Live in Colorado, Work Remotely for a Arizona Employer: Who Taxes You?
Answer
Colorado taxes the income and Arizona cannot. Residency, not the location of the job, drives this answer: Colorado reaches all of a resident's income, and Arizona has no personal income tax to apply to the part earned inside its borders.
Last verified
The instinct that working in a no-tax state means paying no tax is the single most expensive misunderstanding in this niche. Arizona takes nothing, but Colorado still taxes residents on income earned anywhere, so the full amount lands on your Colorado return.
What you file
- 1Resident return · Colorado
File a Colorado resident return reporting all of your income.
The two states, side by side
| Colorado | Arizona | |
|---|---|---|
| Taxes wages | Yes — flat | Yes — graduated |
| Reciprocity partners | None | None |
| Convenience rule | No | No |
| Nonresident return | Form DR 0104 with Schedule DR 0104PN | Form 140NR |
| Credit for other-state tax | Form DR 0104CR | Form 309 |
| Nonresident safe harbour | None published | None published |
| Local income tax | Yes | No |
| Revenue department | Colorado Department of Revenue — Taxation Division | Arizona Department of Revenue |
| Last verified |
The other direction
Reversing the commute does not always reverse the answer. Living in Arizona and working in Colorado gives:Home state only.
Same two states, different situation
The withholding answer turns on how you are paid and where the work happens, not only on which two states are involved.
- W-2 commuter: Colorado → ArizonaBoth states — credit offsets the double tax
- 1099 contractor: Colorado → ArizonaHome state, plus the client state if you work there
- Moved mid-year: Colorado → ArizonaTwo part-year returns
Other Colorado pairs
Questions people actually ask
I live in Colorado and work remotely for a Arizona employer. Which state do I pay?
Colorado taxes the income and Arizona cannot. Residency, not the location of the job, drives this answer: Colorado reaches all of a resident's income, and Arizona has no personal income tax to apply to the part earned inside its borders.
Which state should my employer be withholding for?
Colorado. Your employer should withhold Colorado tax rather than Arizona tax on these wages. If a Arizona line is showing on your pay stub, raise it with payroll now rather than at filing time.
Does my Arizona employer's location alone create a Arizona tax obligation?
No. Arizona sources wages to the place where the work is physically performed, and it does not apply a convenience-of-the-employer rule that would override that. Days you actually spend working inside Arizona are a different matter — those are Arizona-source income and can require a nonresident return.
How current is this?
The Colorado and Arizona rules on this page were last checked against Colorado Department of Revenue — Taxation Division and Arizona Department of Revenue on 2026-08-07. We re-check the full grid every December after state legislative sessions close, and re-check the convenience-of-the-employer states quarterly because that is where the rules move fastest.
Sources
Every fact above comes from the revenue department that publishes the rule. We do not cite secondary summaries, and we do not restate a figure we could not find at source.
- Colorado Department of Revenue — Taxation Division — individual income taxaccessed 2026-08-07
- Arizona Department of Revenue — individual income taxaccessed 2026-08-07