Net payFreeNo signupEstimates only
Your salary is not what lands in your bank. Four kinds of deduction come out of every paycheck, in a fixed order, and this page itemizes all four with the arithmetic worked out.
Last updated 3 October 2026
This is an estimate, not your paystub. It uses the 2026 federal rate tables and standard deduction from Revenue Procedure 2025-32, the 2026 employee Social Security and Medicare rates from IRS Publication 15, and one flat state percentage you type in. It is not the Publication 15-T percentage method your employer’s payroll system runs, it reads nothing from your Form W-4 beyond filing status, and it knows nothing about your health premiums, local taxes, or credits. Educational only: not tax, payroll, or financial advice.
The short answer: on a $78,000 salary paid every two weeks, a $3,000 gross paycheck lands as $2,333.12. About $517 of that gap is tax. The other $150 is a 401(k) contribution that is still your money, just not in your checking account.
Four kinds of deduction come out, and the order they come out in is what makes the arithmetic confusing:
Anything post-tax comes out of what is left and saves you nothing: a Roth 401(k), union dues, a wage garnishment, insurance premiums your employer does not run through a pre-tax plan.
That split is the single most useful thing to understand about your paystub. A 401(k) deferral and a health premium look identical sitting next to each other on the page, and they are not: both lower your income tax, but only one of them lowers your Social Security and Medicare.
Single filer, no dependents, $3,000 gross every two weeks, 5% going into a traditional 401(k), no state income tax. Every figure below is the one this calculator produces, and the steps are the order it runs them in.
Step 1. Annualize the paycheck.
$3,000 × 26 paychecks = $78,000 a year.
Step 2. Take out the pre-tax 401(k).
5% of $78,000 = $3,900 a year, which is $150.00 out of each paycheck.
Step 3. Find the federal taxable income.
$78,000 − $3,900 (401(k)) − $16,100 (2026 standard deduction, single) =
$58,000.
Step 4. Run $58,000 through the 2026 single-filer brackets.
Read that fourth line again, because it is where most of the confusion about tax brackets comes from. Your top rate is 22%, but your federal income tax is 9.6% of your gross. The 22% applies only to the last $7,600, never to the whole salary.
Step 5. Social Security.
6.2% of the full $78,000, not the $74,100 left after the 401(k) came out. $4,836.00 a year, or
$186.00 per paycheck.
Step 6. Medicare.
1.45% of the full $78,000, again before the 401(k). $1,131.00 a year, or $43.50
per paycheck.
Step 7. State income tax.
$0.00 in this example, because the state field is set to 0.
| Line | This paycheck |
|---|---|
| Gross pay | $3,000.00 |
| Pre-tax 401(k), 5% | −$150.00 |
| Federal income tax | −$287.38 |
| Social Security, 6.2% | −$186.00 |
| Medicare, 1.45% | −$43.50 |
| State income tax | −$0.00 |
| Take-home | $2,333.12 |
$3,000 on the offer letter, $2,333.12 in the bank. That is 22.2% of the paycheck gone, but only 17.2% of it is tax. Over a year: $78,000 gross, $13,439 in federal tax and FICA, $3,900 into the 401(k), $60,661 deposited.
A pre-tax deduction comes out before a tax is figured, so it shrinks the number that tax is applied to. A post-tax deduction comes out afterwards and shrinks nothing but your deposit. The part that catches people out is that pre-tax deductions do not all shrink the same taxes.
The IRS answers this one directly. For employee pre-tax elective salary deferrals, Social Security (FICA) and Medicare are both “Yes”, and federal income tax is no. Its W-2 guidance says the same thing from the other side: for Box 1 wages, “Don’t include pre-tax contributions made under a salary reduction agreement”, while for Boxes 3 and 5, the Social Security and Medicare wage boxes, “Include all employee pre-tax…contributions.”
Publication 15 says that when an employer pays the cost of an accident or health insurance plan for employees, including a spouse and dependents, “your payments aren’t wages and aren’t subject to social security, Medicare, and FUTA taxes, or federal income tax withholding.” On health savings accounts it says employer contributions to an employee’s HSA or Archer MSA “aren’t subject to social security, Medicare, or FUTA tax, or federal income tax withholding if it is reasonable to believe at the time of payment of the contributions they’ll be excludable from the income of the employee.” And for the salary-reduction case, the premium taken out of your own paycheck through a section 125 plan, the same publication notes that “Benefits provided under cafeteria plans may qualify for exclusion from wages for social security, Medicare, and FUTA taxes.” (Publication 15, 2026.)
A designated Roth contribution comes out of your net. It lowers no tax, and this estimator has no field for it.
The practical version, using the worked example above where the top rate is 22%: a dollar into the traditional 401(k) saves 22 cents of income tax and still pays 7.65 cents of Social Security and Medicare. A dollar of health premium run through a section 125 plan can save both. That is why the order on your paystub is worth reading rather than skimming.
