Why game studios and SaaS companies are setting up in Türkiye

Most countries that court software companies offer one thing: a lower rate on profit. You move, you pay less tax on what you earn, and that is the whole arrangement. It works well if you are profitable and badly if you are spending to grow.

Türkiye does both halves. Qualifying IT export income is taxed at 0%. Separately, the state pays back 50 to 70% of what you spend growing abroad, covering advertising, store commissions, hosting, events, overseas offices and sales salaries, as cash into your company account.

That second half is the part almost nobody outside Türkiye knows about, and for a studio in growth mode it is usually worth more than the first.

The three reasons

1. Exported IT revenue is taxed at 0%. Presidential Decision No. 11257, published on 30 April 2026 and applying to tax periods from 1 January 2026, raised the corporate tax deduction on qualifying service export income to 100%. Software, game and IT service revenue invoiced to customers abroad and used abroad ends up taxed at nothing. Exported services are also VAT-exempt. The conditions are mechanical rather than difficult: a Türkiye-registered entity, invoices issued to the foreign customer, the service used abroad, and the revenue brought into Türkiye by the tax return deadline. There is more detail in the 0% tax post.

2. Growth spend comes back as cash. Under Decision No. 10962, the base rate is 50% of eligible spend, paid as a reimbursement in Turkish lira. When the activity targets one of the Ministry's 20 target countries for the IT sector, which include the US, UK, Germany, Japan, South Korea and Canada, promotion, office, event and digital product promotion items go to 70%. For a mobile studio buying users in the US and Japan, this is the biggest single line in the programme.

Support is calculated on the invoice amount including indirect taxes, so VAT you paid on eligible expenses comes back at the same rate. For the items studios use most, which are hosting, app store commissions, per-title advertising, brand marketing, overseas offices and sales staff, there is no pre-approval. You spend, you pay from the company account, and the claim is filed afterwards within the six-month window.

3. The entry cost is low. There is no minimum revenue for the Standard Programme and no separate enrolment step for the IT sector. You file your basic company documents once, alongside your first claim, and you are in. Setting up the entity itself, meaning registration, director, tax ID, bank account and accountancy, takes weeks rather than quarters.

Why the two halves compound

Take $100,000 of user acquisition spend aimed at players in the United States.

As an expense it reduces taxable profit, though if your export income is already taxed at 0% then the deduction is not where the value sits. As a claim under Article 17 it comes back at 70%, which is $70,000 in cash, subject to the item's caps.

Your effective cost of buying that user is $30,000. This changes which campaigns are viable and what CPI you can afford to pay. It is the reason studios that started out shopping for a low-tax jurisdiction often end up here instead.

What it costs to run a Turkish entity

The overhead is real and worth planning for. A Turkish company needs monthly bookkeeping and payroll filings, a tax representative, and disciplined record-keeping. You keep invoice and payment originals for ten years, even though nothing is submitted on paper. Spend has to be paid from the company's own account or card, because a founder's personal card breaks the claim. Support is paid in Turkish lira, so if your costs are in dollars you carry some FX timing risk between payment and reimbursement.

None of this is heavy compared with what comes back, but it happens every month, not once a year at accounts time.

Who it does not fit

• Companies selling mainly into the Turkish domestic market. Both the tax regime and the incentive

programme are built on export. Domestic revenue gets neither.

• Companies with no growth spend. If you do not advertise, pay platform commissions, attend events or hire abroad, there is little to reimburse. The tax side still applies.
• Anyone unwilling to keep clean books. The programme is generous because it is evidenced. Mismatches between contract, invoice and payment are the most common reason claims stall.
• Companies that need money this month. Review takes one to three months after filing.

Next step

The calculator gives an itemised estimate from your actual annual spend in about a minute, including the 70% target-country rate.

If the number looks interesting, the useful next conversation is about the last six months of your spending, because a good part of it may still be claimable today.