How to use this hourly to salary calculator
Pick a direction, enter your rate or salary, and adjust the schedule to match your job:
- Hours per week is your regular schedule. Leave it at 40 for a standard full-time job; enter 30 or 25 for part-time.
- Paid weeks per year stays at 52 if your employer pays you through vacations and holidays. If you take unpaid time off, or you are a contractor who bills only when working, subtract those weeks. Two unpaid weeks means 50.
- Overtime hours per week is optional. The calculator pays them at time-and-a-half. Going from salary to hourly, enter overtime only if the salary you typed already includes it.
The results table spreads the annual total across every common pay frequency so you can compare a biweekly offer against a semimonthly one without a spreadsheet.
The formula
Annual salary = Hourly rate × Hours per week × Weeks per year
Reverse it to go the other way:
Hourly rate = Annual salary ÷ (Hours per week × Weeks per year)
Overtime adds a second term: overtime hours × weeks × rate × 1.5. Someone earning $22 an hour, 40 hours a week, with 4 hours of weekly overtime earns $22 × 40 × 52 = $45,760 in regular pay plus $22 × 1.5 × 4 × 52 = $6,864 in overtime, for $52,624 a year.
The 2,080-hour rule
40 hours × 52 weeks = 2,080 hours. That single number does most of the work in salary conversions, and it is worth memorising:
- Hourly to annual: multiply by 2,080 (or, as a quick approximation, double the rate and add three zeros: $25/hour ≈ $50,000; the exact answer is $52,000).
- Annual to hourly: divide by 2,080 (or halve the salary and drop three zeros: $70,000 ≈ $35/hour; exact is $33.65).
The federal government's own pay tables use 2,087 hours, which averages in leap years, so government figures will be a fraction lower per hour than this calculator shows. Employers that offer unpaid holidays, or workers on seasonal or academic-year contracts, should use their real paid weeks. Ten months of work at 40 hours a week is roughly 1,733 hours, not 2,080, and the hourly equivalent of the same salary is 20% higher.
Conversion table for common hourly rates
All rows assume 40 hours a week and 52 paid weeks, before tax.
| Hourly | Weekly | Biweekly | Monthly | Annual |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| $15.00 | $600 | $1,200 | $2,600 | $31,200 |
| $17.50 | $700 | $1,400 | $3,033 | $36,400 |
| $20.00 | $800 | $1,600 | $3,467 | $41,600 |
| $22.50 | $900 | $1,800 | $3,900 | $46,800 |
| $25.00 | $1,000 | $2,000 | $4,333 | $52,000 |
| $30.00 | $1,200 | $2,400 | $5,200 | $62,400 |
| $35.00 | $1,400 | $2,800 | $6,067 | $72,800 |
| $40.00 | $1,600 | $3,200 | $6,933 | $83,200 |
| $45.00 | $1,800 | $3,600 | $7,800 | $93,600 |
| $50.00 | $2,000 | $4,000 | $8,667 | $104,000 |
| $60.00 | $2,400 | $4,800 | $10,400 | $124,800 |
| $75.00 | $3,000 | $6,000 | $13,000 | $156,000 |
Note that "monthly" here is annual ÷ 12. A biweekly employee actually receives 26 paychecks, which means two months a year contain three paydays. If you budget by month, use the monthly column, but expect the cash to arrive unevenly.
Salaried vs. hourly: what changes besides the math
The conversion is arithmetic, but the two pay structures differ in ways that matter:
Overtime eligibility. Under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), hourly ("non-exempt") workers must be paid 1.5× for hours beyond 40 in a week. Salaried employees can be classified as exempt from overtime only if they earn at least the federal salary threshold and their duties pass the executive, administrative, or professional tests. For 2026 the federal threshold remains $684 per week ($35,568 a year). A 2024 Department of Labor rule that would have raised it was vacated by a federal court in November 2024, and in May 2026 the Department published a technical amendment restoring the 2019 regulations, so $684 is the operative federal figure. Several states, including California, New York, Washington, and Colorado, set higher thresholds. A salaried employee earning $34,000 a year is still owed overtime under federal law regardless of job title.
Pay stability. Salaried pay is the same every period even when a holiday week is short. Hourly pay drops in short weeks and rises with overtime, which is why the "weeks per year" input matters more for hourly workers.
Hidden hours. A $60,000 salary is $28.85 an hour at 40 hours. At the 50 hours a week that many exempt roles actually demand, it is $23.08. When comparing an hourly offer to a salaried one, ask how many hours the salaried role really expects.
Benefits. Salaried positions more often bundle health insurance, retirement matching, and paid leave. Employer-paid benefits are commonly worth 25–35% of base salary, so a $55,000 salaried job with full benefits can be worth more than $30 an hour ($62,400) with none.
Contractor rate vs. employee salary
Freelancers and 1099 contractors frequently under-price themselves by dividing their old salary by 2,080. That figure ignores three costs an employer used to carry:
- Payroll taxes. An employee pays 7.65% in Social Security and Medicare and the employer matches it. A contractor pays both halves, 15.3%, as self-employment tax on roughly 92% of net profit.
- Benefits. Health insurance, retirement contributions, paid holidays, and sick leave now come out of the contractor's own revenue.
- Unbillable time. Selling, invoicing, bookkeeping, and gaps between projects are unpaid. Most solo consultants bill 1,200–1,600 hours a year, not 2,080.
The common rule of thumb is to add 25–30% to the employee-equivalent hourly figure to cover the first two items, then divide by realistic billable hours to cover the third:
Contractor rate = Salary × 1.30 ÷ Billable hours per year
For an $80,000 salary: $80,000 × 1.30 = $104,000, ÷ 1,600 billable hours = $65 an hour. Dividing by 2,080 instead gives $50, and dividing the raw salary by 2,080 gives $38.46, a rate that leaves the contractor roughly 40% worse off than the job they left. Track your hours with a timesheet for a month before setting a rate; most people overestimate their billable time.
Using the numbers in a negotiation
Salary negotiations go better when both sides are talking about the same unit:
- Convert the offer to your unit before reacting. A recruiter's "$32 an hour" is $66,560. Your current "$70,000" is $33.65 an hour. The gap is $1.65 an hour, or $3,440 a year ($70,000 − $66,560), which is a much easier number to negotiate over than two figures in different units.
- Price the hours, not the title. If a salaried role expects 45 hours, divide by 2,340, not 2,080, before comparing it to an hourly offer.
- Quantify benefits in dollars. Ask for the employer's health premium contribution and retirement match, then add them to the annual figure. A $4,800 a year match is $2.31 an hour.
- Ask for the round number that helps you. A $1 an hour raise sounds small and is $2,080 a year; a $2,500 raise sounds substantial and is $1.20 an hour. Frame your request in whichever unit makes it easier for the other side to say yes.
- Check the take-home before deciding. Gross pay is not what lands in your account. Run the final figure through the payroll calculator to compare net pay across states or filing statuses, especially if the new job is in a different state.
If you run a business and are converting the other way, deciding what to pay staff, remember that the salary is only part of your cost. Employer payroll taxes, workers' compensation, and benefits typically add 20–30% on top, which is why a $25 an hour hire costs closer to $65,000 a year than $52,000, and why that loaded figure, not the wage, belongs in your pricing and margins.