Multiplying an hourly rate by 2,080 assumes you are paid for every one of those hours. That is true of a salary and frequently untrue of an hourly job, which is exactly why the two are so hard to compare. This hourly to salary calculator lets you take the unpaid time out instead of pretending it is not there.
At $25 an hour on a forty hour week, the shortcut gives $52,000. That is the number to start from, not the one to finish with.
Unpaid time is the whole difference
A salaried worker is paid through the holidays. An hourly worker frequently is not, and every unpaid week comes straight off the annual figure rather than being spread across it.
Two unpaid weeks at $25 an hour is $2,000, turning $52,000 into $50,000 before anyone mentions tax. Your weekly pay has not changed at all; you are simply paid for fifty weeks instead of fifty-two. Shutdowns, seasonal gaps and leave beyond your allowance all belong in that field.
What to enter
- Set paid vacation days and paid holidays to whatever your employer actually gives you, which for many hourly roles is zero.
- Put shutdowns, seasonal gaps or unpaid leave in unpaid weeks off.
- Use your usual hours rather than your best week, since the annual figure multiplies any optimism by fifty-two.
Comparing an hourly job against a salaried offer
This is what the calculator is really for, and the honest comparison has three parts rather than one.
The first is the annual figure with unpaid time taken out, which is what this page gives you. The second is what the salaried job pays you for not working: a package with ten vacation days and eleven holidays is twenty-one paid days the hourly job probably does not match. The third is everything that never appears in either number, chiefly health cover and retirement contributions.
Worth knowing: hourly work has one advantage the comparison usually misses. Beyond forty hours a week you are entitled to time and a half, and many salaried roles are not. If you regularly work long weeks, that premium can close a gap the annual figures suggest is unbridgeable.
Going the other way
If you have a salary and want to know what an hour of your time is worth, the salary to hourly calculator works the same relationship from the opposite end, and the answer there tends to surprise people in the other direction.
Hourly to salary calculator FAQ
$52,000 a year if you are paid for a full forty hour week across all fifty-two weeks. If two of those weeks are unpaid, it is $50,000. If none of your holidays are paid, the figure falls further, which is why the shortcut of multiplying by 2,080 overstates most hourly jobs.
Multiply your hourly rate by your weekly hours, then by the number of weeks you are actually paid for. The standard shortcut uses 2,080 hours, which is forty hours across fifty-two weeks, but that only holds if every week is paid.
It assumes they are paid. 2,080 is simply forty hours times fifty-two weeks, so it treats every week as a paid week. For a salaried job that works. For an hourly job with unpaid time off it overstates your annual pay.
Usually a little, once unpaid time and benefits are counted, but not always. Hourly work carries an entitlement to time and a half beyond forty hours a week that many salaried roles do not, so a job with regular overtime can come out ahead.