Savings
Axis Bank fixed deposit interest rates, by tenure and deposit size
Axis Bank’s own rate card of 27 August 2026, read in full: the general and senior schedules, why a bigger deposit can earn less, and what early closure costs.
Axis Bank’s domestic rate card effective 27 August 2026 pays a general depositor 6.50% at its peak and a resident senior citizen 7.25%, both on deposits below ₹3 crore. The general curve reaches 6.50% at 18 months and then runs flat all the way to ten years, so a general depositor who locks money away for a decade earns exactly what an 18-month deposit earns. Senior citizens are the single exception, and the reason is one bucket where the age premium quietly widens.
The rate card of 27 August 2026
This is the domestic deposit schedule Axis publishes as a PDF and links from its FD interest rates page. It covers rupee term deposits under ₹5 crore in two amount bands, and it is a callable schedule — premature withdrawal is permitted, at a cost set out below.
| Maturity period | General, under ₹3 cr | General, ₹3–5 cr | Senior, under ₹3 cr | Senior, ₹3–5 cr |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 7–14 days | 3.00% | 3.25% | 3.50% | 3.75% |
| 15–29 days | 3.00% | 3.25% | 3.50% | 3.75% |
| 30–45 days | 3.25% | 4.00% | 3.75% | 4.50% |
| 46–60 days | 4.00% | 4.25% | 4.50% | 4.75% |
| 61–87 days | 4.75% | 4.50% | 5.25% | 5.00% |
| 88 days to 3 months 24 days | 5.00% | 5.25% | 5.50% | 5.75% |
| 3 months 25 days to under 4 months | 5.00% | 4.25% | 5.50% | 4.75% |
| 4 months to under 6 months | 5.00% | 5.25% | 5.50% | 5.75% |
| 6 months to under 9 months | 5.50% | 5.50% | 6.00% | 6.00% |
| 9 months to under 1 year | 5.75% | 5.75% | 6.25% | 6.25% |
| 1 year to 1 year 10 days | 6.25% | 6.15% | 6.75% | 6.65% |
| 1 year 11 days to under 13 months | 6.25% | 6.15% | 6.75% | 6.65% |
| 13 months to under 15 months | 6.25% | 6.15% | 6.75% | 6.65% |
| 15 months to under 18 months | 6.45% | 6.15% | 6.95% | 6.65% |
| 18 months to under 2 years | 6.50% | 6.15% | 7.00% | 6.65% |
| 2 years to under 3 years | 6.50% | 6.15% | 7.00% | 6.65% |
| 3 years to under 5 years | 6.50% | 6.15% | 7.00% | 6.65% |
| 5 years to 10 years | 6.50% | 6.15% | 7.25% | 6.90% |
Two dates govern this table: Axis’s own effective date of 27 August 2026, and the day we read it, 4 September 2026. The card states that rates change without prior notice, so this is a record of what the bank published, not a quote.
It is one of six schedules on that page, and they move independently: NRI deposits also date from 27 August, Fixed Deposit Plus and its NRI version from 26 August, MIBOR-linked floating rate deposits from 1 July, and FCNR and RFC deposits from 4 September 2026 — the most recently repriced of the six. Axis is not among the seven banks in our maintained fixed deposit interest rates comparison — read this page against that one to place it.
The general curve stops rising at 18 months
Read the second column downwards and the shape appears. Rates climb to 6.25% at one year, add twenty basis points at 15 months, add five more at 18 months, and then stop. From 18 months to ten years the general rate is 6.50% and never moves.
So a general depositor gains nothing by committing money for three, five or ten years rather than 18 months. The extra 102 months buy no additional interest, and they cost the option to redeploy if rates rise. Eighteen months to under two years is the top rung worth taking; anything longer is a bet that reinvestment rates will be worse in 2028, made without being paid to make it.
The senior uplift is half a point, except in one bucket
Across seventeen of the eighteen maturity buckets, Axis adds exactly 0.50 percentage points for a resident senior citizen. In the last one — 5 years to 10 years — it adds 0.75, taking 6.50% to 7.25% below ₹3 crore and 6.15% to 6.90% in the higher band. That a bank varies the uplift by tenor at all is worth knowing; our page on senior citizen FD rates shows where else it happens.
