How We Calculate Irish Take-Home Pay — Methodology

How we calculate Irish take-home pay

The Irish calculator uses Salary Codex's own rules engine with rates taken from Revenue and the Department of Social Protection. The documents are listed on the data sources page. The tax year is the calendar year.

Order of operations

Gross salary for the year.
Pension contributions to an occupational scheme, PRSA or similar reduce income for Income Tax only, up to an age-related share of earnings — 15% under 30 rising to 40% from 60 — with earnings capped at €115,000. They do not reduce USC or PRSI.
Income Tax: 20% up to your standard rate band (€44,000 single, €48,000 single parent, €53,000 married plus the second earner's income up to €35,000), 40% above it.
Tax credits are then deducted: the Personal credit (€2,000, or €4,000 married), the Employee (PAYE) credit (up to €2,000, never more than 20% of PAYE income), and where they apply the Single Person Child Carer, Age, Home Carer and Rent credits.
Age exemption: if you are 65 or over and your income is within the exemption limit (€18,000 single, €36,000 married, more with children) no Income Tax is due; just above it, marginal relief caps the tax at 40% of the excess.
USC on gross income in bands of 0.5%, 2%, 3% and 8%, with nothing due when income is €13,000 or less and reduced rates for people aged 70 or over or with a full medical card whose income is €60,000 or less.
PRSI Class A for employees, described below.
MyFutureFund, if you choose it: 1.5% of gross pay is taken from what is left after Income Tax, USC and PRSI, described below.

PRSI and the October change

PRSI is charged week by week. Pay of €352 a week or less is exempt; above that the employee rate applies to all of it, with a PRSI credit of up to €12 a week that falls by one-sixth of pay above €352.01 and is gone at €424. The rate changes on 1 October each year under the PRSI roadmap, so we apply the January–September rate to 39 weeks and the new rate to the last 13 weeks of the year (4.2% and 4.35% in 2026). Employer PRSI uses the same weeks.

MyFutureFund (auto-enrolment)

The automatic enrolment retirement savings system, MyFutureFund, started on 1 January 2026. Employees aged 23 to under 60 who earn €20,000 or more a year and do not pay into a pension through payroll are enrolled automatically; people outside those limits can opt in from age 18 up to the State Pension age of 66. A job where you pay into a pension through payroll is exempt.

Because many people are not enrolled, the calculator leaves MyFutureFund out unless you set the MyFutureFund field to Enrolled. When you do, in years 1 to 3 of the scheme:

you pay 1.5% of gross pay, taken from your pay after Income Tax, USC and PRSI: there is no tax relief on these contributions;
your employer adds 1.5%, which we include in the cost to employer; Revenue does not treat it as a Benefit in Kind or charge USC on it, and we work out employer PRSI on your pay as before;
the State adds 0.5% (€1 for every €3 you pay), which goes into your fund and does not change your take-home pay.

No contributions are due on gross pay above €80,000 in a calendar year. In practice contributions stop after the pay period in which pay for the year passes €80,000, so a little more can be paid in that period; we stop at exactly €80,000. The rates rise every three years to 6% each for you and your employer and 2% from the State from year 10. If you also pay into a pension through payroll, the calculator treats your job as exempt and shows no MyFutureFund contributions.

Married couples and civil partners

Couples are jointly assessed: Income Tax is worked out on the combined income with the married band and credits, while USC and PRSI are charged on each person's own pay. With two incomes the calculator shows the household's take-home pay. With one income the Home Carer credit can be added when the other spouse cares for a dependent at home.

Tests

Test	Scope	Result
Revenue rate charts	Bands and credits for 2025 and 2026	All match
Revenue USC examples	€25,000, €50,000, €50,000 with a medical card, €75,000 aged 75 (2026)	Reproduced to the cent
Revenue Income Tax and age examples	Monthly-paid single employee on €4,000, jointly assessed couple under the exemption limit, marginal relief at €38,000 with two children (2025)	All reproduced
PRSI	Class A tables 2025 and 2026, PRSI credit taper under S.I. 600/2015	All match
MyFutureFund	Citizens Information example (€20,000 a year: €300 from you, €300 from your employer, €100 from the State), the €80,000 cap, payroll pension exemption and age limits	All reproduced

There is no independent open-source model of the Irish system to cross-check against at scale, so every rule is tested against Revenue's own worked examples.

Not yet included

Benefits in kind, bonuses paid in particular weeks and emergency tax.
Self-employment (Class S PRSI) and income other than employment.
Budget 2027 changes, which apply from 1 January 2027.

Updates and errors

Rules are updated when Revenue or the Department of Social Protection publish a change; the version and verification date appear on the calculator. If a result does not match your payslip, tell us — corrections ship as a new rules version.

Estimates only. Not tax, legal or financial advice.