Paycheck Calculator

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Estimate your US take-home pay from a gross salary: federal income tax from the published bracket tables, plus the employee half of Social Security and Medicare. Federal and FICA only — state and local tax are not included.

Take-home pay after federal tax and FICA. To convert a salary between hourly, weekly and annual rates without tax, use the Salary Calculator.

Use via API

Free, no sign-up
REST + MCP
Updated Sep 2026
Reviewed by Olgun Ozoktas

Your pay

Gross pay per period

Pay frequency

Filing status

Tax year

Brackets, the standard deduction and the Social Security wage base all come from the published tables for this year.

Pre-tax deductions

401(k) per period

Lowers federal income tax. Does not lower Social Security or Medicare.

HSA / health premiums per period

A Section 125 cafeteria plan lowers both federal income tax and FICA.

Extra federal withholding

Step 4(c) on your Form W-4, per pay period.

Take-home per period

$3,136.54

$81,550.00 a year

Gross (annual)$104,000.00

Federal income tax-$14,494.00

Social Security-$6,448.00

Medicare-$1,508.00

Effective rate

21.59%

Marginal rate

22%

Federal and FICA only. State and local income tax are not included, so your actual take-home will be lower in a state that taxes wages.

Common uses

Comparing a job offer

A higher salary in a different bracket does not raise take-home by the same proportion. Entering both offers shows the difference in the number that actually reaches you.

Deciding how much to put in a 401(k)

Raising the contribution and watching take-home fall by less than the contribution shows exactly what the tax deferral is worth to you at your bracket.

Checking a payslip

If Social Security or Medicare on your payslip differs from the figures here, something is set up differently and it is worth asking payroll why.

Budgeting a raise

A raise is taxed at your marginal rate, not your effective rate. The two tiles side by side make the difference concrete before you spend it.

Why is my paycheck so much smaller than my salary?

Between a salary and the money that lands in your account sit four separate deductions, and only one of them is the income tax people think of. Federal income tax is charged in brackets on what is left after the standard deduction, so the rate on your last dollar is not the rate on all of them. Social Security takes 6.2% but stops at an annual wage base. Medicare takes 1.45% with no cap at all, and adds another 0.9% above a threshold that depends on your filing status. Pre-tax contributions reduce some of these and not others. This calculator shows each one separately so you can see where the gap actually goes.

The Paycheck Calculator estimates United States take-home pay from a gross salary, in your browser. It applies federal income tax using the published bracket tables and the standard deduction for your filing status, then the employee half of FICA: 6.2% Social Security up to the annual wage base, 1.45% Medicare on all wages, and the additional 0.9% Medicare tax on wages above the threshold for how you file.

Pre-tax contributions are handled separately because they behave differently. A traditional 401(k) contribution comes out before federal income tax but after Social Security and Medicare, so it lowers one and not the others. A Section 125 cafeteria-plan contribution — an HSA, an FSA, or your share of health insurance premiums — comes out before all three. Treating them as one field, which many calculators do, overstates the FICA saving on retirement contributions.

What it does not include is state and local income tax, and that is a deliberate limit rather than an oversight: rates, brackets and local surcharges vary too much between and within states for a single figure to be honest. The result here is therefore an upper bound on take-home for anyone in a state that taxes wages. If you want to convert a salary between hourly, weekly and annual rates without any tax at all, the Salary Calculator does that; if you are self-employed and pay both halves of FICA, the Self-Employment Tax Calculator is the right one.

How it compares

Most payroll providers offer a take-home calculator, and they are generally accurate because they are running the same engine that produces your payslip. They also want an email address, and some want enough detail to start a sales conversation. The free alternatives are usually supported by advertising and vary in how clearly they state what they leave out.

The gap this page tries to fill is being explicit about scope. It says on the page that state and local tax are excluded, shows each deduction on its own line rather than giving a single net figure, and separates the two kinds of pre-tax contribution because they do not have the same effect. The numbers come from the same module the API serves, so the page and a programmatic call cannot disagree.

