Travel Nurse Tax-Free Stipends & GSA Per Diem Rates Explained

A travel nurse tax-free stipend is a weekly housing and meals payment that isn't taxed because it reimburses the cost of living away from your tax home — and the amount agencies can pay tax-free is benchmarked to the federal GSA per diem rates published at gsa.gov. For FY2025, the standard continental-US (CONUS) rate is $110 per night for lodging and $68 per day for meals and incidentals (M&IE), with higher limits in expensive metros. Stay at or under the GSA rate for your assignment city and the stipend is presumptively reasonable and tax-free; pay above it and the excess can be reclassified as taxable wages.

This is the engine behind a travel nurse's take-home pay. Once you understand how GSA rates cap the tax-free portion, you can read any pay package and spot when a stipend is too good to be legal.

What the stipend is supposed to cover

Two separate stipends make up the tax-free portion of most contracts:

• Housing stipend — covers lodging while you're on assignment, benchmarked to the GSA lodging rate for the city.
• M&IE stipend — covers meals and incidentals (tips, minor expenses), benchmarked to the GSA M&IE rate.

Both are only tax-free if you maintain a qualifying tax home. If you don't, none of it is tax-free — see travel nurse tax home rules before you count on these dollars.

Why GSA rates are the benchmark

The General Services Administration sets per diem rates that federal employees get reimbursed at when they travel. The IRS lets private employers use those same published rates as a safe harbor: reimburse an employee at or below the GSA rate for the locality, and you generally don't have to prove each individual expense.

Agencies lean on this hard. They look up the GSA lodging and M&IE rates for your assignment city, and they keep your tax-free stipends at or under those numbers. At-or-under is the green zone. Above the GSA rate, the excess loses its safe-harbor protection and can be treated as wages — taxable, with FICA owed.

The FY2025 numbers

Locality type	Lodging (per night)	M&IE (per day)
Standard CONUS (most areas)	$110	$68
Higher-cost metro (example: San Francisco)	~$300+	~$92
Higher-cost metro (example: Boston, seasonal)	~$300+	~$92

The standard rate applies to most of the country. Designated high-cost cities get their own, larger figures, and some are seasonal (a beach or ski town's lodging rate jumps in peak months). Always look up the specific city and month on gsa.gov rather than assuming the standard rate.

A note on M&IE: GSA M&IE rates come in tiers (the FY2025 tiers run from $68 up to $92 for the highest-cost areas). The $68 figure is the standard floor most assignments use.

Turning daily rates into weekly stipends

Pay packages quote stipends weekly; GSA quotes them daily. To compare, convert:

• Lodging: the GSA rate is per night. A full week is 7 nights, so the standard $110 × 7 = $770/week of tax-free housing room. Many contracts pay less than the full GSA ceiling.
• M&IE: $68 × 7 = $476/week at the standard rate. (Travel days are technically reimbursed at 75% of M&IE, but agencies usually pay a flat weekly figure.)

So under the standard CONUS rate, the combined tax-free ceiling is roughly $1,246/week. In a high-cost metro it can be far more. You can run any city's rates and your own package through the travel nurse stipend calculator to see how much of your offer fits in the tax-free zone.

A worked example

Consider a Phoenix assignment (standard CONUS for FY2025) on a 3x12 schedule:

Component	Weekly amount	GSA weekly ceiling	Inside the safe harbor?
Base hourly ($24 × 36)	$864 (taxable)	n/a	n/a
Housing stipend	$1,300	$770 ($110 × 7)	No — $530 over
M&IE stipend	$350	$476 ($68 × 7)	Yes — under

Here's the subtlety: that $1,300 housing stipend is above the Phoenix GSA lodging ceiling. Agencies often still pay it — but the portion above GSA loses its automatic safe-harbor protection. If audited, the agency would need to substantiate that actual lodging cost more, or risk the excess being treated as wages. This is exactly why you compare each stipend line against the city's GSA rate before signing. For a high-cost city like San Francisco, that same $1,300 would sit comfortably under the ceiling.

When excess stipends become taxable

Two ways travelers get caught:

1. Stipend exceeds GSA and isn't substantiated. The above-GSA portion can be reclassified as taxable wages plus FICA.
2. No qualifying tax home. This is the bigger risk — it makes the entire stipend taxable, not just the excess. (Covered fully in the tax-home article.)

Either way, the fix is the same: keep the stipend at or under GSA for the locality, and make sure your tax home is rock solid. If you're working across several states in one year, the recordkeeping compounds — see travel nurse taxes across multiple states.

How to use GSA rates when comparing offers

• Look up the exact city and assignment month at gsa.gov/perdiem.
• Convert the daily lodging and M&IE rates to weekly (× 7).
• Compare each stipend line in the offer to its GSA ceiling.
• Flag any stipend well above GSA and ask the recruiter how it's justified.
• Remember a higher base + reasonable stipend is safer than a tiny base + an inflated stipend.

The whole framework for weighing offers lives in how to compare travel nurse contracts, and the rest of the series is on the travel nursing hub.

Frequently asked questions

What are the FY2025 GSA per diem rates?

For fiscal year 2025, the standard CONUS rate is $110 per night for lodging and $68 per day for meals and incidentals (M&IE). High-cost metros have higher, location-specific rates that you can look up by city and month at gsa.gov.

Are travel nurse stipends taxable?

Tax-free stipends are not taxable if you maintain a qualifying tax home and the stipend stays at or under the GSA per diem rate for your assignment city. Without a tax home, all stipends are taxable. The portion of any stipend that exceeds the GSA rate can also be taxed unless it's substantiated.

How much can a travel nurse stipend be?

There's no single legal maximum, but the tax-free safe harbor is the GSA per diem rate for the locality. At the standard CONUS rate that's about $770/week for lodging and $476/week for M&IE. High-cost cities allow more. Anything above the GSA ceiling risks being treated as taxable wages.

What happens if my stipend is higher than the GSA rate?

The portion above the GSA rate loses automatic safe-harbor protection. If you can't substantiate that your actual costs were higher, the excess can be reclassified as taxable wages subject to income tax and FICA.

Do I have to keep receipts for my stipend?

Using the GSA per diem safe harbor generally means you don't have to itemize every meal or lodging receipt. But you should keep proof of your tax home and the assignment dates. If your stipend exceeds the GSA rate, you may need receipts to justify the difference.

Where do I find the GSA rate for my assignment city?

Go to gsa.gov/perdiem and search by city and state (and check the month, since some rates are seasonal). If your city isn't listed separately, the standard CONUS rate applies.

---

This is educational only and not financial or tax advice. GSA per diem rates change annually and by locality, and tax-free treatment depends on maintaining a qualifying tax home. Confirm your situation with a travel-tax professional.