Before you start

A RUT
A ClaveÚnica or SII credentials for the online system
Your first entry stamp into Chile, which is what starts the exemption clock
An application to the SII, if you want the extension

Step-by-step

1
Find your first entry date and write it down
Article 3 of the income tax law gives three years counted 'desde su ingreso a Chile'. That is your first entry, including a tourist trip taken before you decided to move. Dig out the stamp or the immigration record now, because the whole calculation hangs off it.
OnlineWho: YouWeek 1
2
Understand when residency itself begins
Under article 8 N°8 of the Código Tributario as amended by Ley 21.210, you are tax resident once you have been in Chile more than 183 days, continuous or not, within any rolling twelve-month period. This replaced the old six-months-in-a-calendar-year test, and older guides still describe the superseded rule.
OnlineWho: You
3
Expect the pre-residency Additional Tax on Chilean employment income
Before residency bites, employment income earned here is caught by the Additional Tax at 20% as a unique tax under article 60. It looks like a payroll error and it is not. Once resident, employees fall under the Second Category Tax like everyone else.
Via employerWho: Your employer
4
Confirm the exemption applies to you and to which income
During the three years you are taxed only on Chilean-source income — foreign salary, rent, dividends and pensions stay outside the Chilean net. Verify your position with the SII rather than assuming, particularly if your work is performed physically in Chile for a foreign payer, which is the fact pattern that gets argued about.
OnlineWho: You
5
Diary the extension application for year two
The extension is granted by the SII's Director Regional in qualified cases and must be requested before the initial three years expire. It cannot be applied for retrospectively, and the statute sets no fixed length — six years total is common practice, not an entitlement. A calendar reminder eighteen months in is worth a great deal of money.
OnlineWho: YouBefore the third anniversary of your entry
6
File the annual return in April
Chile's Operación Renta runs each April through the SII's online system, which pre-populates much of the return. Employees have most of it done for them; anyone with foreign income or a Chilean business does not.
OnlineWho: YouApril annually

Documents you’ll need

RUT
ClaveÚnica or SII credentials
Your first entry record into Chile
Employment contract or contractor invoices
Evidence of foreign income sources, for the exemption

Things most newcomers don’t know

The three tax-free years run from your first entry into Chile, not from when you became resident.

Article 3 says 'los tres primeros años contados desde su ingreso a Chile'. A scouting trip, a holiday, a month spent deciding whether to move — all of it has already been spending the exemption. People calculate from the date the visa was granted or the date they crossed 183 days and routinely lose a year that way. Work the real deadline out from the first entry stamp and set the reminder against that date.

Source: Ley sobre Impuesto a la Renta, article 3

The extension is discretionary and nobody will prompt you.

Article 3 allows the SII's Director Regional to extend the three years 'en casos calificados'. It is not automatic, it cannot be claimed retrospectively, and the law fixes no length — six years in total is what practice commonly reaches rather than what the statute promises. Because the deadline falls three years after an entry stamp most people have forgotten about, it is silently missed more often than it is refused.

Source: Ley sobre Impuesto a la Renta, article 3; SII extension application

Chile has no digital nomad visa, and the tax runway is what it offers instead.

There is no dedicated remote-work residence category here. What Chile has is at least three years, often longer, during which foreign-source income is outside the Chilean net — which for a remote worker on a foreign salary is worth far more than a visa label. It is why Valparaíso works so well for people paid from elsewhere. The constraint is the residency route, not the tax.

Source: Chilean income tax law; SERMIG has no nomad subcategory

Residency is 183 days in any rolling twelve months, not in a calendar year.

Ley 21.210 rewrote article 8 N°8 of the Código Tributario to a rolling twelve-month test, replacing the old six-months-in-a-calendar-year rule. The practical consequence is that splitting your presence across two calendar years no longer helps: 100 days in one year and 100 in the next can make you resident. A great deal of older guidance, including material still circulating among expatriates here, describes the superseded test.

Source: Código Tributario art. 8 N°8 as amended by Ley 21.210

Common mistakes to avoid

Counting the three years from residency rather than from your first entry into Chile.
Letting the three-year window lapse without applying to the SII for the extension.
Treating six years as an entitlement when it is discretionary practice.
Planning presence around a calendar-year test that Ley 21.210 replaced with a rolling twelve-month one.
Relying on a published bracket table without checking sii.cl, given ongoing reform.

Some of this may be out of date. Spotted something inaccurate? Help us keep it right for the next newcomer.