PAN Card Download by Name and Date of Birth: Free Download and Step-by-Step Guide

You cannot download a PAN card using only your name and date of birth. The Income Tax Department discontinued the old “Know Your PAN” facility that allowed this. To download an e-PAN today, you need your actual PAN number (or an application acknowledgement number, or a linked Aadhaar), plus your date of birth and an OTP on your registered mobile.

This trips up a lot of people because “name and DOB” search used to work, and older articles still describe it. Here is what actually works in 2026, including how to find your PAN number first if you’ve lost it.

Can You Download a PAN Card Using Only Name and Date of Birth?

No. The Income Tax Department’s original “Know Your PAN” tool, which let you retrieve your PAN number by entering just your name and DOB, was shut down after it was flagged as a data-security risk. It has been replaced by “Verify Your PAN” on the e-filing portal, which works the other way around: you enter your PAN number along with your name and DOB, and the system confirms whether they match its records.

In short: name and DOB alone verify a PAN. They do not retrieve or download one. You need the PAN number (or a valid substitute like an acknowledgement number or linked Aadhaar) before any download step will work.

How to Find Your PAN Number If You Don’t Know It

If you’ve lost track of your PAN number, try these in order before attempting any download:

• Check old documents. Form 16, income tax returns, bank KYC forms, demat account statements, and loan documents all carry your PAN.
• Log in to the e-filing portal. If you’ve ever registered on incometax.gov.in, your PAN number shows on your profile page under “My Profile.”
• Use linked Aadhaar. If your Aadhaar is linked to your PAN, you can pull up your e-PAN using just your Aadhaar number and OTP, with no PAN number needed. See the Aadhaar-based e-PAN download steps for the full process.
• Call PAN customer care. Protean and UTIITSL support lines can guide you through recovery once you verify your identity. Keep your PAN customer care number handy if the online routes fail.
• Check for name-format mismatches. A surprising number of “PAN not found” errors trace back to how the name was entered at application time (initials, middle name placement, or missing suffixes like Kumar or Devi). If your card was issued with a different name format than what you’re typing, correction, not re-download, is usually the actual fix. This is a common enough issue that it’s worth reading through how first and last names work on a PAN card before you assume the record itself is wrong.

PAN Card Status Check by Name and Date of Birth (Verify Your PAN)

Once you have your PAN number, use “Verify Your PAN” to confirm your details are correctly recorded before attempting a download.

1. Go to the Income Tax e-filing portal and open “Verify Your PAN” under Quick Links (pre-login, no account needed).
2. Enter your PAN, full name exactly as on the card, date of birth, and an active mobile number.
3. Click Continue and enter the OTP sent to your mobile.
4. The portal displays whether your PAN is active and whether the name and DOB match departmental records.

This step only confirms status. It does not generate a downloadable file. If it shows your PAN as inoperative, that usually means your Aadhaar-PAN linking is incomplete, which you’ll need to fix through the Aadhaar-PAN linking process before the PAN is accepted for most financial transactions.

How to Download PAN Card Without a PAN Number

Two legitimate routes exist if you genuinely don’t have your PAN number on hand.

Using Aadhaar Number (Instant e-PAN)

This works only if your PAN was originally issued or updated through the Instant e-PAN facility, and your Aadhaar is linked with an active registered mobile number.

1. Go to the e-filing portal’s Instant e-PAN section and choose “Check Status/Download PAN.”
2. Enter your 12-digit Aadhaar number and click Continue.
3. Enter the Aadhaar OTP sent to your registered mobile.
4. If the PAN is allotted, download the e-PAN PDF directly, free of cost.

Full walkthrough here: download PAN using Aadhaar.

Using Acknowledgement Number (Recent Applicants)

If you applied recently through Protean and haven’t received your PAN number yet, the 15-digit acknowledgement number from your application works as a substitute.

1. Visit the Protean eGov e-PAN download page.
2. Select the acknowledgement number option.
3. Enter the acknowledgement number, date of birth, and captcha.
4. Verify via OTP (email or mobile) and download the PDF.

Step-by-Step: Free e-PAN Download (When You Have Your PAN Number)

Once you know your PAN number, pick the portal that originally issued it: Protean (formerly NSDL) or UTIITSL. Using the wrong one won’t find your record.

Income Tax e-Filing Portal

1. Go to the Instant e-PAN section, click “Check Status/Download PAN.”
2. Enter PAN or Aadhaar as prompted, complete OTP verification.
3. Download the PDF if your PAN was issued via the Instant e-PAN route.

