UK hourly wage calculator for 2026/27.

Multiply your hourly rate by the hours you work each week, then by 52. At £20.00 an hour for a 37.5-hour week that is £39,000 a year before tax. The same sum at £15.00 an hour gives £29,250, and at £30.00 an hour it gives £58,500. Some payrolls use 52.14 weeks rather than 52 — the arithmetically exact figure, 365.25 divided by 7 — which adds about 0.3% to the annual total.

£20.00 an hour on a 37.5-hour week is £39,000 a year gross. For 2026/27, on the standard tax code with no pension or student loan, you take home about £31,600 a year — £2,633.34 a month, or £16.21 for every hour you actually work. The difference between the £20.00 on your contract and the £16.21 in your bank account is Income Tax at 20% and National Insurance at 8%.

£15.00 an hour for 37.5 hours a week is £29,250 gross, leaving roughly £24,580 after Income Tax and National Insurance in 2026/27 — about £2,048.34 a month. That works out at £12.61 an hour net. Part-time hours change this a lot: the first £12,570 you earn is tax free, so fewer hours means a much higher share of your pay is kept.

Take your annual net pay and divide it by the hours you actually work in a year. On a 37.5-hour week that is 1,950 hours. Someone on £20.00 an hour keeps £16.21 of it; someone on £50.00 an hour keeps £34.41 of it, because more of their pay falls in the 40% band. The calculator above shows this figure directly, alongside the amount lost per hour to tax, National Insurance, pension and student loan.

Overtime is ordinary earnings, so it is taxed exactly like the rest of your pay — there is no separate overtime tax rate. What makes it feel heavily taxed is that it sits on top of everything else, so every overtime pound is charged at your marginal rate rather than your average one. A basic-rate employee loses 20% tax plus 8% National Insurance from each overtime pound, keeping 72p. Once your total pay passes £50,270 the tax rate rises to 40% but National Insurance drops to 2%, so you keep 58p. Add a 9% student loan repayment and those figures fall to 63p and 49p.

At £20.00 an hour, time and a half pays £30.00 gross an hour. A basic-rate employee keeps 72% of that, so £21.60 net — against £14.40 for a normal hour. It is genuinely worth more per hour, and it stays worth more even at the higher rate. What changes is the gap: for a higher-rate taxpayer with a student loan, an hour at time and a half nets £14.70. Enter your overtime hours in the calculator to see the effect on your annual figure.

The personal allowance is £12,570 for 2026/27, and employee National Insurance starts at the same point, £12,570. On the National Living Wage of £12.71 an hour that is 19.0 hours a week before any deduction begins. A full-time week at that rate produces £24,785 gross and £21,365 net. Both thresholds are frozen until April 2028, so each year's wage increase pulls more part-time work into tax.

From 1 April 2026 the National Living Wage for workers aged 21 and over is £12.71 an hour. The rate for 18 to 20 year olds is £10.85, and the under-18 and apprentice rates are both £8.00. Apprentices get the apprentice rate only if they are under 19, or in the first year of their apprenticeship. Note that these change on 1 April while tax rates change on 6 April, so two sets of figures apply in early April.

Yes — set the hours to whatever you actually work. Part-time pay is not taxed differently, but because the £12,570 allowance is an annual figure, working half the hours does much better than halving your take-home. At £18.00 an hour, 20 hours a week keeps 91% of gross pay, against 81% at 40 hours. If your hours vary week to week, run the calculator on your average — but remember PAYE looks at each pay period, so a busy month can over-deduct and correct itself later in the year.

Only above a point. Scotland has six Income Tax bands and a 19% starter rate, so lower-paid hourly workers pay very slightly less than in the rest of the UK — at most about £40 a year. Above roughly £33,500 of income the position reverses, and by the time you reach the Scottish higher rate at £43,662 the gap widens quickly. National Insurance is identical across the UK, because it is reserved to Westminster. Tick "Scotland" in the calculator to apply Scottish rates, or use our tax calculator for Scotland for the full band-by-band comparison.

Three reasons cover almost every difference. First, your tax code: an emergency code, a benefit-in-kind adjustment or an underpayment being collected all change your tax-free amount, and entering your real code fixes it. Second, PAYE works period by period rather than annually, so if your hours vary the deductions swing about and settle up over the year. Third, this calculator does not model things like a company car, multiple jobs, court-order deductions or salary advances. If your payslip is consistently out and you cannot see why, it is worth having someone check the code with HMRC.

No. It applies the standard 2026/27 rates, thresholds and bands to a single hourly-paid job. It does not handle multiple employments, benefits in kind, self-employed income alongside your wages, or anything decided by your specific tax code history. If you are hourly-paid through an umbrella company, working across the CIS scheme, or holding two jobs at once, the interaction is worth checking with a Chartered Certified Accountant.