Income & Payroll Tax Calculators
12 tools in this collection — free, instant, and private in your browser.
Taxes touch nearly every dollar you earn, invest, or receive, yet most people have only a vague sense of their true tax burden. This suite of tax calculators demystifies the numbers, from the paycheck level all the way up to annual liability, so you can plan proactively rather than react at filing time.
For employees, the paycheck take-home and gross-to-net salary calculators instantly show what a given salary actually yields after federal income tax, state tax, Social Security, and Medicare. The FICA tax calculator isolates the Social Security and Medicare components, which are often misunderstood because they apply at flat rates before any standard deductions. If you receive a year-end bonus, the bonus tax withholding calculator clarifies why your bonus check looks smaller than expected and whether supplemental withholding rates apply.
Self-employed workers face a different challenge: no employer withholds on their behalf, and they owe both the employee and employer shares of FICA — together called the self-employment tax. The self-employment tax calculator handles this, and the quarterly estimated tax calculator translates your expected annual liability into four safe-harbor payment amounts to avoid underpayment penalties.
Investors need the capital gains tax calculator, which distinguishes between short-term gains taxed as ordinary income and long-term gains taxed at preferential rates. The effective tax rate calculator reveals the blended rate you actually pay across all brackets — a figure that is almost always lower than your marginal rate and more useful for comparison. The marginal tax bracket calculator identifies exactly which bracket applies to the next dollar of income, which matters when deciding whether to realize additional income this year.
Property owners will find the property tax calculator useful for estimating annual bills from assessed value and mill rates, while international or online sellers can use the VAT calculator to compute value-added tax in either direction.
All income & payroll tax calculators
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| Tool | What it does |
|---|---|
| Bonus Tax Withholding Calculator | Estimate tax withheld and take-home on a bonus using the flat supplemental-wage method, including federal supplemental rate and payroll tax. |
| Capital Gains Tax Calculator | Calculate capital gains tax on an asset sale from your sale proceeds, cost basis, and applicable capital-gains rate. |
| Effective Tax Rate Calculator | Calculate your effective (average) tax rate — total tax divided by total income — and see your after-tax income. |
| FICA Tax Calculator | Calculate your FICA tax (Social Security + Medicare) withheld from wages, including the Social Security wage cap and Additional Medicare Tax on high earners. |
| Gross-to-Net Salary Calculator | Convert an annual gross salary to net pay after pre-tax deductions, income tax, and payroll tax, with a per-paycheck breakdown. |
| Marginal Tax Bracket Calculator | Compute income tax across three progressive brackets you define, and see your marginal rate, effective rate, and after-tax income. |
| Paycheck Take-Home Calculator | Estimate your take-home pay per paycheck from gross pay, pre-tax deductions, a combined tax rate, and post-tax deductions. |
| Payroll Tax Calculator | Calculate employee and employer payroll taxes (Social Security and Medicare) on wages, with editable rates and Social Security wage base. |
| Property Tax Calculator | Estimate annual and monthly property tax from your home's assessed value, assessment ratio, tax (mill) rate, and any exemption. |
| Quarterly Estimated Tax Calculator | Estimate quarterly estimated tax payments for self-employed and 1099 income from expected net income, an effective tax rate, self-employment tax, and tax already withheld. |
| Self-Employment Tax Calculator | Estimate self-employment tax (Social Security + Medicare) on net business profit, with the net-earnings factor and Social Security wage base as editable assumptions. |
| VAT Calculator | Add VAT to a net price or remove VAT from a gross price. Enter the amount, your VAT rate, and the direction to see net, VAT, and gross figures. |
Frequently asked questions
- What is the difference between marginal and effective tax rate?
- Your marginal rate is the rate applied to the last dollar of taxable income — the highest bracket you reach. Your effective rate is total tax divided by total income, which is always lower because the lower brackets apply to the first dollars earned. Effective rate is the better measure of your overall tax burden.
- How much self-employment tax do I owe?
- Self-employment tax is 15.3 percent on net self-employment income up to the Social Security wage base (which adjusts annually), then 2.9 percent on income above that. You can deduct half of the self-employment tax when calculating your adjusted gross income, which partially offsets the burden.
- How do I avoid an underpayment penalty as a freelancer?
- The IRS safe harbor requires paying in at least 90 percent of the current year's tax liability or 100 percent of the prior year's liability (110 percent if your prior-year AGI exceeded $150,000). Quarterly estimated payments are due in April, June, September, and January. Use the quarterly estimated tax calculator to spread your projected liability across those four dates.