Protean eGov Technologies

1. Open the “Download e-PAN” option under PAN Services.
2. Enter PAN number, date of birth, Aadhaar (if linked), and captcha.
3. Choose OTP delivery by email or mobile, validate, and download.
4. Free if your PAN was allotted or updated in the last 30 days; ₹8.26 (inclusive of tax) after that. See the full PAN card charges breakdown for how this compares to other PAN-related fees.

UTIITSL

1. Visit the UTIITSL PAN portal and select e-PAN download.
2. Enter PAN details and verify via OTP.
3. Download the PDF once verification succeeds.

All three PDFs are password-protected. The password is your date of birth in DDMMYYYY format. For example, 5 January 1995 becomes 05011995.

If you’d rather have a physical card reprinted instead of just a digital copy, that’s a separate request. See the PAN card reprint guide.

Can You Find Date of Birth From a PAN Number?

No, not by decoding the number itself. A PAN’s ten characters don’t encode your date of birth anywhere. Per the Income Tax Department’s own explainer on PAN structure, here’s what each character actually represents:

None of that is date-related. Every “find DOB from PAN” tool you’ll encounter online actually works in reverse. You enter the DOB you already believe is correct, and the system tells you if it matches. There’s no public lookup that surrenders someone’s DOB in exchange for just a PAN number.

If you genuinely need to recover the DOB tied to your own PAN (say your Form 16 and your memory disagree), your real options are: check the original PAN application copy or allotment letter, check Aadhaar (if the two are linked and consistent), or check net banking KYC records where you’re an existing customer. Businesses verifying employee or vendor PANs in bulk can do this at scale only through registered channels like TRACES PAN verification or the e-filing portal’s Bulk PAN/TAN service, both restricted to registered deductors and approved external agencies, not open to the general public.

If Name or DOB Verification Keeps Failing

A failed match usually means one of three things: a data-entry error at the time of PAN allotment, a legal name change (marriage, gazette notification) never updated on the PAN, or a mismatch between how your name appears on PAN versus Aadhaar.

To fix it, you’ll need to file a PAN correction request. Since 1 April 2026, PAN applications and corrections use Forms 93, 94, 95, and 96 under Rule 158 of the Income-tax Rules, 2026. The earlier Form 49A and 49AA were officially discontinued. If you’re still seeing references to 49A online, check whether that content has been updated; the PAN Form 49A guide covers what changed and which form now applies to your situation.

What Experts Say

Practitioners handling PAN queries regularly point to the same recurring issue: most “I can’t download my PAN” complaints aren’t download failures at all. They’re identity-matching failures caused by inconsistent name formatting across Aadhaar, bank KYC, and the original PAN application. Fixing the underlying record through a correction request resolves the download problem permanently, whereas retrying the same portal with slightly different name spellings usually doesn’t. Tax consultants also flag that people frequently confuse “PAN verification” tools with “PAN retrieval” tools. The two do fundamentally different jobs, and no legitimate government portal in 2026 offers open-ended PAN or DOB lookup by name alone, precisely because that was the security gap the older “Know Your PAN” tool created.

FAQs

Can I download my PAN card using only my name and date of birth? No. Name and date of birth are used to verify an existing PAN, not to retrieve or download one. You need your PAN number, an acknowledgement number, or a linked Aadhaar to actually download the e-PAN.

How can I check my PAN card status by name and date of birth? Use “Verify Your PAN” on the Income Tax e-filing portal. Enter your PAN, full name, date of birth, and mobile number, then complete OTP verification to see whether your details match departmental records.

How do I find my PAN number by name? Check old documents like Form 16, ITRs, or bank KYC forms, or log in to the e-filing portal where your PAN appears on your profile. If your Aadhaar is linked to your PAN, you can also retrieve your e-PAN using just your Aadhaar number and OTP.

Can I download a PAN card without a PAN number? Yes, in two cases: using a linked Aadhaar number through the Instant e-PAN facility, or using the 15-digit acknowledgement number from a recent Protean application.

How can I find my date of birth from my PAN number? You can’t decode DOB from the PAN itself. The ten characters encode holder status and name initials, not dates. Existing PAN holders can check their original application copy, linked Aadhaar, or bank KYC records instead.

Is e-PAN download free? Yes, within 30 days of PAN allotment or the last data update. After that, Protean charges ₹8.26 (inclusive of tax) per download; UTIITSL applies a similar nominal fee.