Self-Employed Tax Calculator (2026)
Start from what you invoiced, take off your expenses, and see both federal bills, what you actually keep, and how much to set aside for each quarterly payment.
Reviewed by Teja K, CPA · last reviewed . General information, not tax advice for your situation. A calculator is an estimate, not a filed return. How we research and review this.
Everything you invoiced or were paid, before costs
Equipment, software, home office, mileage, professional fees
Enter your revenue and expenses to see both federal bills, what you keep, and what to set aside each quarter.
Tax year 2026. Federal tax only — set aside state tax on top of these figures.
There are two federal bills, not one
This is the thing that catches out almost every first-year freelancer. Working for yourself produces two separate federal taxes on the same profit, and people budget for one.
Income tax runs through the ordinary brackets after your deductions, the same as it would on a salary. Self-employment tax is Social Security and Medicare — the same taxes an employee has withheld, except you pay both halves because there is no employer to pay the other one.
At modest profit the self-employment bill is frequently the larger of the two, because the standard deduction shelters a good deal of income tax while self-employment tax applies from the first dollar of earnings.
- Self-employment tax: 15.3% on 92.35% of profit — 12.4% Social Security up to the 2026 wage base of $184,500, and 2.9% Medicare with no ceiling.
- Income tax: the ordinary brackets, after the standard deduction of $16,100 single or $32,200 married filing jointly.
- A further 0.9% Medicare surtax once earnings pass a statutory threshold that is never adjusted for inflation.
- Nothing at all below $400 of net earnings, where Schedule SE is not required.
Revenue is not profit, and the rate you care about is on profit
Tax is charged on profit — what you invoiced less what it genuinely cost you to earn it. That is why this page starts from revenue and asks for expenses separately rather than asking for a profit figure you may not have worked out yet.
The effective rate shown below is measured against profit, not revenue. A rate against revenue would look reassuringly low for any business with real costs, while telling you nothing about the burden on what you actually earned.
- Home office, where part of your home is used regularly AND exclusively as your principal place of business. Exclusively is the demanding word.
- Business mileage, which does not include commuting, and which needs a log kept at the time rather than reconstructed later.
- Equipment and software, frequently claimable in full in the year of purchase rather than spread over years.
- Professional fees, insurance, subscriptions and the business portion of your phone and internet.
- Health insurance premiums, available as an above-the-line deduction and one of the most commonly missed items entirely.
Half of your self-employment tax is also deducted before income tax is calculated. That is already applied above — it reduces income tax only, never the self-employment tax itself.
What to set aside, and when to send it
Nothing is withheld from a client payment, so the whole of both bills is yours to fund. The set-aside figures below are your estimated federal tax divided four ways and twelve ways — the quarterly number is what the IRS expects, the monthly number is usually easier to actually do.
If you expect to owe $1,000 or more when you file, the IRS expects payments during the year and can charge an underpayment penalty for skipping them, even if you pay the whole balance on time at filing. Four deadlines: April, June and September, then the following January.
Set aside state tax on top of these figures. This page is federal only, and most states add their own tax on the same profit.
When the structure itself starts to matter
As a sole proprietor or default single-member LLC, the whole of your profit bears self-employment tax. Once profit is high enough, electing S-Corp treatment can reduce that by splitting income into a salary, which bears payroll tax, and a distribution, which does not.
It is not free. An S-Corp adds payroll filings, a separate business return and in several states an annual fee, so below a certain profit the cost exceeds the saving. There is no universal crossover figure because it depends on a salary you could defend for your role and on which state you are in.
The S-Corp savings calculator models that on your own numbers rather than quoting a threshold.
If you have clients or income in India
Freelancing across the India-US line raises two things this calculation does not cover, and both catch people out.
Income from an Indian client is still US-reportable if you are a US taxpayer, no US withholding will have happened, and Indian tax deducted at source may support a foreign tax credit rather than an exemption. Payments received into an Indian account do not change that, and the account itself may be reportable on an FBAR or Form 8938 depending on the balances.
The state layer is the harder one. States are not parties to the India-US tax treaty, and a state credit for tax paid to other jurisdictions usually means other US states rather than other countries — so Indian tax can be relieved federally and unrelieved at state level on the same income.
Sources
Frequently Asked Questions
How much tax will I pay on 1099 income?
Two bills on the same profit. Self-employment tax is about 14.13% of profit — 15.3% applied to 92.35% of it — and income tax runs through the ordinary brackets after deductions. Enter your revenue and expenses above for your own figure. As a rough planning anchor, setting aside somewhere around a quarter to a third of profit for federal tax is a common starting point, and state tax sits on top.
How much should I set aside for taxes as a freelancer?
Use the quarterly and monthly figures above rather than a rule of thumb, because the right proportion changes considerably with your profit level and filing status. Whatever the number, the practical advice is to move it out of your working account the week you are paid — the most common cause of a missed quarterly payment is the money having already been spent.
Is this an LLC tax calculator too?
Yes. A single-member LLC is disregarded for federal tax by default: its profit is reported on your personal return and bears self-employment tax exactly as a sole proprietorship does. So the calculation for a default LLC owner, a sole proprietor and a 1099 contractor is the same one, which is why there is a single page for it rather than three. If you have elected S-Corp treatment, the position is different and the S-Corp calculator covers it.
Do I pay self-employment tax and income tax on the same money?
Yes. They are two separate taxes on the same profit and both are due. The only relief is that half of the self-employment tax is deducted before income tax is calculated, which is applied above. Budgeting for only one of the two is the most common cash-flow mistake in a first year of self-employment.
What if I also have a salaried job?
Two things change. Tax already withheld from your salary offsets your total bill, so your quarterly payments may be lower than shown here. And your W-2 wages fill the Social Security wage base first, so if your salary already exceeds it, the Social Security element on your freelance profit is nil and only Medicare applies. The self-employment tax calculator handles that interaction directly.
Does this include state tax?
No, federal only. Most states tax the same profit and their rules differ considerably — a few have no income tax at all, several have no standard deduction. The state tax calculator covers all fifty.
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