Tool · Publication 463 → Schedule C

Per Diem to Line 24b

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This is education, not tax advice. I'm not a CPA or EA. State taxes are not covered.

Publication 463 → Schedule C (Form 1040). The rates are the transportation-industry per diem printed in Notice 2025-54 and Notice 2026-60 — final notices; the percentages are Publication 463’s, read in its 2025 edition, the latest posted. Line 24b’s caption is read in the 2026 draft Schedule C. If a rate, a percentage, or the caption changes, this page is updated in place with a dated note at the foot of the page.

Last checked: 2026-10-10
Reads: Notice 2025-54 · Notice 2026-60 · Publication 463
Core line: Schedule C, line 24b
Changes: Update log (1)

Count the days first — only days spent away from home overnight count — then price them. Enter the away-from-home days in each notice period below, say where the travel ran, and say whether the Department of Transportation hours-of-service limits cover the work. The page substantiates the days at the printed rate, applies the percentage Publication 463 prints for that worker, and lands the deductible figure where it goes on the return: Schedule C, line 24b. The page outputs one line’s figure — never a recommendation, and never an amount of tax saved.

JavaScript is off, so nothing is figured for you — the rates and percentages below are printed in full, with the day counts blank: the same arithmetic, worked by hand. $80 a day CONUS and $86 outside it; 80 percent of the substantiated amount under the DOT hours-of-service rule, 50 percent under the general rule; the result enters Schedule C, line 24b.

Transportation per diem → Schedule CDays → line 24b

Days away from home overnight through September 30, 2026 — the Notice 2025-54 period. Overnight days only: a run that returns the same day is not an away-from-home day, and no amount attaches to it.

Substantiated at the rate: —

Days away from home overnight from October 1, 2026 — the Notice 2026-60 period. The rate is the same $80 / $86; the split exists so each day is read under the notice that covers it, not to change any figure.

Substantiated at the rate: —

Total

Substantiated amount — the days above, priced at the rate for their period and place. This is the amount the per diem method proves. It is not yet the deduction.

—

The percentage — Publication 463. Business meals are generally 50 percent deductible. An individual subject to the Department of Transportation hours-of-service limits deducts 80 percent of travel meals: at the rates above, $64.00 a day CONUS and $68.80 outside CONUS, against $40.00 and $43.00 under the general rule.

24b

Deductible meals — enters Schedule C, line 24b. The substantiated total above, limited by the percentage. The travel side of the same days — the non-meal cost of being away — sits on line 24a; this page does not figure it.

—

Away from home is decided before any rate applies, and this page does not decide it. A day counts only if the traveler was away from the tax home long enough to need sleep or rest; a run that leaves in the morning and returns the same day, with a meal break on the road, is not an away-from-home day (Publication 463, Ch. 1), and no amount attaches to it at any rate, in any notice period.

Lodging is not figured. The $80 / $86 is an M&IE rate — meals and incidental expenses. It is not a lodging rate, and no lodging figure is computed or printed on this page. The travel side of the same days sits on Schedule C, line 24a, which this page names but does not figure.

Not the incidental-only method. Each notice also prints a $5 incidental-expenses-only rate (§4) for a day when only incidental expenses are being substantiated; this page does not figure that method.

The rate substantiates the amount only. Time, place, and business purpose for each day are still proved by records (Rev. Proc. 2019-48) — the free 2026 per diem log (CSV) keeps those columns. The full rate series and the rules behind this arithmetic are read on the per diem rates page.

Sources

6 claims

Every claim above traces to a document, a tax year, a line, and the date it was checked.

1

The special transportation industry meal-and-incidental rate is $80 a day for travel in CONUS and $86 for travel outside CONUS, for the period October 1, 2025 – September 30, 2026; the incidental-expenses-only rate is $5 a day

DOC
Notice 2025-54

YEAR
2025 (FY2026 rates)

LINE
§3 (M&IE) · §4 (incidental-only)

CHECKED
2026-10-10
2

The same transportation rate in the following period — $80 / $86 unchanged, the $5 incidental-only rate unchanged — for October 1, 2026 – September 30, 2027

DOC
Notice 2026-60

YEAR
2026 (FY2027 rates)

LINE
§3 · §4

CHECKED
2026-10-10
3

Business meals are generally 50% deductible; an individual subject to the Department of Transportation hours-of-service limits deducts 80% of travel meals — at the current rate, $64.00 a day CONUS and $68.80 outside CONUS, against $40.00 and $43.00 under the general rule

DOC
Publication 463

YEAR
2025

LINE
Ch. 2, “Special rate for transportation workers”

CHECKED
2026-10-10
4

Being away from home turns on sleep or rest: a run that leaves and returns the same day, with a meal break on the road, is not an away-from-home day, and no per diem amount attaches to it

DOC
Publication 463

YEAR
2025

LINE
Ch. 1, “Away From Home”

CHECKED
2026-10-10
5

Under the per diem method the amount of an expense is deemed substantiated; the time, place, and business purpose of each day must still be proved by records

DOC
Rev. Proc. 2019-48

YEAR
2019

LINE
§§4.01–4.02

CHECKED
2026-10-10
6

Line 24a is “Travel” and line 24b is “Deductible meals” — the two landing lines for an away-from-home day's amounts; the deductible meal figure enters at line 24b, already limited by the percentage

DOC
Schedule C (Form 1040)

YEAR
2026 draft

LINE
Lines 24a–24b

CHECKED
2026-10-10

Update log

Changes are dated and kept. Old figures are never silently overwritten.

2026-10-10:

Tool published. The arithmetic replicates the verified per diem record: days priced at the $80 CONUS / $86 OCONUS transportation rate printed in Notice 2025-54 (days through September 30, 2026) and Notice 2026-60 (days from October 1, 2026), limited by Publication 463’s percentages — 80 percent for workers under DOT hours-of-service limits, 50 percent general — and landing on Schedule C, line 24b. The rate is the same in both notice periods, so the split changes no figure; it shows which notice covers which days. Line 24b’s caption is read in the 2026 draft Schedule C; the landing is re-verified against the final 2026 Schedule C when it posts.