See exactly what 2026 income tax costs you

PlainTaxCalc estimates your federal income tax, state income tax, and FICA (Social Security + Medicare) liability for tax year 2026. Inputs are gross income, filing status, and state. Outputs are tax owed at each layer, total tax, effective rate, marginal rate, and approximate take-home. The calculator uses the official 2026 brackets from IRS Revenue Procedure 2025-32 and each state's Department of Revenue.

The federal numbers match the IRS 2026 schedules exactly. State numbers use each state's official 2026 brackets where they have a progressive system, and the official flat rate where they do not. The estimate excludes itemized deductions beyond the standard deduction, tax credits, AMT, and capital gains preferential rates, those are explained in our guides. For filing your actual return, use a tax professional or licensed software.

9 states impose no broad-based income tax: Alaska, Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington, and Wyoming. Washington does levy a 7% capital gains tax above $270,000 in long-term gains, and New Hampshire historically taxed interest and dividends through 2024 (repealed effective 2025).

States choose between three structures: 9 have no income tax, 15 apply a single flat rate to all income, and 27 use progressive brackets where higher income hits higher marginal rates. The top combined federal + state marginal rate ranges from 37% (no-tax states) to 50.3% (California with the 13.3% top bracket on income above $1 million).

Your marginal rate is the rate on your last dollar of taxable income, the bracket you sit in. Your effective rate is total tax divided by total income, what you actually pay as a percentage of everything you earned. Effective is always lower than marginal in a progressive system because the lower brackets fill first. A single filer earning $100,000 in 2026 sits in the 22% federal marginal bracket but pays roughly 14.5% effective federal rate on adjusted gross income.

FICA is the Social Security and Medicare payroll tax. The employee share is 7.65% - Social Security at 6.2% on wages up to $184,500 (the 2026 wage base), plus Medicare at 1.45% with no cap. An additional 0.9% Medicare tax applies to wages above $200,000 (single) or $250,000 (joint). Self-employed workers pay both halves: 12.4% Social Security plus 2.9% Medicare = 15.3% on net self-employment income, before federal income tax.

No. The calculator runs entirely in your browser. We never see your income, filing status, or any input value. There is no account, no email field, no signup. Page-view metrics are collected via privacy-focused Umami analytics, no cookies, no personal identifiers.