KnowFromUs builds payroll and retirement calculators for US workers. What comes out of your paycheck, what goes into your 401(k), and the rules behind both. Every calculator here comes with an article explaining the number, because a figure you cannot check is not much use.
Paycheck Calculators
What actually lands in your account, and why your state changes the answer. California counts overtime by the day rather than the week. New York City tax follows where you sleep, not where you work. Florida does not require your employer to give you a pay stub at all.
Start with the national paycheck calculator, or go straight to your state: California, New York, Florida, Ohio, Illinois, Maryland, Colorado or Virginia. The full set is in the paycheck calculators hub.
401(k) and Retirement
Employer matching formulas are more complicated than they look, and most people leave money on the table without realizing it. A tiered match that pays a dollar on the first 3 percent and 50 cents on the next 2 behaves nothing like a flat 50 percent up to 6.
Work out what you are owed with the 401k employer match calculator, compare Roth against traditional, or check the cost of a 401k loan, an early withdrawal or your required minimum distribution. Everything sits in the 401k hub.
Payroll Tax
The deductions nobody chooses. FICA takes 7.65 percent of your wages, and the thing almost nobody knows is that a traditional 401(k) does not reduce it while Section 125 health benefits do. On $8,000 of contributions that difference is worth $612.
If a bonus arrived and a third of it vanished, the bonus tax calculator explains where it went and how much comes back when you file. Freelancing on the side is covered by the self-employment tax calculator and the quarterly tax calculator, and the tax bracket calculator sorts out marginal against effective rates.
Where the Numbers Come From
The payroll and retirement calculators here are only as good as their sources. Rates and rules are taken from the agency that sets them, not from other websites. The Internal Revenue Service and the Social Security Administration for federal figures, and the relevant state body for everything else: the Employment Development Department and Franchise Tax Board in California, the Department of Taxation and Finance in New York, the labor departments for employment rules. Where a figure comes from an agency, we link to it so you can check it yourself.
One deliberate omission worth explaining. Most state pages here do not print a tax bracket table. States index their thresholds to inflation every year, and a great many sites carry tables labeled with the current year that are in fact a year or two out of date. These pages explain how the brackets work and send you to the state agency for the live numbers. Less convenient, less likely to be wrong.
Nothing here is tax, legal or financial advice. The calculators produce estimates, and they cannot see your W-4, your state withholding form, a garnishment or union dues. Use them to check whether your stub looks right, not to replace it. More about who runs this site and why is on the about page.
Guides
Not everything is a calculator. Our guide to reading your pay stub goes through each line and what it should say, and how compound interest works explains the mechanism behind every retirement projection on this site.