Bonus Tax Withholding Calculator
See what comes out of a bonus in 2026: the flat 22% supplemental rate, FICA, and your state's rate, next to the aggregate method and the tax you really owe.
Bonus Tax Withholding Calculator
Withholding method
Your employer picks the method, not you. A bonus on its own check usually gets the flat percentage method. A bonus folded into a regular check has to be aggregated.
The bonus
The gross supplemental payment, before anything comes out.
2026 standard deductions, per Rev. Proc. 2025-32.
Your regular pay
Gross pay on a normal check. Used for the aggregate method and for your marginal rate.
Drives the Social Security cap and the 0.9% surtax. Read it off your last stub or work it out with the YTD earnings calculator.
State and local
Pick a state to add state withholding.
This state has no flat supplemental rate, so employers run the regular withholding tables. Prefilled with the top marginal rate as an estimate. Adjust it if you know better.
New York City runs about 4.25% on supplemental wages. Most places are 0.
Advanced: deductions and supplemental history
Lowers federal taxable wages. It does not lower FICA wages, so Social Security and Medicare still come out of the full bonus.
Health premiums and HSA contributions reduce both federal and FICA wages, unlike a 401(k) deferral.
Earlier bonuses and commissions. Once the year's supplemental total passes $1,000,000, the rate on the excess jumps to 37%.
Optional, and only used by the aggregate method. Leave it at 0 and the calculator derives it from the 2026 tables instead.
Percentage vs aggregate
The flat percentage method leaves you $50.54 more today. The aggregate method is withholding closer to your real rate, so it is not an error, just a bigger prepayment.
Withheld vs actually owed
Withholding on this bonus matches the tax you owe on it almost exactly. Nothing to settle.
How it prints on a stub
| Line | Type | Current |
|---|
A bonus is an earning line with its own tax lines beside it, and every one of them also carries a year-to-date column on a real stub.
How bonus tax withholding works in 2026
To the IRS, a bonus is a supplemental wage: pay that is not your regular hourly or salaried wages. Commissions, separately paid overtime, severance and back pay all sit in the same bucket. Supplemental wages come with their own withholding rules, and Pub 15 hands your employer two ways to apply them.
Before any of that, the thing half the internet gets wrong: neither method is a tax rate. Withholding is a prepayment against the tax you will owe when you file. A bonus is ordinary income and gets taxed in the same brackets as the rest of your pay. Withhold more than you owe and the difference comes back as a refund.
The percentage method is the flat one, and the one most people run into. It puts 22% on the bonus when the bonus is identified separately from regular wages, which usually means it went out on its own check. Once your supplemental wages for the calendar year pass $1,000,000, the excess is withheld at 37% instead. That tier is not optional, and the $1,000,000 test looks at the year as a whole rather than payment by payment.
The aggregate method takes over when the bonus is folded into a regular paycheck with no separate accounting. Your employer adds the bonus to your normal gross, runs the combined figure through the Pub 15-T tables against your W-4, then subtracts what the regular check would have cost on its own. What is left over is the withholding on the bonus.
Take a $10,000 bonus. Single filer, paid on its own check, year-to-date wages well under the Social Security cap, no state income tax:
- Federal income tax: 22% x $10,000 = $2,200
- Social Security: 6.2% x $10,000 = $620
- Medicare: 1.45% x $10,000 = $145
- Take-home: $10,000 minus $2,965 = $7,035
Effective withholding: 29.65%. Now move that same worker to California, where the 10.23% supplemental rate adds $1,023, take-home falls to $6,012, and effective withholding creeps just past 39.8%. That is where "my bonus was taxed at 40%" comes from. It was withheld at 40%, and a chunk of it is on its way back.
Percentage vs aggregate: which one leaves you more today
Rough guide: if your marginal rate sits below 22%, the aggregate method usually withholds less and you walk away with more of the bonus up front. If your marginal rate is 24% or higher, the flat 22% leaves more in your pocket today, but it under-collected against what you actually owe, and April will notice.
None of this is your call. Your employer decides, and payroll mechanics decide for them: a separate check gets the flat rate, a combined check has to be aggregated. If the aggregate method took more than 22%, nobody made a mistake. The combined check pushed you into a higher bracket for that period and the tables behaved exactly as designed.
The "withheld vs actually owed" panel above is the part most bonus calculators skip. It annualizes your wages, adds the bonus, finds the 2026 bracket you land in, and puts the tax you genuinely owe on the bonus next to what was withheld from it. A positive number is a refund taking shape. A negative one is a bill.
The FICA piece nobody mentions
Federal income tax is only part of the story. FICA runs alongside it on completely different rules:
- Social Security, 6.2%, but only on the first $184,500 of wages in 2026 (up from $176,100 in 2025). The maximum any employee pays for the year is $11,439.
- Medicare, 1.45%, with no cap at all. Every dollar of the bonus carries it.
- Additional Medicare, 0.9%, on wages above $200,000 year-to-date. Your employer withholds it at that threshold regardless of filing status, and does not match it. Your real liability is settled on Form 8959 against your filing-status threshold, so joint filers often see this one come back.
The wage base is why a December bonus often costs less than a March one. Once your year-to-date wages pass $184,500, the 6.2% stops applying, and on a $20,000 bonus that is $1,240 you keep. Plenty of bonus calculators charge it anyway. Put your year-to-date figure in above (the YTD earnings calculator pulls it off a single stub) and this one stops the Social Security line where it should stop, or splits the bonus when it straddles the cap.
