Hourly to Salary Calculator
An hourly wage becomes an annual figure by multiplying the rate by the hours you work each week and then by the weeks you are paid. Twenty-two dollars an hour across a full-time year is about $45,760 — but only if the hours hold every week, which for hourly work is the assumption most likely to fail.
The calculator below takes the rate, your weekly hours and any unpaid weeks, and returns the annual, monthly and weekly equivalents. Use it before comparing an hourly offer against a salaried one, because the two are quoted in units that hide different risks.
Annualize your hourly rate
Set unpaid weeks to zero only if your hours are genuinely guaranteed year-round.
The multiplication, and the assumption inside it
Annual pay is rate times weekly hours times paid weeks. The arithmetic is trivial; the assumption is not. Multiplying by fifty-two treats every week as fully scheduled, and in hourly work the schedule is the variable the employer controls.
A retail assistant nominally on thirty-five hours who averages twenty-eight has not lost a fifth of a week — they have lost a fifth of a year. The table shows the same $22 rate under different realities.
| Weekly hours | Paid weeks | Annual equivalent |
|---|---|---|
| 40 | 52 | $45,760 |
| 40 | 48 | $42,240 |
| 35 | 52 | $40,040 |
| 30 | 52 | $34,320 |
| 28 | 50 | $30,800 |
Ask what the average weekly hours were over the last quarter, not what the maximum is. The answer changes the annual figure more than the rate does.
Guaranteed hours are the thing to negotiate
Between two hourly offers, the higher rate is not reliably the better job. A guaranteed thirty-eight hours at $20 pays more across a year than an unguaranteed forty at $21, and it does so without the week-to-week uncertainty that makes rent harder to plan around.
Variable scheduling has costs that never reach a pay stub. Hours announced days in advance make a second job, a class or childcare difficult to arrange, and the flexibility is usually one-directional. When you are told the rate is fixed, the schedule is often where the real negotiation is available.
Comparing an hourly offer with a salaried one
The two are not the same instrument, and annualising the hourly rate only makes them look comparable. What differs is who absorbs variation.
A salary transfers hours risk to you: a heavy month costs you time and pays no more. An hourly rate transfers it to your employer for time worked, but transfers the volume risk back to you, since a quiet month simply pays less. Neither is better in the abstract — they fail in opposite directions.
Compare four things beyond the annualised number: whether hours are guaranteed in writing, whether overtime is genuinely available and paid, what benefits attach and at what hours threshold, and how much notice the schedule gives. An hourly job with guaranteed hours and real overtime can out-earn the salaried equivalent; the same job without those is a lower offer wearing a higher number.
Benefits eligibility is usually tied to an hours threshold set by the employer and its plan. Get the threshold in writing before treating benefits as part of the package.
What annualising quietly leaves out
The annual figure is a projection built from a steady week, and several ordinary things break that assumption.
- Unpaid leave. Every week off without pay comes straight out of the total, which is why the calculator asks for it rather than assuming fifty-two paid weeks.
- Overtime. Genuine overtime can lift the annual figure well above the straight-time projection, and it is worth calculating separately rather than folding an optimistic average into the base.
- Shift differentials. A night or weekend premium changes effective earnings for anyone whose schedule leans that way, and it rarely appears in the headline rate.
- Seasonality. Work that peaks for one quarter and thins for another does not annualise from a good week without overstating the year.
- Unpaid breaks. A schedule that keeps you on site nine hours to pay for eight changes what the rate is worth per hour of your day, even though it is entirely lawful.
Using the monthly figure for budgeting
The calculator reports a monthly equivalent by dividing the annual figure by twelve, which is the right basis for rent, insurance and any other monthly commitment. It is deliberately not the same as what lands in your account each month.
Weekly and biweekly pay cycles do not divide evenly into months. On a biweekly schedule you receive twenty-six payments a year, so two months out of twelve carry three paychecks rather than two. Budgeting against the higher months and treating the extra as ordinary income is how a stable annual figure turns into a shortfall in the months that are not.
Frequently asked questions
Multiply the rate by your weekly hours, then by the weeks you are paid. At $22 an hour for forty hours across fifty-two weeks that is $45,760. Reduce the weeks for any unpaid time — the difference between fifty-two and forty-eight paid weeks on that rate is more than $3,500.
About $41,600 gross at forty hours a week for fifty-two weeks. At thirty hours it is $31,200, and at forty hours with four unpaid weeks it is $38,400. The rate alone does not determine the annual figure; the guaranteed hours do most of the work.
It depends on which risk you would rather carry. A salary is stable but does not pay for extra hours; an hourly rate pays for every hour worked but leaves you exposed when hours are cut. Compare guaranteed hours, overtime availability, benefits thresholds and scheduling notice, not just the annualised totals.
No. It annualises straight-time pay only, which keeps the base figure honest. Work out overtime separately and add it, rather than building an optimistic average into the base — overtime is usually the first thing to disappear when a business tightens.
The monthly figure is the annual total divided by twelve, which is what you need for monthly bills. Weekly and biweekly cycles do not align with calendar months, so on a biweekly schedule two months a year contain three paychecks and the rest contain two.