The Maryland entry, field by field
This is the registry entry our engine applies for tax year 2026, rendered field by field. Where a field is blank in the registry, the row says so rather than filling the gap.
- Credit for TY2026
- Current credit Yes. Our rules registry carries a current Maryland research credit for tax year 2026.
- Structure
- Incremental: the credit applies to qualified research expenses above a state base amount
- Credit rate
- 10% of qualified research expenses above the base amount
- Base method
- The state adopts the federal §41 base computation, applied to Maryland qualified research expenses.
- Carryforward
- 7 years
- Carryback
- None recorded
- Refundable?
- Refundable for a small business the registry records a small-business test of $5,000,000 net book value of assets.
- Small-business threshold
- $5,000,000
- State form
- Form 500CR
- Statute
- Md. Tax-Gen. Code Ann. §10-721
How the Maryland credit is computed
The Maryland credit is incremental: it applies to the qualified research expenses that exceed a state base amount, not to the whole year's spending. The registry carries a rate of 10%.
The state adopts the federal §41 base computation, applied to Maryland qualified research expenses.
Unused credit carries forward 7 years. Refundability: refundable for a small business - the registry records a small-business test of $5,000,000 net book value of assets.
Ricerca computes the Maryland figure from the same substantiated expense base as the federal §41 credit, using the registry entry for the tax year claimed and applying the state's own qualification rules to it. Where the registry is silent on a point, the study says so and the position is resolved with the return preparer instead of being assumed.
Claiming it alongside the federal credit
The federal §41 credit comes first. It is computed from the qualified research expenses the study substantiates - wages for qualified services, supplies consumed in research, computer and cloud rental, and the allowable share of contract research - and it lands on Form 6765 with the return.
The Maryland credit is then computed from that same substantiated base, with the state's own rules applied on top: its rate, its base amount, its caps, and its own view of what counts. Where the work was physically performed matters: state credits generally reach the research done in the state, so the same employee can sit inside one state's base and outside another's.
That is why the allocation work is done once, at the expense level, with the state attribution recorded as it is built rather than reverse-engineered at filing time.
One base, two computations
- 1 Qualify the activities under the four-part test and total the year's QREs.
- 2 Compute the federal §41 credit and file it on Form 6765.
- 3 Apply the Maryland entry above to the Maryland share of that base, and file it on Form 500CR.
What the registry tells the preparer
These notes travel with the Maryland entry inside the platform and are reproduced here verbatim, including the registry's own emphasis. They are written for the person signing the return, which is exactly why they belong on a page about the credit.
- Maryland's 3% basic R&D credit was repealed for tax years beginning after December 31, 2020 (S.B. 196, Ch. 114, Acts of 2021); only the 10% growth credit remains. Small-business status (net book value of assets under $5M) does NOT change the rate - it makes the credit refundable and reserves a small-business set-aside of the capped annual program allocation.
- Application-based: certified by the Maryland Department of Commerce out of a capped annual allocation; the statutory growth base is the Maryland base amount (average of prior-year Maryland QRE) - substantiate prior-year Maryland QRE before claiming.
Sources
The citations below are carried verbatim on the Maryland registry entry. They are what the study cites, and what a reviewer can check.
- Statute
- Md. Tax-Gen. Code Ann. §10-721
- Form
- Form 500CR
Registry entry version 2024.1, exported from services/study-api/app/engines/rules_engine.py (STATE_RULES_2024 + STATE_RULES_REGIME_OVERRIDES via RulesEngine.get_state_rules) on September 10, 2026. The registry is versioned per state and per tax year: the entry above governs TY2026, and a study for an earlier year is computed under that year's entry instead.