What this means for the number above. This calculator models exactly one pre-tax deduction, the 401(k) percentage. If health, dental, vision, HSA, FSA or commuter money comes out of your paycheck, none of it is in the estimate. Subtract it from the take-home figure yourself, and expect your real federal and FICA lines to be slightly lower than shown, because those deductions usually shrink the wages they are figured on.
The annual total does not move. The paycheck does, and so does the table your employer withholds from. The same $78,000 salary, the same 5% 401(k), no state tax:
| Payroll period | Gross each | Take-home each |
|---|---|---|
| Weekly (52 a year) | $1,500.00 | $1,166.56 |
| Every two weeks (26) | $3,000.00 | $2,333.12 |
| Twice a month (24) | $3,250.00 | $2,527.54 |
| Monthly (12) | $6,500.00 | $5,055.08 |
Every row adds to the same $60,661 a year. Two things are worth knowing beyond the division.
Every two weeks is not twice a month. 26 paychecks is two more than 24, so two months of the year contain three paydays. Same salary, same deductions, and two months that look like a windfall. If you budget monthly on a biweekly paycheck, those two months are the ones that make the other ten feel tight.
Your employer’s withholding table depends on the period. Publication 15 defines your payroll period as “a period of service for which you usually pay wages” and instructs the employer, when there is a regular period, to “withhold income tax for that time period even if your employee doesn’t work the full period.” Publication 15-T then supplies a separate withholding table for each one: weekly, biweekly, semimonthly, monthly and daily. Those tables work the way this page does, by treating the paycheck in front of them as representative of your whole year. One unusually large paycheck is withheld on as though you earned at that rate all year, which is why a check heavy with overtime so often looks over-taxed.
This page annualizes and divides for the same reason, which means it assumes every paycheck in your year is the size of the one you entered. If the paycheck you entered is unusual, the federal line will be unusual too.
Social Security stops for the year. Medicare never does. For 2026 the Social Security wage base limit is $184,500, and employee Social Security is 6.2% of wages up to it (Publication 15, 2026). Once your wages for the year pass that number the 6.2% stops coming out, and your paycheck gets bigger with no raise and no W-4 change.
Take a single filer on $240,000, paid twice a month: $10,000 gross, 24 paychecks.
Medicare keeps going at 1.45% on every dollar, with no ceiling at all. And a second deduction starts: your employer must withhold the 0.9% Additional Medicare Tax once your wages for the year exceed $200,000, and that employer threshold does not change with filing status (IRS Topic no. 560). At $10,000 a paycheck you cross $200,000 on paycheck 20, so paychecks 21 through 24 carry an extra $90.00 each.
So the last few paychecks of the year are about $530 bigger: $620 more because Social Security stopped, $90 less because the Additional Medicare Tax started. In January the base resets and it all begins again.
The 0.9% your employer withholds is also not necessarily what you owe. Your own threshold depends on how you file: $250,000 married filing jointly, $125,000 married filing separately, $200,000 for everyone else (IRS Topic no. 560). The difference is settled on your return, not on your paycheck.
What the estimator above does with this, stated plainly. It shows you a paycheck from before the base is reached, which is the one that holds for most of the year: on the $240,000 example it reports $620.00 of Social Security and no Additional Medicare Tax, matching the first eighteen paychecks exactly. What it will not do is walk you through the rest of the year. It prices one paycheck, not the schedule above it, so the $279.00 nineteenth and the five at $0.00 are in this section rather than in the result panel. The annual figures it reports are full-year totals and already account for both stops.
Overtime, bonuses, commissions and back pay are supplemental wages, and they can be withheld on by a different method than your regular pay. Publication 15 defines them as “wage payments to an employee that aren’t regular wages” and lists “bonuses, commissions, overtime pay…, payments for accumulated sick leave, severance pay, awards, prizes, back pay, reported tips…, retroactive pay increases” among them, while noting that “employers have the option to treat overtime pay and tips as regular wages instead of supplemental wages.”
When they are paid as a separate payment, the usual method is a flat rate: “The withholding rate on supplemental wages remains 22% (37% if supplemental wages paid to an employee during the calendar year exceed $1 million).” That flat 22% is conditional, which is a detail almost no calculator states: it is available only “If you withheld income tax from an employee’s regular wages in the current or immediately preceding calendar year.” Otherwise the employer must use the aggregate method, adding the supplemental wages to the regular wages paid at the same time and withholding “as if the total were a single payment for a regular payroll period”, then subtracting the tax already withheld from the regular wages. Either way, “Regardless of the method you use to withhold income tax on supplemental wages, they’re subject to social security, Medicare, and FUTA taxes.” (Publication 15, 2026.)
And the 22% is withholding, not tax. It is a prepayment on a return that has not been filed yet. If your real marginal rate turns out to be 12%, the over-withheld part comes back as a refund. If it is 32%, you will owe the rest in April.
