$15 an Hour Is How Much a Year?
$15 an hour is $31,200 a year before taxes (40 hours a week, 52 weeks). That is $600 a week, $1,200 every two weeks, and $2,600 a month. Fifteen dollars an hour is the rung where millions of workers land when they climb out of minimum-wage jobs — double the federal floor, yet still well short of the national middle. This page gives you the full picture: the formula, every pay frequency, your realistic take-home after federal taxes, what overtime does to the number, and an honest read on where $15 an hour stands in 2026.
The formula is simple: multiply your hourly rate by 2,080 hours (40 hours × 52 weeks). At your rate, $15 × 2,080 = $31,200.
| Pay frequency | Hours | Gross pay at $15/hr |
|---|---|---|
| Hourly | 1 | $15.00 |
| Daily (8 hrs) | 8 | $120 |
| Weekly (40 hrs) | 40 | $600 |
| Biweekly (80 hrs) | 80 | $1,200 |
| Monthly (average) | 173.33 | $2,600.00 |
| Annual (52 weeks) | 2,080 | $31,200 |
| Annual with 2 unpaid weeks off (50 weeks) | 2,000 | $30,000 |
Two unpaid weeks cost $1,200 — the year drops from $31,200 to an even $30,000. With no paid leave, budget against $30,000, not the headline. Thinking of freelancing at an equivalent rate instead? Price the switch with our salary ⇄ contract converter — it folds in benefits, downtime, and the employer's payroll-tax half that hourly pay quietly includes.
How much is $15 an hour after taxes?
Your $31,200 gross keeps roughly $26,500–$28,000 a year after federal tax — about $2,210–$2,330 a month in hand. The range comes from one fixed recipe: a single filer, 2026's $16,100 standard deduction, Social Security and Medicare at a flat 7.65% (about $2,387 on this gross), federal brackets on the rest, and no state income tax. It is a range because the final 2026 bracket thresholds can still shift — and your own pre-tax deductions for health premiums or retirement lift take-home while state income tax lowers it. Run your exact numbers in our tax set-aside calculator. The $16,100 single-filer figure is the official 2026 standard deduction (IRS Revenue Procedure 2025-32) — background at the IRS standard deduction guidance.
Your tax picture is unusually gentle for one reason: the $16,100 standard deduction shields more than half your gross, so only about $15,100 faces federal income tax at all — almost entirely in the lowest bracket. At this income your flat 7.65% FICA bite (about $2,387) is bigger than your entire income-tax bill, which surprises first-time filers every year. Earn more later and that balance reverses fast.
Is $15 an hour a good wage?
It is a real step up from the floor and still below the middle. The all-occupations median sits near $24.51 an hour, leaving $15 roughly $9.50 an hour — about $19,800 a year full-time — short of the typical American worker. But the other comparison matters more at this level: the federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour ($15,080 a year), which makes $15 more than double the federal floor — roughly what minimum-wage work pays across two full years, earned in one. For scale, cashiers — one of the country's largest occupations — earned a median of $15.81 an hour in May 2025, per the Bureau of Labor Statistics, putting $15 an hour just below that line.
Whether it is "good" is mostly a housing question. The 30%-of-gross rule allows about $780 a month on $2,600 gross, which rents a room or a split apartment in most markets but rarely a solo one-bedroom. The constructive read: $15 an hour is the launchpad rung — and the climb to $18 an hour is worth $6,240 a year, one of the best returns on a single raise anywhere in this series.
Twice the minimum wage: what the multiple buys
The 2.07× multiple over the $7.25 federal minimum is more than symbolism. At $15,080 a year, minimum-wage work leaves virtually nothing after rent in any US metro; at $31,200, the 50/30/20 budget on a ~$2,270 take-home midpoint finally has all three lines filled: needs absorb about $1,135, wants get $681, and savings-and-debt keeps $454. That $454 savings line is the whole game at this income — six months of it is a $2,700 emergency fund, which is the difference between a car repair and a missed rent check. None of this is comfortable, but it is the first rung where the math allows a plan rather than just survival.
Overtime at $15 beats asking for a raise
Time-and-a-half at $15 pays $22.50 an hour — a higher rate than $18-an-hour workers earn at straight time. Five steady overtime hours a week means 40 × $15 = $600 plus 5 × $22.50 = $112.50, for a $712.50 week. Hold that all year: $712.50 × 52 = $37,050 — within $390 of what $18 an hour pays full-time ($37,440), with no negotiation and no new job. Before counting it, apply the usual cautions: overtime is the least reliable dollar in any budget, and it is taxed at your highest marginal rate, so bank the base $31,200 in your plans and let overtime accelerate the savings line instead of funding the lifestyle.
Related conversions
One rung up is $18 an hour ($37,440 a year) — $6,240 more for the same hours. Two rungs up: $20 an hour ($41,600 a year). Turning any wage into freelance pricing? The contract rate converter builds the benefits and tax gross-up in, and the tax set-aside calculator pins down the exact take-home.