OIDAR B2C vs B2B: Who Pays GST on Digital Services Sold to India?

When a foreign business sells digital (OIDAR) services to India, who pays the GST depends entirely on whether the customer is registered for GST. Sell to an unregistered customer (B2C) and you charge and remit 18% IGST (forward charge). Sell to a GST-registered business (B2B) that gives you a valid GSTIN and they account for the tax under reverse charge — you charge nothing.

The single deciding factor: a valid GSTIN

• No GSTIN → B2C → “non-taxable online recipient” (NTOR). You must register for Indian GST and charge 18% IGST on the sale, then remit it via your monthly GSTR-5A. There is no threshold — this applies from the first such sale.
• Valid GSTIN → B2B → reverse charge. The Indian registered buyer self-assesses and pays the IGST. You do not charge it and you have no registration duty for those sales.

Decision table

	B2C — unregistered customer (NTOR)	B2B — GST-registered business
Charges the 18% IGST	You (the foreign supplier)	Nobody on your side
Pays it to the government	You, via GSTR-5A	The Indian buyer, under reverse charge
Must you register for GST?	Yes	No
On the invoice	Add 18% IGST	”Subject to reverse charge”

Don’t call B2C “reverse charge”

A common and costly error: assuming the consumer handles the tax under reverse charge. That is the stale pre-October-2023 framing. Today, B2C/NTOR is a forward charge collected by you; reverse charge applies only to B2B. (See the NTOR trap.)

Make it automatic

Capture a GSTIN field at checkout and validate it against the public GST portal. If valid → treat as B2B and drop the IGST. If blank/invalid → treat as B2C and add 18% IGST. Wiring this into billing means you never have to classify customers by hand — and you don’t under-collect.

For the full picture — registration (REG-10), monthly filing (GSTR-5A), and the income-tax angle — see the OIDAR guide for foreign businesses.

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General information as of June 2026, not tax advice. BatchWise handles OIDAR registration + filing for foreign sellers.