Self-Employment Tax Calculator

How self-employment tax works

When you have a regular job, you and your employer split the cost of Social Security and Medicare. You each pay half through payroll. When you work for yourself, there’s no employer to split with, so you cover both halves. That’s self-employment tax, a combined 15.3% on your net earnings, on top of your regular income tax.

It’s calculated on 92.35% of your net self-employment income (the tax code lets you knock off the employer-half equivalent first). The 12.4% Social Security portion only applies up to the annual wage base of $184,500. The 2.9% Medicare portion has no cap and applies to every dollar. If you also have a W-2 job, those wages count against the Social Security cap first.

The one bit of relief is that you can deduct half of your self-employment tax as an adjustment to income, which lowers your income tax. This calculator applies that deduction, then adds the income tax your profit creates at your bracket so you see the whole federal bill, not just the payroll piece. New to all of this? Start with the plain-English guide, quarterly taxes for the self-employed.

2026 self-employment tax rates

2026 Social Security wage base per the SSA. High earners may also owe an extra 0.9% Additional Medicare Tax above $200,000 ($250,000 married), which this calculator includes in the breakdown.

From this ballpark to your real quarterly payment

The IRS does not want this money in April. It wants it in four installments during the year, and it charges interest on installments that come up short. The full calculator turns this estimate into an exact payment using both IRS methods, your deductions, and what you have already paid.