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E-Invoice and the IRN, Explained

E-invoicing is surrounded by tools whose copy implies they can make you compliant with it. This page explains what an IRN actually is, the one place it can come from, and the exact point where a tool like this one has to stop.

What an IRN is

IRN stands for Invoice Reference Number. Under GST e-invoicing, a covered supplier does not simply raise an invoice and send it: the invoice details are first reported to the Invoice Registration Portal, which checks the data, registers the invoice, and returns the IRN as the proof of that registration — together with a signed QR code encoding the key invoice details. The IRN and the QR code are then carried on the invoice that goes to the buyer. An IRN is therefore not a number a seller can compute, reserve or print for themselves: it exists only because the portal created it, at the moment the invoice was registered.

How it works, in order

1. Raise the invoice as usual — with every Rule 46 field complete: the format guide lists them, and the generator checks them as you type.
2. Report the invoice details to the Invoice Registration Portal — directly on the portal, or through business software that connects to it. This reporting step is the e-invoice; there is no other version of it.
3. The portal validates and registers the invoice, and returns the IRN and the signed QR code.
4. Issue the invoice carrying both. The buyer — and any officer — can use the QR code to confirm the invoice was genuinely reported.
5. File GSTR-1 separately. E-invoicing happens invoice by invoice, at the time of issue; GSTR-1 is the period summary. Registering an invoice does not file your return, and filing a return does not create IRNs. The two steps meet in your data, not in each other.

Who must comply

The requirement follows the supplier's size: e-invoicing applies to registered businesses whose aggregate turnover exceeds the limit the government has notified for it. That limit has been lowered in phases since the system began, so businesses that were out can come in — applicability is a question to re-check, not a status you earn once. Where it applies, it covers the invoices such a supplier issues to registered customers, and export invoices; an ordinary retail sale to a walk-in customer is not reported for an IRN. This page deliberately prints no turnover figure: the figure is set and changed by notification, and the current one is published on the official e-invoice portal — check there, or ask your tax adviser, rather than trusting any number printed on a tool's website, including ours.

What FacturaFit does — and where it stops

• Prepares the invoice data. Rule 46-complete documents, GSTIN format and checksum validation, the place-of-supply split — so an invoice is right before anyone reports it anywhere.
• Prepares the return data. The GSTR-1-structured export, labelled "review before filing" everywhere it is offered. Its schema status is stated, dated: UNVERIFIED AT BUILD (checked 2026-11-08).
• Performs no reporting. No IRNs, no e-invoices, no portal connection, no filing — the same boundary stated on the terms page and in the homepage questions.

That division is the honest one. Preparation is work a document tool can do well and verifiably; registration is an act of the government's system, and a tool that claims to do it from your browser is claiming something it cannot be checked on — until the notice arrives, addressed to you.

What you still do yourself

• Check whether e-invoicing applies to you, against the current notified limit on the official portal.
• Report each covered invoice to the Invoice Registration Portal and issue it with the returned IRN and QR code.
• Review the GSTR-1 export in the official offline tool and file on the official portal, with your own credentials, as always.