That single widened premium reverses the advice above. Where a general depositor is paid nothing to go past 18 months, a senior is paid 25 basis points to go past five years. That is worth taking only if the money is genuinely surplus to the next five years of spending. A retiree weighing the same lock-in against the government’s senior-only alternative should read SCSS against a bank FD first.
Axis gives the senior rate to resident individuals aged 60 or above as on the date of booking or renewal, and states that a customer who attains 60 during the tenure of an existing deposit does not get the preferential rate for the remainder of that term. Turning 60 next month is a reason to wait, or to time a renewal.
A bigger deposit can earn less
The instinct that more money commands a better rate is wrong here, and the direction of the error changes with tenure.
Below six months, the ₹3 crore to under ₹5 crore band generally pays more — 75 basis points more at 30 to 45 days. Between six months and one year the two bands are identical. From one year onwards the relationship inverts, and by 18 months a deposit of ₹3 crore or more earns 6.15% while a deposit of ₹2.99 crore earns 6.50%. Crossing the ₹3 crore line costs 35 basis points on every long bucket.
The larger band also contains a pothole the retail band does not. A deposit of 3 months and 24 days earns 5.25%; one of 3 months and 25 days earns 4.25%; one of 4 months earns 5.25% again. A hundred basis points disappear in a bucket less than a week wide, for both general and senior depositors, with no equivalent dip in the sub-₹3-crore column, which pays a flat 5.00% across all three buckets.
Nor does going much larger help. The ₹5 crore and above schedule runs through seven further bands, from ₹5 crore to ₹1,000 crore and above, and its highest general rate anywhere is 6.50% — equal to, never better than, a sub-₹3-crore retail deposit, and at long tenures worse, at 6.20% to 6.35%. No amount of money buys a better long-tenure rate here than an ordinary retail deposit does.
What the card does not say is whether the amount band is tested per deposit or across everything you hold. Axis’s terms use “contracted amount” when setting the ₹5 crore premature-closure threshold, which points to a per-deposit test, but the rate schedule is silent. If you are near ₹3 crore and thinking of splitting the money to stay in the better column, confirm the treatment before booking — and note that splitting within Axis does nothing for deposit insurance.
One outright conflict, and one silence. The rate card carries a full senior-citizen schedule for deposits of ₹5 crore and above, while the FD and RD terms say the special senior and staff rates do not apply to callable deposits over ₹5 crore. Both are Axis documents, both read on 4 September 2026; we did not put the question to the bank, so above ₹5 crore get the rate confirmed in writing before funding. And neither document states a minimum amount for an ordinary rupee fixed deposit, so this page publishes none — the ₹100 floor quoted below is the tax-saver rule, not the general one.
Above ₹3 crore, liquidity costs 20 basis points
At ₹3 crore Axis opens a second door. Fixed Deposit Plus is a non-callable deposit with a ₹3 crore minimum, and on its card effective 26 August 2026 it pays 6.35% from one year onwards in the ₹3 crore to under ₹5 crore band, against 6.15% on the callable schedule. The terms are unambiguous about what that extra 20 basis points costs: the deposit cannot be closed before maturity except in narrow cases such as bankruptcy, a court or regulatory direction, or death — and even then the rate reverts to the ordinary FD rate and a penalty applies.
For a senior citizen the arithmetic inverts completely. Axis states that special senior-citizen rates do not apply to Fixed Deposit Plus, and the FD Plus card indeed publishes no senior column. So a senior with ₹3.5 crore chooses between 6.65% callable and 6.35% locked. The callable deposit pays 30 basis points more and keeps the exit open, so FD Plus is simply the worse product for anyone eligible for the age uplift.
What breaking the deposit costs
Every rate in the main table is a callable rate, and callable means permitted, not free.
