What Must a GST Invoice Contain?

If you'd rather not build this layout by hand every time, the GST Invoice Generator below fills in these fields for you and keeps the layout consistent across every invoice you issue.

GST Invoice Example

Here's how those fields come together on a simple intra-state sale — a Mumbai-based supplier selling office furniture worth ₹20,000 (taxable value) to a Mumbai-based registered business, at the 18% GST 2.0 slab:

Because both parties are in Maharashtra, the tax splits equally into CGST and SGST rather than being charged as IGST — the mechanics of that split are covered in our CGST, SGST and IGST explainer. Once you know the taxable value and rate, the GST Calculator can work out the CGST/SGST or IGST split for you automatically.

GST Invoice vs Regular Invoice

A "regular" or non-GST invoice is just a commercial record between two parties, with no legally fixed format — a freelancer without GST registration, for instance, can bill however they like. A GST tax invoice is different: because it's the basis for input tax credit and tax reporting, it must carry the specific particulars set out above (GSTIN, HSN/SAC, tax breakup, and so on), whether or not the seller would otherwise have included them.

Common GST Invoice Mistakes

• Reusing an invoice number from a previous financial year — the serial number must be unique within each financial year, not unique forever.
• Charging both CGST/SGST and IGST on the same invoice — a supply is either intra-state or inter-state, never both, so only one combination applies.
• Leaving out the recipient's state and state code on an inter-state invoice, which is what actually determines the place of supply.
• Quoting an HSN code with fewer digits than your turnover band requires (or more than needed, which isn't wrong but adds unnecessary detail) — confirm the applicable digit count for your turnover rather than copying a competitor's invoice.
• Issuing a tax invoice — instead of a bill of supply — for an exempt sale, or for a supply made under the composition scheme, where GST cannot legally be charged separately.
• Forgetting the reverse-charge declaration on a supply where the recipient, not the supplier, is liable to pay the GST.

When Different Invoice Rules Apply

The particulars above cover a standard tax invoice, but GST law carves out several situations where the requirements differ:

• Exports and SEZ supplies: instead of the usual recipient-address fields, the invoice must carry an endorsement such as "SUPPLY MEANT FOR EXPORT/SUPPLY TO SEZ UNIT OR SEZ DEVELOPER FOR AUTHORISED OPERATIONS ON PAYMENT OF INTEGRATED TAX" (or the equivalent bond/LUT wording), plus the recipient's details and the destination country.
• Reverse charge: the invoice must explicitly state that tax is payable on reverse charge, since the recipient — not the supplier — will deposit the GST.
• B2C sales of ₹50,000 or more to an unregistered recipient: the recipient's name, address, delivery address and state must still be recorded, even without a GSTIN.
• Composition scheme and exempt supplies: these use a bill of supply (Rule 49), not a tax invoice — no GST amount is shown, since composition dealers can't collect tax separately from customers.
• Revised or supplementary invoices: issued under Rule 53 to reference and correct an earlier invoice — for example, after a price revision — and must cite the original invoice's number and date.
• E-invoicing: businesses above the notified turnover threshold must generate an Invoice Reference Number (IRN) and QR code through the government e-invoice portal; the invoice must carry that QR code, and the supplier's signature requirement is waived on the resulting electronic invoice.

If you regularly issue quotations, proforma invoices or delivery challans alongside tax invoices, keeping all of them consistent (and switching cleanly from a quotation or proforma into a final GST invoice once an order is confirmed) is easier with a single set of tools rather than re-typing details each time.

And if you later need to correct an issued invoice — a price change, a return, or a short-shipment — a credit or debit note keeps that correction properly linked to the original invoice rather than editing it after the fact.