One last trap. Deferring the bonus into your 401(k) cuts your federal taxable wages, so the federal line drops. It does nothing to FICA wages. Social Security and Medicare still take their cut of the full amount. Section 125 deductions (health premiums, HSA) reduce both. That is why those two fields are separate above.
State supplemental rates on bonuses
For 2026, states sort into three groups:
- No income tax (nine states): Alaska, Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington, Wyoming. Nothing comes out.
- A published flat supplemental rate: the biggest group, anywhere from North Dakota's 1.5% to New York's 11.7%. California is the one that stings, at 10.23% on bonuses and stock options (6.6% on other supplemental wages). Vermont is odder still. It withholds 30% of your federal withholding, so its state line moves whenever the federal method does.
- No flat rate: roughly eighteen states, Pennsylvania, Illinois, New Jersey and Maryland among them, where employers just run the regular withholding tables. For those, the calculator prefills an estimate from the top marginal rate and lets you type over it.
Rates changed on January 1, 2026 in Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Ohio and Oklahoma. A figure you looked up last year may well be stale.
Putting the bonus on a pay stub
On the stub, a bonus is nothing exotic. It is an earning line with its own tax lines beside it, each one carrying a current-period amount and a year-to-date amount. The table above shows the shape of it. Those year-to-date columns are worth getting right, because they are what decides whether the next bonus carries any Social Security tax at all.
Payslip44 builds the document itself: a Bonus earning line, Tax-category deductions for each withholding line, per-line year-to-date amounts, six layouts, and money math that is decimal-precise and will not drift by a cent. It all runs on your device, and finished stubs export to PDF, PNG, CSV or plain text.
Numbers look right? Download Payslip44 and put them on a real stub.
Figures reflect the 2026 tax year (IRS Pub 15 and Pub 15-T, Rev. Proc. 2025-32, and the SSA contribution and benefit base). Treat this as an estimate, not tax advice. What actually comes out of your bonus depends on your W-4, your state's forms, and your employer's payroll system.
Frequently Asked Questions
Common questions about bonus tax withholding calculator
How much tax is withheld from a bonus in 2026?
When the bonus is paid separately from regular wages, most people see 22% federal withholding on the first $1,000,000 of supplemental wages for the year, and 37% on anything above that. Then 7.65% FICA on top (6.2% Social Security up to the $184,500 wage base, 1.45% Medicare with no cap), then state tax. On a $10,000 bonus, someone well under the wage base in a state with no income tax gives up $2,200 federal, $620 Social Security, and $145 Medicare, and keeps $7,035. Move that person to California and its 10.23% takes the same bonus down to $6,012.
Why is my bonus taxed at 40%?
It was not taxed at 40%. It was withheld at roughly 40%, which is a different thing. Stack 22% federal, 6.2% Social Security, 1.45% Medicare and a state rate somewhere around 5% to 11%, and you land in the high 30s or low 40s. Withholding is a prepayment. The bonus itself is ordinary income and gets taxed at your ordinary marginal rate when you file. If that rate turns out to be 12% or 22%, the flat 22% collected too much, and the excess comes back as a refund.
What is the difference between the percentage method and the aggregate method?
The percentage method puts a flat 22% on the bonus, and it is only on the table when the bonus is identified separately from regular wages. The aggregate method adds the bonus to your regular paycheck, runs the combined amount through the Pub 15-T tables, then subtracts what would have come out of the regular check on its own. You do not pick between them. Your employer does, and in practice the choice follows whether the bonus went out on its own check.
Do I get bonus tax withholding back as a refund?
If the flat 22% sits above your actual marginal rate, yes. That extra gets squared up on your Form 1040 and lands in your refund. If your marginal rate is 24% or higher, the 22% came up short, and you may owe a little at filing. The "withheld vs actually owed" panel above shows which side of that line you are on.
Is a bonus subject to Social Security and Medicare tax?
Yes. A bonus is wages, so FICA applies. The cap is where it gets interesting: Social Security only touches the first $184,500 of wages in 2026, so a December bonus paid to someone already past that figure carries no Social Security tax whatsoever. Medicare has no cap and takes its 1.45% from every dollar. Put your year-to-date wages in above and the calculator stops the 6.2% in the right place.
Can I avoid tax on my bonus by putting it in my 401(k)?
Partly. A 401(k) deferral pushes the federal income tax down the road, so the federal withholding line on the stub drops. FICA wages do not move an inch. Social Security and Medicare still come out of the full bonus. Section 125 deductions (health premiums, HSA) work the other way and cut both federal and FICA wages. People mix these two up constantly, and it is the single most common error in bonus math.
Which states don't tax bonuses?
Alaska, Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington and Wyoming have no state income tax, so nothing comes out on that line. Most other states apply a flat supplemental rate. The ones that hurt are California, at 10.23% on bonuses and stock options, and New York at 11.7%. Vermont does its own thing entirely: it withholds 30% of your federal withholding instead of a percentage of the bonus.
Why was my bonus withheld at 37%?
Because your supplemental wages for the calendar year (bonuses, commissions and the like) crossed $1,000,000. The 37% on the excess is required by law, not something your employer chose, and the $1,000,000 test looks at the whole year rather than a single payment. If a bonus straddles the line, the part below gets 22% and the part above gets 37%.