For rupee term deposits with a contracted amount below ₹5 crore, opened or renewed on or after 1 May 2014, the terms set interest on premature closure at 1.00% below the card rate prevailing on the date of deposit, applicable for the period the money actually remained. Both halves bite: you drop to the shorter-tenure rate that was on the card the day you booked, and then lose a further full percentage point. Break an 18-month deposit at nine months and the starting point is the nine-month rate from your booking date, not 6.50%.
Three carve-outs are worth knowing. Close within 7 days of booking and no interest is payable at all. Close between 7 and 14 days and the terms give the rate applicable for the period held, without the penalty. And on deposits opened or renewed on or after 15 December 2017, a first partial withdrawal of up to 25% of the original principal attracts no premature-closure penalty rate — the balance carries on at its contracted rate. Later partial withdrawals, and any single one above 25%, attract the penalty on the whole withdrawn amount.
One rule that is frequently still quoted as current has been withdrawn. The waiver of premature penalty on deposits above two years closed after 15 months applied to deposits opened or renewed from 15 December 2020 to 9 November 2023. Axis’s terms state that for deposits opened or renewed on or after 10 November 2023 the feature is not applicable.
At ₹5 crore and above, partial withdrawal requires both the withdrawal and the residual balance to be at least ₹5 crore, and the bank may refuse premature withdrawal outright to holders other than individuals and Hindu Undivided Families. Where the cash need is temporary, a loan against the FD usually beats closure, because it preserves the contracted rate and the maturity date.
How the interest is actually computed
The nominal rate is not the yield, and Axis changed the arithmetic recently enough that it is worth stating.
For deposits booked or renewed on or after 18 August 2025, quarterly-payout and reinvestment deposits compound and pay on anniversary quarters rather than calendar quarters — a deposit booked on 10 July now pays or compounds on 10 October. Interest is computed on the actual number of days in the quarter over a 365-day year, whether or not it is a leap year. Deposits booked earlier continue on the old method until they mature, and pick up the new one on renewal. At 6.50% compounded quarterly the effective one-year figure is roughly 6.66% before tax; our FD interest rates calculator runs the same arithmetic. With an actual-days numerator, though, neither it nor a textbook formula will reproduce Axis’s maturity value to the rupee.
Short deposits differ again: from 7 days to under 6 months Axis calculates simple interest, so nothing compounds. And a monthly payout is not the rate you were quoted — because the interest leaves early and never compounds, Axis applies a discounted rate, publishing the formula with its own illustration in which a 7.20% cumulative rate becomes 7.156% monthly. Choose a monthly payout because you need the income, not because the headline looks identical.
Since August 2013, finally, the interest reinvested in a cumulative deposit is reinvested net of TDS. Tax leaves the compounding base as it goes, so a pre-tax maturity figure overstates what arrives.
Tax, insurance and the tax-saver variant
Interest is taxable as it accrues, not when the deposit matures. Axis deducts TDS under section 393(1) of the Income-tax Act, 2025, at 10% where a valid PAN is on record and 20% where it is not furnished. Current thresholds are annual interest of ₹50,000 for most resident depositors and ₹1,00,000 for resident senior citizens, applied across all branches of the bank rather than per deposit. A depositor with nil tax liability for the year and total income below the basic exemption limit can stop the deduction with a Form 121 declaration under section 393(6) — one form per customer ID rather than one per deposit, filed afresh each financial year, and effective only from the date it is submitted. TDS is an advance credit, not a settlement — the full treatment is in our guide to tax on FD interest.
The five-year tax-saver deposit is a different instrument in everything but name: it qualifies under section 123 read with Schedule XV of the Income-tax Act, 2025, takes ₹100 to ₹1.5 lakh per customer per financial year, and is open only to individuals and HUFs. It cannot be closed before maturity except on a deceased claim, cannot be pledged and cannot carry a lien, and on a joint holding the deduction goes to the first holder alone.
Deposit insurance is per depositor per bank, not per deposit, and Axis’s terms restate the DICGC position with an example worth repeating: ₹4,95,000 of principal plus ₹4,000 of accrued interest is insured in full, but on a principal of exactly ₹5,00,000 the interest is not, because the total exceeds the limit. Balances across every Axis branch are aggregated. Joint holdings and claim timing are in DICGC deposit insurance.
