Overtime Pay Calculator

How overtime pay is calculated

Federal law owes one and a half times the regular rate for every hour worked past 40 in a fixed, recurring workweek. At $20 an hour that premium is $30; at $18 it is $27; at $25 it is $37.50. Forty-six hours at $20 comes to $800 for the first forty plus $180 for the six overtime hours, or $980 for the week.

The phrase carrying the weight is regular rate, which is not always the wage on the offer letter. Non-discretionary bonuses, shift differentials and most commissions have to be folded in before the multiplier applies, so someone on $20 plus a $50 attendance bonus in a 50-hour week is owed the premium on a higher figure than $30.

Is overtime taxed differently?

No. Overtime is taxed as ordinary wages, at the same rates as the rest of your pay. It often looks more heavily taxed because withholding tables treat a larger paycheck as though every pay period were that size, which pushes more into withholding up front. That is a timing effect on withholding rather than a higher rate, and it settles when the return is filed.

Proposals to exempt overtime from tax surface periodically and the details change, so any specific date or threshold quoted second-hand is likely to be stale by the time you read it. Before you change how you withhold, confirm the current position with the IRS or your payroll provider. We deliberately do not publish a figure here, because a wrong one on a compliance page is worse than none.

Weighted and blended overtime

An employee who works two roles at two different rates is owed overtime on the weighted average of those rates, not on whichever rate they happened to be earning in the 41st hour. Twenty hours at $18 and twenty-five hours at $22 is $360 plus $550, which is $910 across 45 hours, so the regular rate is $20.22 and the premium on the five overtime hours is calculated from that. Paying the premium on the lower rate is a common and expensive shortcut.

Daily overtime, and the states that have it

Most states follow the federal weekly standard, so four 11-hour days produce 44 hours and overtime is owed on four of them. A handful add a daily threshold, which means the premium can be triggered in a week that never reaches 40 at all. California is the best-known example and Alaska, Colorado and Nevada also apply daily rules.

Because the standard varies, so does the answer. Overtime laws by state gives the rule where you operate, including which states add a daily premium and which set a lower weekly threshold for particular employers.

Do salaried employees get overtime?

Frequently, yes. A salary does not by itself make somebody exempt: the role has to satisfy a duties test and be paid above a salary threshold as well. Misclassifying a salaried employee as exempt is among the most expensive wage-and-hour errors there is, because the liability accumulates silently across every week they worked more than 40 and surfaces all at once.

If you are checking whether a salary clears the threshold, the salary to hourly calculator converts it, and the time card calculator totals the week the premium is calculated from.