The Minnesota Estate Tax Exemption for 2026: $3,000,000, and the Rate Table That Goes With It

The number for 2026: $3,000,000

Minnesota’s estate tax exclusion for a person who dies in 2026 is $3,000,000 — a fixed dollar amount in the statute, not an indexed one. Minn. Stat. § 291.016, subd. 3(b) lists it by year of death and ends here:

(4) $3,000,000 for decedents dying in 2020 and thereafter.

No inflation clause appears anywhere in the subdivision. Its History line ends at the 2017 first special session — 1Sp2017 c 1 art 1 s 33; art 13 s 14 — and the Revisor’s Table 2 of statutes changed records no action on § 291.016 in the 2025 regular session, the 2025 first special session, or the 2026 session. The figure that applied to a 2020 death applies to a 2026 death.

The rate schedule

Minn. Stat. § 291.03, subd. 1(b), for decedents dying in 2018 and thereafter — the statute’s own two columns, every figure as enacted:

Thirteen percent is the floor. There is no bracket below it and no phase-in. The Department of Revenue’s rate page carries the same 16 percent high and 13 percent low for 2018-present, “only a guide.”

The exemption is not a deduction from the tax. Section 291.016, subd. 3(a) allows a subtraction in computing the Minnesota taxable estate equal to the sum of two amounts: the exclusion amount for the year of death, which is the $3,000,000, and the lesser of the value of qualified small business and qualified farm property or $5,000,000 minus that exclusion. Where the estate holds no qualified farm or business property the second amount is zero and the subtraction is the $3,000,000 alone. Section 291.03, subd. 1 applies the schedule to the taxable estate that results and multiplies the result by a situs fraction “not greater than one” — one, for a Minnesota resident whose property is all here. At the low end the arithmetic lands where you would guess: $3,500,000 less $3,000,000 is $500,000, and 13 percent of that is $65,000.

Two things Minnesota does not have

No inheritance tax. The Department of Revenue puts it in a sentence: “Inheritance tax is a tax on what beneficiaries of an estate inherit. Minnesota does not have an inheritance tax.” The same page adds: “Minnesota’s inheritance tax was repealed starting in 1980.”

No portability. Federal law lets a surviving spouse use the first spouse’s unused exclusion only by election: under 26 U.S.C. § 2010(c)(5)(A) the amount may not be taken into account unless the executor of the first estate files an estate tax return computing it and makes the election on that return, and no election may be made on a return filed after the time prescribed by law, including extensions. Minnesota has no equivalent. Section 291.016, subd. 3 moves nothing from one spouse’s exclusion to the other’s, and the Department said so in its January 22, 2025 analysis of S.F. 30: “Portability is currently not available under Minnesota law.” Minnesota offers a state-only QTIP election instead, on the estate tax machinery page.

Who has to file

The filing test is not what the family takes home. Minn. Stat. § 289A.10, subd. 1 requires a return from the personal representative of a decedent holding property with a Minnesota situs if a federal estate tax return is required, or if

the sum of the federal gross estate and federal adjusted taxable gifts, as defined in section 2001(b) of the Internal Revenue Code, made within three years of the date of the decedent’s death exceeds … $3,000,000 for estates of decedents dying in 2020 and thereafter.

Gross estate, plus three years of adjusted taxable gifts — not net of the mortgage, the debts, the charitable bequest, or the marital deduction. The Department’s filing-requirement page uses the same word, gross: returns are required “when the total gross value of the estate exceeds” the table figure, $3,000,000 for 2020-present. A return can be required on an estate that owes nothing.

The deadline

Nine months. Minn. Stat. § 289A.18, subd. 3: “An estate tax return must be filed with the commissioner within nine months after the decedent’s death.” Section 289A.19, subd. 4 extends the filing deadline by six months, or by however long the federal extension under section 6081 of the Internal Revenue Code runs, whichever is longer. The Department states the working rule: “Form M706, Estate Tax Return and payment are due nine months after a decedent’s death. We allow an automatic six-month extension to file, but do not allow an extension for payment.”

The federal figure, for contrast

The federal basic exclusion for 2026 is $15,000,000, and it is statutory rather than an IRS announcement. 26 U.S.C. § 2010(c)(3)(A) reads “the basic exclusion amount is $15,000,000” — the figure Pub. L. 119-21, § 70106(a) substituted on July 4, 2025. Subparagraph (B) indexes it “[i]n the case of any decedent dying in a calendar year after 2026,” and Rev. Proc. 2025-32 § 2.14 confirms that “[t]he basic exclusion amount will be adjusted for inflation for calendar year 2027 and future years.”

The 2026 gap is five to one, and it widens by operation of law: the federal number is indexed every year from 2027 forward; Minnesota’s does not move unless the legislature moves it.

What changed for 2026

Nothing in the exemption. Nothing in the rates. One provision in the estate tax chapter changed at all: Laws 2026, ch. 128, art. 1, § 31, signed by the governor May 27, 2026, struck “2023” and inserted “2026” in Minn. Stat. § 291.005, subd. 1(3), so “Internal Revenue Code” for Minnesota estate tax purposes now means the Code as amended through May 1, 2026. The Revisor’s posted § 291.005 still displays May 1, 2023 and a History line ending in 2023; the session law is the current text.

Where the rest of it is

This page is the number, the rate table, and the dates. The machinery — how the Minnesota taxable estate is built, the three-year gift add-back, the state-only QTIP election, the farm and small-business subtraction and its recapture, the situs rules for nonresidents, and who is personally liable when an estate distributes before it pays — is on the Minnesota estate tax page. Neither page tells you what to do about your own estate.