Pay Raise Calculator

How to use the calculator

1. Current pay and pay period: your gross pay before taxes and deductions, and how often it is quoted (hourly, weekly, biweekly, semimonthly, monthly or annual).
2. Raise: choose how you know it. A percentage (4%), a dollar amount in the same period as your pay ($1.50 an hour, $2,400 a year) or the new pay itself. A negative number works for a pay cut.
3. Hours per week: used to convert between hourly pay and the other periods. The default is 40. Under Advanced options you can change weeks per year (default 52).
4. Expected inflation (optional): your own assumption for the coming year. Leave it empty to hide the inflation results.

How the calculator works

New pay = current pay × (1 + raise %), or current pay + raise amount, or the new pay you typed. The raise percentage is (new − current) ÷ current.

Every period is converted through annual pay:

• Annual = hourly × hours per week × weeks per year
• Annual = weekly × weeks per year, or biweekly × weeks per year ÷ 2
• Annual = semimonthly × 24, or monthly × 12

The real raise uses the exact formula, not a subtraction: real raise = (1 + raise) ÷ (1 + inflation) − 1. The real annual gain is your new annual pay expressed in today's dollars, minus your current annual pay. A negative figure means your purchasing power falls even though your paycheck grows.

All figures are gross. Federal and state income tax, Social Security, Medicare and benefit deductions are not included, so the extra take-home pay will be smaller than the raise.

Worked examples

1. A 4% raise on $60,000

Your salary rises to $62,400, a raise of $2,400 a year or $200 a month. At 40 hours and 52 weeks, your hourly equivalent goes from $28.85 to $30.00. With 3% inflation, the real raise is 0.97% and the real gain is $582.52 a year in today's dollars.

2. An hourly raise from $22.00 to $23.50

A $1.50 raise is 6.82%. At 40 hours a week for 52 weeks, annual pay goes from $45,760 to $48,880, or $3,120 more.

3. When a raise is a pay cut in real terms

A 2% raise on $60,000 gives $61,200. If prices rise 4%, the real raise is −1.92%, and in today's dollars the new salary is worth $1,153.85 less than your current one.

4. Biweekly vs. semimonthly

A $2,500 biweekly paycheck with a 5% raise becomes $2,625:

Biweekly means 26 paychecks a year, semimonthly means 24, so the same salary gives a smaller biweekly check. In most years, two months include a third biweekly paycheck. How often you are paid depends on your employer and on state payday laws, which the U.S. Department of Labor summarizes by state.