Which row applies to you
| If you are | The row that applies | What to settle before booking |
|---|---|---|
| A general depositor under ₹3 crore | 18 months to under 2 years, 6.50% — nothing longer pays more | Whether you might need the money before 18 months |
| A resident senior under ₹3 crore, money genuinely surplus | 5 years to 10 years, 7.25% — the only bucket with a 0.75 point uplift | That you are already 60 on the booking date |
| A senior who may need the money within five years | 18 months to under 5 years, 7.00% | Whether a 9-month or 1-year rung at 6.25–6.75% covers the gap |
| Holding ₹3 crore to under ₹5 crore, general | 6.15% callable, or 6.35% locked on FD Plus | Whether two deposits below ₹3 crore at 6.50% are open to you |
| Holding ₹3 crore to under ₹5 crore, senior | 6.65% callable; FD Plus carries no senior uplift | That FD Plus is 30 basis points worse for you and cannot be broken |
| Reasonably likely to break the deposit | Any callable row | The first partial withdrawal up to 25% is penalty-free; the rest is card rate minus 1.00% |
| Parking cash for weeks | 7 days to under 6 months — 3.00% to 5.00% general, 3.50% to 5.50% senior | Closing inside 7 days pays no interest at all |
Book from the confirmation screen, not from this page. Check that the receipt shows the exact number of days, the contracted rate, the customer category and the maturity date, and keep it — a deposit advice is better evidence than a rate card that has since been replaced. If the screen offers a rate you did not expect, find out which document is stale before you fund it. Axis documents do contradict each other: our reading of its lifetime free credit cards found the landing page and the Key Fact Sheet at odds over the same card.
Common questions
What is the highest FD rate Axis Bank pays?
On the domestic rate card effective 27 August 2026, the highest general-public rate is 6.50% a year and the highest resident senior-citizen rate is 7.25%, both on deposits below ₹3 crore. The general 6.50% is reached at 18 months and is then paid unchanged on every longer bucket up to ten years. The senior 7.25% appears only in the 5-years-to-10-years bucket. Rates change without notice, so read the current card before booking.
Does a larger deposit earn a higher rate at Axis Bank?
Not beyond one year. On the card of 27 August 2026, a deposit of ₹3 crore to under ₹5 crore earns 6.15% from 18 months onwards against 6.50% for a deposit below ₹3 crore — 35 basis points less for more money. Below six months the larger band pays more in most buckets, by as much as 75 basis points at 30 to 45 days, though not in every one of them; between six months and a year the two are identical. The higher wholesale bands above ₹5 crore never beat the sub-₹3-crore long-tenure rate either.
What does Axis Bank charge for breaking a fixed deposit early?
For rupee term deposits of a contracted amount below ₹5 crore opened or renewed on or after 1 May 2014, the terms state that interest is paid at 1.00% below the card rate prevailing on the date of deposit, for the period the money actually stayed. Close within 7 days of booking and no interest is payable at all. A first partial withdrawal of up to 25% of the original principal attracts no premature-closure penalty rate; later or larger ones do.
If I turn 60 during the deposit, do I get the senior citizen rate?
No. Axis assesses senior-citizen eligibility on the date the deposit is booked or renewed. Its terms state plainly that where a customer attains 60 during the tenure of an existing deposit, the preferential rate does not apply for the remainder of that deposit’s term. The uplift is also limited to resident individuals, so it is not available on NRI deposits. If your sixtieth birthday is near, the renewal date is the moment that matters.
Is the no-penalty rule on long Axis deposits after 15 months still available?
No, and this is widely reported as though it were current. The waiver of premature penalty on deposits above two years closed after 15 months applied to deposits opened or renewed between 15 December 2020 and 9 November 2023. Axis’s own terms state that for deposits opened or renewed on or after 10 November 2023 the feature is not applicable and the ordinary premature penalty applies. Do not book a long deposit expecting it.
Sources
Rates and rules on this page were read directly from the following sources on the dates shown. Figures change — if you are about to act on one, confirm it at the source.