On 1 October, Utah started collecting a 2% excise tax on gross receipts from online platforms that are legally required to run age verification because a third or more of their content counts as “harmful to minors.” Signed into law in March by Governor Spencer Cox, Senate Bill 73 makes Utah only the second US state — after Alabama — to actually start collecting a tax aimed squarely at adult content businesses, rather than just proposing one.
Why it matters to creators
Nobody is sending OnlyFans creators a tax bill from Salt Lake City. The levy falls on “covered entities” — the platforms and sites themselves — not on individual creators, which is a relief given how often creators already get blindsided by tax bills they didn’t see coming. But it’s a live example of a trend every working creator should be tracking: states are moving from regulating adult platforms (age checks, content rules) to taxing them directly, and the money raised this way tends to come back out of either subscription prices or platform margins. Alabama has quietly run a similar tax for over a year. Pennsylvania and Florida both have versions in the pipeline. If you have fans in any of these states, or you’re a US creator based in one, this is the start of a patchwork that’s only going to get more complicated.
What Utah’s tax actually does
SB 73 is an excise tax, not a sales tax — a distinction that matters. A sales tax is added at checkout and collected from the customer; this one is imposed directly on the business, which can absorb the cost or raise prices, but doesn’t have to show it as a line item. The 2% applies to gross receipts from Utah customers on “covered transactions”: subscriptions, memberships, pay-per-view, streaming and other digital content sold by a “covered entity” — defined as any commercial site required to run age verification under Utah law because more than 33.3% of its content meets the state’s definition of material harmful to minors.
Covered businesses file and pay quarterly through the Utah State Tax Commission. Ninety per cent of the revenue goes to a new Minor Mental Health Restricted Account; the rest funds enforcement by the Division of Consumer Protection, which can issue fines of up to $2,500 per violation (rising to $5,000 if a company ignores an enforcement order) and can pursue a company over Utah users even if they try to mask their location with a VPN.
Does it reach OnlyFans?
This is the part nobody has actually answered. Utah’s test is about the website, not the platform’s brand: does it require age verification because more than a third of its content is “harmful to minors”? Dedicated webcam sites, clip stores and paysites plainly qualify. A mixed platform hosting everything from fitness and cooking content to explicit material sits in murkier territory, and no official guidance has named OnlyFans, Fansly or any other specific platform as a covered entity.
The adult industry’s trade body, the Free Speech Coalition, isn’t waiting to find out the hard way. In a member advisory issued the day before the tax took effect, FSC board chair Jeffrey Douglas told members that “a tax on speech is unconstitutional” — but warned that businesses with Utah sales remain liable “unless the law is challenged and overturned,” and that wilful non-payment can bring serious fines or felony charges. FSC has form here: it successfully sued Utah over an earlier age-verification law in 2023, and a similar challenge to SB 73 would hardly be a surprise. Until one lands, the safest assumption for any platform or solo operator with a meaningful Utah audience is that the tax applies unless they can show otherwise.
Alabama got there first, and more states want in
Utah isn’t breaking new ground so much as catching up. Alabama’s Materials Harmful to Minors Tax has been in effect since 1 September 2025 — a full year before Utah’s — and at 10% of gross receipts, it’s five times steeper. Alabama’s version also reaches content “produced, sold, filmed or generated” in the state, regardless of where the buyer is based, which is a broader net than Utah’s customer-location test.
More are drafting their own versions. Pennsylvania’s SB 1246, introduced in March 2026 and still pending, would add a 10% tax on top of the state’s existing 6% sales tax on adult subscriptions and purchases. In Florida, Republican gubernatorial candidate James Fishback has pitched a 50% income tax specifically on OnlyFans creators’ earnings if he’s elected — currently just a campaign promise, not a bill, but a sign of where the political wind is blowing in some statehouses.
There’s no UK equivalent on the table. The closer parallel for British creators is Ofcom’s enforcement under the Online Safety Act, which fines platforms for failing age checks rather than taxing their revenue — a different mechanism aimed at the same underlying political pressure.
What to do now
- If a meaningful share of your subscribers are in Utah, Alabama or Pennsylvania, watch for any pricing or policy emails from your platform — a tax like this is exactly the kind of cost that gets passed through quietly.
- If you self-host content, run your own paysite, or operate independently of a major platform, check whether your business could be a “covered entity” under Utah’s or Alabama’s rules, and get advice before you ignore it.
- Follow the Free Speech Coalition’s legislative tracker for bills like Pennsylvania’s SB 1246 moving in your state.
- Don’t assume this is US-only or OnlyFans-specific forever — keep an eye on how this money gets spent and whether other states cite Utah or Alabama as a model.
- Keep your own records clean regardless: a creator’s tax position with HMRC or the IRS is separate from what a platform owes a state, and your own filing deadlines don’t move because of this.
This is general information, not legal or tax advice — speak to a qualified professional about how any of this applies to your situation.
