Pakistan Taxes YouTubers on a Rs195 RPM. Earn Less, and You Have to Prove It.

Pakistan's Federal Board of Revenue has written an RPM into its income tax rules. Under SRO 1641(I)/2026, dated 23 September, a resident creator's remuneration from monetized social content is the higher of two numbers: what they were actually paid, in cash or in kind, or Rs195 multiplied by total views divided by 1,000. Arab News puts Rs195 at about $0.71. The rule says the rate "is subject to revision from time to time."

The second half of the formula does more work than the first. Minimum taxable income is remuneration minus expenses, and expenses count only up to 30% of revenue. A creator who spends 60% of revenue on editors, studio time and staff is still assessed on at least 70%. On 1 million monetized views, deemed remuneration is Rs195,000. The most that can come off is Rs58,500, which leaves a floor of Rs136,500 before ordinary Income Tax Ordinance rates apply. That arithmetic is ours; the procedure sets no separate tax rate.

The burden flips too. A creator who believes they earned less than the benchmark must "demonstrate evidence to this effect to the satisfaction of the Commissioner." An FBR official, speaking anonymously to Arab News, listed what counts: platform revenue reports, payout statements matched to bank credits, withholding certificates, and sponsorship contracts or invoices. The commissioner can also ask for access to a creator's dashboard. If a return declares less than the formula, the FBR can rectify it and recover the difference. Advance tax is due every quarter on the same formula.

Gifted product counts. "Payment in kind counts," the official said, and a free product given in return for a post makes that post paid. Creators who want to show a post was unpaid were told to keep proof that monetization was off, that earnings were zero, and that no brand deal or gifted product was attached.

Since the backlash, the FBR has held one line. "Rs195 per 1,000 views is a benchmark, not a final verdict," a spokesperson said on X, according to Economy.pk. The official told Arab News the rules don't reach posts that collect views without earning anything, and that on platforms that don't pay by the view, creators declare what they were actually paid. He called Rs195 "the below average amount normal Pakistani content fetches per 1000 views on YouTube." The FBR has not published the research behind that figure.

Creators aren't persuaded. "The new FBR formula is based on assumed earnings," Shahzad Ghias, host of The Pakistan Experience (351,000 YouTube subscribers), told Arab News on 12 October. He said that in some months his production costs exceed his YouTube income. Talha Ahad, whose TCM Originals channel has more than 530,000 subscribers and whose team employs dozens, said the same 30% cap lands very differently on a solo creator than on a production company. Islamabad-based YouTuber Hamza Bhatti warned that rules seen as unfair would push payments into informal channels.

Foreign creators aren't exempt. A separate rule, SRO 1642(I)/2026, applies the same formula to non-residents whose earnings are Pakistan-source and who reach more than 50,000 users in Pakistan in a tax year, or 12,250 in a quarter, Profit reported.

The pool is not small. Google Pakistan said in December that more than 95,000 Pakistani channels had passed 10,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 had passed a million, according to Arab News. For the channels that are monetized, YouTube Studio is now a tax document.