Salary to Hourly Calculator (and Back)
Enter a yearly salary to see what it works out to per hour, or enter an hourly rate to see the equivalent annual salary. Set how many hours you work per week and how many weeks you are paid per year, and the calculator also breaks your gross pay down by weekly, biweekly, semimonthly, and monthly paychecks. All figures are gross — before taxes and deductions.
Conversion
40 hours × 52 weeks = the 2,080-hour standard work year. All figures are gross, before taxes and deductions.
Hourly rate
$25.00/hr
$52,000.00/yr ÷ 2,080.00 hrs
From annual salary
$52,000.00/yr
Paid hours / year
2,080.00
Pay by frequency
Gross paycheck by frequency
Compare scenarios
Run the same calculation with two or three input sets side by side. Differences are highlighted; every number comes from the same tested formula as the calculator above.
| Input | Scenario A | Scenario B |
|---|---|---|
| Mode | ||
| Annual Salary | ||
| Hourly Rate | ||
| Hours Per Week | ||
| Weeks Per Year |
How it works
The hourly conversion divides your annual salary by the total paid hours in a year, which is hours per week × weeks per year. The US default is 40 hours across 52 weeks, or 2,080 hours — so a $52,000 salary comes to exactly $25.00 an hour. Change either input and the rate moves with it: the same salary spread over more hours is a lower hourly rate, and over fewer hours a higher one.
Running it the other way multiplies your hourly rate by those same paid hours to get an annual salary. This is the number to quote when a contract or job posting lists pay by the hour and you want a yearly figure to compare against salaried offers. The two directions are exact inverses, so a salary converted to hourly and back returns the original amount.
The paycheck breakdown takes the annual salary and divides it by the number of pay periods each schedule uses: 52 weekly, 26 biweekly, 24 semimonthly, and 12 monthly. Biweekly (every two weeks) and semimonthly (twice a month) are not the same — biweekly produces 26 checks and two extra 'three-paycheck' months a year, while semimonthly always lands 24 equal checks on fixed dates.
Frequently asked questions
Why does the calculator use 2,080 hours for a full year?+
2,080 is the conventional full-time work year: 40 hours a week times 52 weeks. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics and most payroll systems use it as the standard divisor to convert between salaried and hourly pay, which is why $52,000 a year maps cleanly to $25.00 an hour. It is a convention, not a law — if your normal schedule is 37.5 or 35 hours, or your employer counts a different number of paid weeks, change the hours and weeks inputs so the rate reflects your actual work year.
How do paid time off and unpaid weeks change the result?+
A salaried employee with paid vacation is still paid across all 52 weeks, so 52 weeks is the right input and their effective hourly rate on the hours actually worked is a bit higher than the simple 2,080-hour figure. Someone hourly or self-employed who takes two unpaid weeks off is really only paid for 50 weeks — entering 50 raises the implied hourly rate needed to reach the same annual total. If you want the rate you must charge to cover unpaid time off, reduce the weeks-per-year input accordingly.
Are these numbers before or after taxes?+
Every figure here is gross pay — the amount before income tax, Social Security and Medicare (FICA), health premiums, retirement contributions, and any other deductions. Your take-home pay will be meaningfully lower, and by how much depends on your filing status, state, and benefit elections. This tool is for converting between salary and hourly and for comparing offers on an apples-to-apples gross basis; use a dedicated take-home or paycheck calculator to estimate what actually lands in your bank account.