How we calculate

Converting pay between periods

Yearly pay is the hourly rate times hours a week times paid weeks a year. Everything else is yearly pay divided by the number of periods in a year: 52 weeks, 26 biweekly periods (weeks ÷ 2), 24 semimonthly periods and 12 months. Daily pay uses the days you work each week. The default is 40 hours and 52 paid weeks, the 2,080-hour year payroll departments use; change either and every figure follows.

We never multiply weekly pay by four to get a month. A month averages 4.33 weeks, so that shortcut understates monthly pay by about 8%.

Federal taxes

The take-home pay calculator works out the tax you owe for the whole year, then divides it by the period you choose. Federal income tax applies the 2026 brackets to wages minus pre-tax 401(k) contributions minus the standard deduction of $16,100 (single), $32,200 (married filing jointly) or $24,150 (head of household), from IRS Revenue Procedure 2025-32.

Social Security is 6.2% of wages up to $184,500. Medicare is 1.45% of all wages plus 0.9% above $200,000 ($250,000 for married couples). 401(k) contributions reduce income tax but not these two.

The overtime calculator estimates the 2025 to 2028 deduction for qualified overtime as half the regular rate times hours over 40 in the week, capped at $12,500 ($25,000 joint); the capped amount is then reduced by $100 for each $1,000 of income above $150,000 ($300,000 joint), with your annual pay standing in for modified AGI.

State and local taxes

Each state is modeled with its own 2026 brackets or flat rate, standard deduction, personal exemptions and the basic credits every filer gets. Where a state's rules depend on income we apply them too: sliding standard deductions (Alabama, Wisconsin, South Carolina), exemption phase-outs (Connecticut, Maryland, Maine, New Mexico, Ohio, Rhode Island), New York's tax benefit recapture, Arkansas's high-income recapture, the federal tax deductions in Alabama, Missouri and Oregon, Vermont's minimum tax and Pennsylvania's tax forgiveness for low incomes. Where a state makes filers read the tax from its printed tax table (Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Delaware, DC, Hawaii, Kansas, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, Rhode Island and Vermont, below each state's cutoff), we use the table's method, so the result matches the return to the dollar.

Each state's result is checked against cases worked by hand from the state's official tables and instructions: three per state (single at $52,000, married at $120,000, single at $250,000), plus New York City and Maryland county cases.

Employee payroll premiums are included where the state requires them: disability and family leave insurance in California, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Hawaii and Massachusetts, paid leave programs in Washington, Oregon, Colorado, Connecticut, Maine, Minnesota and Delaware, Washington's long-term care premium, and the employee share of unemployment insurance in Alaska, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. In Colorado and Delaware the employer may pay the whole premium; we show the employee share as a worst case.

Local income taxes are modeled for Maryland counties, New York City (including the NYC school tax credit every resident gets) and Yonkers. Elsewhere you can enter your local rate and we apply it to gross wages.

What we leave out

The estimates assume wages are your only income, you take the standard deduction, claim no dependents and file jointly if married, with one earner. They leave out tax credits (child tax credit, earned income credit), health insurance and HSA contributions, itemized deductions and other income. Your paycheck can also differ because employers withhold using W-4 tables that approximate the yearly tax rather than match it. For a filing decision, use your actual return or a tax professional.

State data and sources

Status shows whether the state had published its 2026 figures when we last checked. Where it had not, we use the latest official figures and update them when the new ones appear.

Federal: IRS Revenue Procedure 2025-32, IRS Publication 15-T (2026), Social Security Administration contribution and benefit base.

Corrections

Tax tables change, sometimes in the middle of the year: Arkansas, South Carolina, Utah and West Virginia all cut rates retroactively in 2026. We recheck every state when it publishes new figures. If you find a number that does not match your state's official tables, tell us and we will check it against the source and fix it.