How to use the wage calculator
Select your province or territory, enter your gross pay (what you earn before anything is taken off), and say what period that figure covers. Then pick the pay period you want the results in. The two are separate questions: a salary quoted annually is still paid every two weeks, so you can enter $100,000 a year and read the answer a month at a time. The calculator annualizes your wage, applies the 2026 federal and provincial tax brackets to it, then works out what comes off each individual cheque. An hourly wage is annualized at 40 hours a week and a daily wage at 5 days a week, both for 52 weeks.
What comes off a Canadian paycheque
Four things, for most employees. Federal income tax and provincial income tax are charged on your taxable income at progressive rates, reduced by the basic personal amount and the Canada employment amount. CPP contributions are 5.95% of earnings between the $3,500 exemption and the $74,600 ceiling, plus 4% on earnings up to $85,000, for a 2026 maximum of $4,646.45. EI premiums are 1.63% of the first $68,900 of insurable earnings, a maximum of $1,123.07. Quebec is the exception: it runs QPP at 6.3% rather than CPP, charges a lower 1.30% EI rate, and adds QPIP at 0.430% for parental insurance.
Why your real cheque may not match this figure
The per-cheque figures here are a real cheque rather than the year divided up: CPP and EI come off at the full rate until they reach their annual maximums and then stop, which is why your pay rises partway through the year without your salary changing. Income tax is held level across the year, which is what the payroll formula does.
Your own cheque will still differ if you claim more than the basic personal amount on your TD1, have a pension or union dues deducted, receive taxable benefits, or have asked for extra tax to be withheld. Every credit this calculator applies, including the basic personal amounts, the Canada employment amount, and the credits for your CPP and EI premiums, is one the CRA payroll formula also applies at source, so none of it is a refund you have to wait for.
Average tax rate vs marginal tax rate
Your average tax rate is total income tax divided by gross pay: what the year actually cost you. Your marginal tax rate is the combined federal and provincial rate on your next dollar of income, which is what matters when you are deciding whether to take on overtime or make an RRSP contribution. The marginal rate is always the higher of the two, because Canada's brackets tax your first dollars at lower rates than your last.
Does moving province change your take-home pay?
Yes, and by more than most people expect. You pay provincial tax where you live on December 31, not where you work. On the same salary the gap between the most and least generous jurisdiction runs to thousands of dollars a year: Alberta's $22,769 basic personal amount and 8% bottom rate, Ontario's surtax and health premium, Quebec's higher rates offset by its 16.5% federal abatement, and Nunavut's 4% bottom bracket all pull the result in different directions.