Federal income tax is, in the IRS’s own words, “a pay-as-you-go tax. You must pay the tax as you earn or receive income during the year” (Publication 505). Withholding is the prepayment; your return takes credit for it and settles the difference. Getting it close is the goal. Getting it exact on a single paycheck is not possible, and these are the usual reasons this page and your paystub disagree.
“The amount of income tax your employer withholds from your regular pay depends on two things: The amount you earn. The information you give your employer on Form W-4” (IRS, Tax withholding). This page reads one thing from your W-4: filing status. It has no field for dependent credits, other income, extra deductions, additional withholding per paycheck, or the two-jobs checkbox, and every one of those moves the federal line.
Your employer runs the Publication 15-T percentage or wage-bracket method. This page runs the annual rate tables from Revenue Procedure 2025-32 and divides. The two land close but not identical, and payroll rounds every paycheck while this page divides a yearly figure.
Health, dental and vision premiums. HSA and FSA contributions. Commuter benefits. Imputed income on group life insurance above the excludable amount. Union dues. Wage garnishments. Retirement plan loan repayments. Any of these, and your real net is lower than the figure above.
City and county income tax, state disability and paid family leave contributions, and anything your state does that is not one flat percentage. The state field here is a single rate you type in, and nothing on this page is sourced for state tax, so get your rate from your own state’s revenue agency rather than from here.
The estimate assumes every paycheck of your year looks like this one. A raise, a bonus, unpaid leave, a mid-year job change, a second job or a commission month all break that assumption, and the annual figures are what drift first.
None of this is tax advice. If a real decision rides on the number, take your actual paystub to a tax or payroll professional.
Every rate, threshold and dollar amount on this page was read from the IRS on 1 October 2026:
Calculations run locally in your browser. Nothing you type is sent anywhere. Part of the PaystubKit tools collection.
Four kinds of deduction come out before you see it, and they are not all figured on the same number. Pre-tax deductions come out first and shrink your taxable wages. Federal income tax is figured on what is left after those and after your standard deduction. Social Security at 6.2% and Medicare at 1.45% are figured on your gross, before the 401(k). State and local income tax come last. In the worked example on this page, a $3,000 paycheck every two weeks on a $78,000 salary takes home $2,333.12: about $517 of tax, plus a $150 401(k) contribution that is still your money.
Usually far less than your top bracket. In the example on this page a single filer on $78,000 pays $7,472 of federal income tax, which is 9.6% of gross, even though the highest rate touching that salary is 22%. Add Social Security and Medicare and the total is $13,439, or 17.2% of gross. Brackets are marginal: the 22% applies only to the last $7,600 of taxable income, never to the whole salary.
It lowers your federal income tax but not your Social Security or Medicare. The IRS treats employee pre-tax elective salary deferrals as exempt from federal income tax withholding while still subject to FICA. So at a 22% marginal rate, a dollar into a traditional 401(k) saves 22 cents of income tax and still pays 7.65 cents of Social Security and Medicare. A health premium taken through a section 125 cafeteria plan can save both.
Social Security stops once your wages for the year pass the wage base limit, which is $184,500 for 2026. At $10,000 a paycheck that happens on about the nineteenth one, and every paycheck after it is $620 bigger with no raise and no W-4 change. Medicare has no ceiling, and your employer must start withholding the 0.9% Additional Medicare Tax once your wages exceed $200,000, so the net gain is roughly $530 a paycheck. In January the wage base resets and the 6.2% starts again.
The year does not change; the paycheck does. The same $78,000 salary with a 5% 401(k) takes home $1,166.56 weekly, $2,333.12 every two weeks, $2,527.54 twice a month, or $5,055.08 monthly, and every one of those adds up to $60,661 a year. Every two weeks is 26 paychecks rather than 24, so two months of the year contain three paydays. Your employer also uses a separate Publication 15-T withholding table for each payroll period.
Overtime, bonuses, commissions and back pay are supplemental wages. When paid as a separate payment the usual method is a flat 22% of federal withholding, or 37% once supplemental wages for the year exceed $1 million. That flat rate is only allowed if income tax was withheld from your regular wages in the current or immediately preceding calendar year; otherwise the employer must add the payment to your regular wages and withhold as if the total were a single regular payment. Social Security and Medicare apply either way, and 22% is withholding, not the tax you owe.
This page annualizes the one paycheck you entered and applies the 2026 annual rate tables. Your employer runs the Publication 15-T percentage or wage-bracket method and rounds every paycheck. This page reads only filing status from your W-4, with no field for dependent credits, other income, extra withholding or a second job. It cannot see health, dental, vision, HSA, FSA or commuter deductions, city or county taxes, state disability contributions, or anything your state does that is not one flat rate. And it assumes every paycheck of your year is the size of the one you entered.
No. Everything here is an educational estimate, not tax, payroll or financial advice. If a real decision rides on the number, check it against your own paystub with a tax or payroll professional.