It is an estimate of annual liability spread across your pay periods, not a payroll engine. Real payroll uses the IRS percentage-method tables period by period and accounts for year-to-date totals, so an individual payslip can differ by a few dollars even when the annual figure matches.

Tips

Effective rate is everything withheld as a share of gross. Marginal rate is what the next dollar is taxed at. The marginal number is always the higher one, and it is the one that matters when you are deciding whether extra work is worth it.
Social Security stops once your wages for the year reach the wage base, so a high earner's take-home jumps partway through the year. This calculator shows the annual average rather than that month-to-month step.
The additional 0.9% Medicare tax starts at $200,000 for single filers and head of household, $250,000 filing jointly, and $125,000 filing separately. Those thresholds were fixed in 2013 and have never been adjusted for inflation.
A Roth 401(k) contribution is not pre-tax, so it does not go in the 401(k) field here. It reduces take-home by its full amount without reducing any tax.
This estimates annual liability evenly across your pay periods. Real payroll software uses the IRS percentage-method tables per period, so a single payslip can differ by a few dollars even when the annual figure agrees.
If you live in a state that taxes wages, subtract that separately. Nine states have no wage income tax at all, and in those the figure here is close to complete.

Frequently asked questions

Does this include state income tax?

No, and that is the main thing to know about the result. Federal income tax and FICA are included; state and local income tax are not. In a state that taxes wages your real take-home will be lower than the figure shown. In the nine states with no wage income tax, the figure is close to complete.

What is the difference between the effective rate and the marginal rate?

The effective rate is everything withheld divided by your gross pay — what you actually lose overall. The marginal rate is the bracket your last dollar of taxable income fell into, which is what a raise or an extra shift is taxed at. The marginal rate is always the higher of the two, which is why a raise feels smaller than the headline number.

Why does a 401(k) contribution not reduce my Social Security tax?

Because traditional 401(k) contributions are exempt from federal income tax but not from FICA. Your Social Security and Medicare are figured on the pay before the contribution comes out. A Section 125 cafeteria-plan contribution, such as an HSA or health premiums, is exempt from both, which is why this calculator asks for the two separately.

What is the Social Security wage base?

A cap on the earnings Social Security tax applies to, reset each year. Once your wages for the year pass it, the 6.2% stops for the rest of the year. Medicare has no equivalent cap and keeps applying to every dollar.

What is the additional Medicare tax?

An extra 0.9% on wages above $200,000 for single filers and head of household, $250,000 for married filing jointly, and $125,000 for married filing separately. It applies only to the amount above the threshold, and unlike most tax figures those thresholds are not adjusted for inflation.

Which tax years does it cover?

The years in the published tables the tool uses, shown in the Tax year dropdown. The brackets, standard deduction and Social Security wage base are all specific to a year, so pick the one you are estimating for rather than assuming the current year's figures apply.

Will this match my payslip exactly?

Usually to within a few dollars. This estimates your annual liability and divides it evenly across pay periods; real payroll uses the IRS percentage-method tables for each period and tracks year-to-date totals, so individual payslips vary, especially around the point where Social Security caps out.

Where do I put a Roth 401(k) contribution?

Nowhere, because it is not pre-tax. A Roth contribution reduces your take-home by its full amount without reducing any tax, so simply subtract it from the result yourself.

Is my salary information sent anywhere?

No. The calculation runs in your browser and nothing you type is sent to a server or stored. You can confirm it in your browser's network tab.

I am self-employed. Can I use this?

Not directly. Self-employed people pay both halves of Social Security and Medicare rather than the employee half, and they deduct business expenses first. Use the Self-Employment Tax Calculator instead.

Run it from code

$ curl -X POST \
  api.findutils.com/api/tools/paycheck-calculator/execute \
  -d '{"gross_pay":4000,"pay_frequency":"biweekly","filing_status":"single","tax_year":"2025"}'

$ claude mcp add findutils \
  --transport http https://mcp.findutils.com/
# then call findutils:paycheck_calculator

API reference Add to Claude