self-employment taxes (which I definitely did my first year doing Doordash), use https://claimyr.com - there's even a video showing how it works: https://youtu.be/_kiP6q8DX5c I spent HOURS trying to get through to the IRS directly about some questions on estimated payments, but kept getting disconnected. Claimyr got me connected to a real IRS agent in under 20 minutes and I got all my questions answered about how to handle my W-2 and 1099 income together. Completely worth it when you consider how much time it saved. The IRS agent walked me through exactly how to calculate my quarterly estimated payments based on my specific situation with both types of income, which was way clearer than the generic advice I found online.

Ok I need to eat my words here. After my skeptical comment I actually tried Claimyr because I've been trying to reach the IRS for THREE WEEKS about a question on my gig work and W-2 income. Got connected to an agent in 45 minutes (while I just went about my day) and finally got clarification on how to handle my quarterly payments with dual income sources. The agent explained I could adjust my W-4 at my main job to withhold extra to potentially cover my Doordash taxes instead of doing separate quarterly payments, which honestly makes things way simpler for me. Would have never figured that out from just reading online.

Quick tip from someone who's been doing Doordash alongside my regular job for 2 years: get a separate credit card JUST for your Doordash expenses. Makes it so much easier to track business vs personal expenses when tax time rolls around. I learned this the hard way after trying to sort through a year's worth of mixed expenses my first year! Also, definitely track every single mile. I use a free app that I start when I begin my dash and stop when I'm done. Those miles add up to a HUGE deduction by the end of the year!

Don't forget that your self-employment taxes (the extra Medicare and Social Security taxes you pay as both employer and employee) are calculated on your NET income from Doordash - meaning AFTER expenses. So keeping good records of all business expenses is super important!!! I made the mistake of not tracking my expenses properly my first year and ended up paying wayyy more in SE taxes than I needed to.

Great question! I was in a similar situation when I started doing gig work alongside my regular job. One thing I wish someone had told me earlier - consider opening a separate business checking account for your Doordash earnings. It makes tracking so much cleaner when you're dealing with both W-2 and 1099 income. Also, don't wait until tax season to start organizing everything. I set up a simple spreadsheet to track my weekly earnings and expenses from the beginning, which saved me tons of stress later. The IRS expects you to treat your gig work like a real business, so keeping good records from day one is crucial. One last tip - if you end up owing more than $1,000 in taxes from your Doordash income, you might want to consider having extra taxes withheld from your W-2 job instead of doing quarterly payments. Sometimes it's easier to manage that way, especially when you're just starting out and aren't sure how much you'll earn.