Paycheck calculator
What actually lands, from what you are paid — using the 2026 federal withholding method your employer's payroll system uses, with the worksheet printed underneath so the number can be checked rather than believed.
By Alex Seote, Built and maintains Rule Calculator
Tables transcribed from IRS Publication 15-T (2026) · How we check
An estimate of withholding, not tax advice and not a payroll record. Your employer's figure can differ legitimately — from a mid-year W-4 change, an imputed benefit, a garnishment or a different withholding method — and what you finally owe is settled on your return.
What your W-4 says
Take-home, each cheque
$2,092.60
$54,407.50 a year, from a gross of $65,000.00. Withholding and payroll taxes take 16.3%.
Where it goes
| Gross pay | $2,500.00 | $65,000.00/yr |
| Federal income tax | -$216.15 | -$5,620.00/yr |
| Social security | -$155.00 | -$4,030.00/yr |
| Medicare | -$36.25 | -$942.50/yr |
| Take-home | $2,092.60 | $54,407.50/yr |
The federal withholding, line by line
| Annual wages, after pre-tax deductions | $65,000.00 |
| Adjusted annual wage (Worksheet 1A, line 1i) | $56,400.00 |
| Bracket it lands in | $19,900.00 and up, at 12% |
| Tentative annual withholding | $5,620.00 |
| Divided by 26 pay periods | $216.15 |
Those five lines are IRS Publication 15-T Worksheet 1A for 2026, the percentage method an automated payroll system uses. The bracket is from the published table, so the figure can be checked against it directly.
The deduction that is not what it looks like
Pre-tax deductions are not one category. A traditional 401(k) or 403(b) reduces the wages federal and state income tax are computed on, and leaves the social security and Medicare wages untouched — which is why your W-2 shows a box 1 smaller than boxes 3 and 5. A section 125 plan, which is where most health, dental and vision premiums sit, reduces all three.
The practical effect: $400 a fortnight into a 401(k) at a 22% bracket saves $88 of income tax and nothing else, so take-home falls by $312 rather than by $288. Calculators that apply one pre-tax rule to everything overstate the paycheck of every person contributing to a retirement plan, which is most people who use one.
Questions people actually ask
- Why is my take-home so much less than my salary divided by 26?
- Because three separate taxes come out before you see it, and they are not one number. Federal income tax withholding depends on your W-4 and your annualised pay; social security takes a flat 6.2% up to a ceiling; Medicare takes 1.45% with no ceiling at all. On a $100,000 salary with no adjustments that is about $20,800 a year before any state tax, which is a fifth of the total.
- Does my 401(k) contribution save me social security tax?
- No, and this is the single most common error in take-home calculators. A traditional 401(k) contribution comes out before federal and state income tax but after social security and Medicare — the wages in box 3 and box 5 of your W-2 include it. A section 125 health premium is the opposite: it comes out before all of them. Contributing $400 a cheque therefore reduces your take-home by more than the income tax saving alone would suggest, and this page applies both rules separately.
- Why does my paycheck get bigger later in the year?
- Because social security stops. For 2026 it is charged on the first $184,500 of wages and nothing after, so a high earner sees 6.2% of every cheque come back once they pass that line. Medicare does the opposite and adds 0.9% above $200,000, which is why the two effects can arrive in the same autumn.
- What does the Step 2 box on the W-4 do?
- It switches your employer to a second set of tables that withhold more from the same wage. Each job withholds as though its pay were your only income, so two jobs each withholding at the bottom of the schedule leave a household underpaid at the year end. Ticking the box on the higher-paying job’s W-4 fixes it by treating the standard deduction and the low brackets as already used up.
- Why does this page ask me for my state rate?
- Because inventing it would be worse than asking. Nine states have no income tax at all, some have a single flat rate, and the rest are progressive with their own brackets, deductions and credits — and several cities tax on top. A national calculator that quietly picks a number gives an answer that is confidently wrong for most people. Enter the rate from your last payslip and the figure above becomes yours rather than an average.
- Is this the tax I owe, or what my employer takes?
- What your employer takes. Withholding is an estimate the payroll system makes each period; what you owe is settled on your return, and the gap between them is your refund or your bill. A large refund is not a windfall, it is a year of interest-free lending — and the fix for it is the W-4, not the calculator.
Sources
- IRS Publication 15-T (2026) — Federal Income Tax Withholding Methods
- IRS Publication 15 (2026) — Employer’s Tax Guide
- Percentage method tables for 2026, social security at 6.2% to $184,500, Medicare at 1.45% with an additional 0.9% above $200,000.