Salary to Hourly: How to Convert Your Pay (With Calculator)

The Salary to Hourly Formula

The core formula is straightforward. Take your annual gross salary and divide it by the total number of hours you work in a year.

Hourly Rate = Annual Salary ÷ (Hours per Week × Weeks per Year)

Example: $65,000 ÷ (40 × 52) = $65,000 ÷ 2,080 = $31.25/hr

The standard assumption is 40 hours per week for 52 weeks, giving 2,080 total hours. But that number only works if you never take time off. If your job includes paid vacation, holidays, or sick days, the actual hours you work are fewer, which means your effective hourly rate is higher than the simple formula suggests.

Why PTO Changes Everything

Most full-time employees in the United States get between 10 and 20 days of paid time off per year (vacation plus holidays). That translates to 2 to 4 fewer working weeks. Here is how that shifts the hourly rate for a $60,000 salary:

The difference between no PTO and 4 weeks off is $2.40 per hour. That adds up to nearly $5,000 in annual value. When comparing job offers, always factor in how much time off each position includes.

Common Salary to Hourly Conversions

Here are quick conversions for common US salary levels at 40 hours per week and 52 weeks per year.

Converting Hourly to Annual Salary

The reverse calculation is just as simple. Multiply your hourly rate by the number of hours you work per week, then multiply by 52 weeks.

Annual Salary = Hourly Rate × Hours per Week × Weeks per Year

Example: $25/hr × 40 hrs × 52 weeks = $52,000/year

This is especially useful for hourly workers thinking about moving to salaried positions, or freelancers trying to benchmark their rates against full-time equivalents. Remember to account for benefits, health insurance, and retirement contributions, which salaried employees often get on top of their base pay.

How to Compare Job Offers Fairly

Salary alone does not tell the full story. Two positions paying the same annual amount can have very different true hourly rates depending on expected hours and PTO.

Offer B pays $5,000 less per year, but you earn over $5 more per hour of your time. Always convert to hourly when comparing positions with different schedules.

Setting Your Freelance Hourly Rate

Freelancers often make the mistake of matching their old salaried hourly rate. But you also need to cover self-employment taxes (roughly 15.3% in the US), health insurance, retirement savings, and unbillable time spent on administration and marketing.

Overtime and the FLSA

Under the Fair Labor Standards Act, non-exempt employees in the United States must be paid at least 1.5 times their regular hourly rate for any hours worked beyond 40 in a single workweek. In 2024, the salary threshold for overtime exemption was raised, so more employees now qualify for overtime pay.

If you regularly work overtime, your effective hourly rate is actually higher than the base calculation. For example, a $50,000 salaried employee who works 45 hours per week and qualifies for overtime earns about $24.04/hr for the first 40 hours and $36.06/hr for the extra 5, making the effective rate roughly $25.48/hr.

Use Our Free Calculator

Skip the math and get instant results with our free Salary to Hourly Calculator. It handles both directions (salary to hourly and hourly to salary), lets you adjust hours per week and PTO, and shows a complete breakdown including daily, weekly, bi-weekly, and monthly amounts.