New York Paycheck Calculator — Take-Home Pay After Taxes (2026)

Take-home pay in New York

New York levies a progressive income tax on top of federal tax and FICA, and a separate payroll levy assessed on wages. Everything below is computed for New York specifically, at 2026 rates.

A worked example

New York against the other states

New York ranks 5 of 5 for take-home on identical pay, $3,975 a year behind Florida. Take-home is only one side of a relocation decision — housing usually moves by a multiple of this gap, and states without an income tax raise the money through property and sales taxes instead.

Not all pre-tax dollars are worth the same

Every paycheck calculator lumps "pre-tax deductions" into one bucket. They are not one bucket. A traditional 401(k) contribution is excluded from income tax but is still fully subject to Social Security and Medicare. A health premium taken under a Section 125 plan is excluded from income tax and from the FICA wage base, and from New York's wage-based payroll levy as well.

Same $5,000 routed two ways, on the pay in this example:

The premium route keeps $404.04 more in your pocket for the same money moved. $382.50 of that is FICA the 401(k) cannot avoid, and $21.60 is New York payroll tax assessed on wages. The 401(k) saves exactly $0.00 of FICA — nothing, because deferral does not change what you earned for Social Security purposes.

This is not an argument against the 401(k), which is doing something else entirely: deferring income to a year when your rate may be lower, and buying decades of untaxed growth. It is an argument against reading one "pre-tax" label and assuming two deductions are equivalent. If you have a choice about how benefits are structured — an HSA, a premium conversion plan, a dependent care FSA — the ones that dodge FICA are worth more per dollar than the ones that do not.

Worth noting the mirror image: for a self-employed person the same health premium is charged self-employment tax in full, because the deduction is written against income tax only. The self-employment tax calculator quantifies that side.

Why your refund is not a bonus

Withholding is an estimate your employer makes on the IRS's behalf, using the W-4 you filled in once and probably have not looked at since. It is not your tax. A large refund means you lent the government money at 0% for up to sixteen months; a large bill means the opposite.

The W-4 has not had "allowances" since 2020. It now asks for dollar amounts directly: step 3 for dependent credits, 4a for other income, 4b for deductions beyond the standard, and 4c for extra withholding per period. The most common cause of an unexpected bill is step 2 — two jobs, or a working spouse, each withholding as though its salary were the household's only income, so both under-withhold against a jointly progressive rate.

Who this is for

Anyone paid in New York checking a payslip, comparing an offer, or deciding what to put into a 401(k). The general paycheck calculator covers the same ground for any of the five states this site models.

What this does not account for

• Local and city income taxes beyond the state level, though New York's are modelled.
• Federal tax credits. The child tax credit and other federal credits are not modelled — the dependents field feeds state exemptions only, so a filer with dependents will owe less federally than shown.
• Wage garnishments, union dues, and employer-specific deductions.
• Bonuses and supplemental wages, which are withheld at a flat supplemental rate rather than through the bracket table.
• Employer contributions — a 401(k) match and the employer's half of your premium are real compensation that never appears on the gross line.
• Year-to-date effects. Each period is computed as if it were typical, so the Social Security wage base cut-off part-way through a year is not modelled per period.
• 5 states are modelled (California, Florida, Illinois, New York, Texas).

Sources and dates

Federal brackets, the standard deduction, FICA rates and wage base, and each state's schedule come from the IRS and state revenue departments for tax year 2026, listed below with the date each was checked. The pre-tax comparison figures are computed by running this page's own engine both ways rather than quoted. If a figure disagrees with your payslip, trust your payslip and let us know.