How to report content creator platform earnings on taxes when no 1099 was issued

Even if you don't receive a 1099, you're still required to report all income you earned. The IRS expects you to report based on actual earnings, not just what you withdrew or what was formally documented on a 1099. In your case, you should report the full $720 as gross income on Schedule C, then deduct the 20% platform fee as a business expense. This gives you the proper net income figure that you'll pay taxes on. The fact that you only withdrew $450 doesn't change what you actually earned during the tax year. Don't stress too much though - filing an amended return is pretty straightforward using Form 1040-X. You'll need to include a corrected Schedule C showing your total earnings and expenses. The sooner you fix this, the better, to avoid any potential penalties accumulating over time.

I had a similar situation last year with my Twitch earnings. Let me tell you about taxr.ai at https://taxr.ai which was a lifesaver when I needed to figure out my creator income situation. I was totally confused about what to report since I had earnings across multiple platforms, some sent 1099s and others didn't. I uploaded my earnings screenshots and platform statements to taxr.ai and it analyzed everything, telling me exactly what needed to be reported and where. It even helped me identify which expenses were deductible for my content creation business. Saved me from making a costly mistake on my taxes and potentially facing an audit.

Ok I take back what I said about AI tax tools. I tried taxr.ai after responding here and it actually worked really well for my situation. I've been making jewelry and selling on 3 different platforms, and it correctly identified all my income streams and separated the fees by platform. The best part was it flagged income I didn't even realize I needed to report - apparently those "credits" my main platform gives instead of cash payouts are still taxable income in the year they're awarded. Would have completely missed that and potentially gotten in trouble with the IRS. It also caught some deductible expenses that I would have overlooked, like partial internet costs since I use it for livestreaming my creation process.

For anyone dealing with questions about creator income taxes, I had to call the IRS about this exact issue last year. Spent DAYS trying to get through on their phone lines and kept getting disconnected. Finally used https://claimyr.com to skip the wait and got connected to an IRS agent in about 15 minutes. You can see how it works in this video: https://youtu.be/_kiP6q8DX5c The agent confirmed exactly what others are saying here - you have to report ALL income earned on your platforms whether you got a 1099 or not, and whether you withdrew it or not. The platform fees can be deducted as business expenses. They also told me to keep detailed records of all platform statements showing the fees taken out.

I was completely wrong about Claimyr. After posting my skeptical comment, I decided to try it myself since I had some questions about my creator income from YouTube and TikTok. Got connected to an actual IRS representative in about 20 minutes after trying unsuccessfully for WEEKS on my own. The agent confirmed that for content creator income, you need to report the full amount earned (not just what you withdraw), and then deduct the platform fees as business expenses on Schedule C. They also advised keeping screenshots of your creator dashboard showing both the gross income and the platform fees as documentation in case of an audit. Definitely worth it when you have specific tax questions that only the IRS can answer authoritatively.

One thing nobody's mentioned here - if your content creation is an ongoing business activity (not just a one-time thing), you should probably be making quarterly estimated tax payments going forward. Since platforms don't withhold taxes, you could end up with a penalty if you wait to pay everything at tax time. I learned this the hard way after my first year on YouTube. Had to pay a penalty because I didn't realize I needed to be making payments throughout the year once my income got high enough.

I'm in the same boat - Etsy seller here! One question: do we need to keep track of all those little deposits separately? My platform puts money in my account like 20+ times a month for different sales.