California Unemployment Calculator

California unemployment insurance

How EDD figures your weekly benefit amount

Your weekly benefit amount (WBA) depends on one number: the wages you were paid in the highest quarter of your base period. A base period is 12 months split into four calendar quarters, and EDD looks at wages paid in the last 18 months before your claim. The standard base period is the first four of the last five completed calendar quarters before your claim begins. Your claim begins on the Sunday of the week in which you apply, so a claim filed in early October 2026 uses July 2025 through June 2026. The calculator relabels the wage boxes whenever you change the date.

EDD then reads your weekly amount from its unemployment insurance benefit table, which applies to every new claim beginning January 2, 2005 or later. The table starts at $40 a week for $900.00 to $948.99 in the highest quarter and stops at $450 a week for $11,674.01 and over. Above $1,846 in the highest quarter, each step of $26 adds $1 a week, so for most workers the weekly amount is close to the highest quarter divided by 26, about half of what they earned in an average week of that quarter. Because of the $450 cap, anyone who earned more than $11,674 in their best quarter gets the same maximum.

Source: EDD, Unemployment Insurance Benefit Table (DE 1101BT5), for new claims with a beginning date of January 2, 2005 or after. The calculator uses all 411 rows of the table.

Do your wages qualify?

To set up a valid claim you must have earned at least $1,300 in the highest quarter of your base period, or at least $900 in the highest quarter and total base period earnings of 1.25 times that quarter. With $900 in your best quarter, for example, you need $1,125 in the whole base period. The calculator runs both tests and tells you which one failed. EDD's own estimator asks you to include vacation pay, tips, residual payments, commissions and bonuses in your wages and to leave out severance pay.

Wages are only the first step. To be eligible you must also be out of work through no fault of your own, physically able to work, ready to accept work and actively looking for work. The calculator cannot judge those conditions; EDD decides them after you apply.

Standard or alternate base period

If you did not earn enough in the standard base period, EDD automatically checks the alternate base period: the last four completed calendar quarters before the claim begins. It can only be used when the standard base period does not give a valid claim, so a higher amount in the alternate period does not replace a valid standard claim. That is why the calculator shows the alternate period as "Not needed" when your standard period qualifies. Enter wages in the fifth box to see whether a recent quarter would rescue a claim that the standard period cannot support.

How much you can collect in total

Your maximum benefit amount is 26 times the weekly benefit amount or one-half of your total base period wages, whichever is less. Steady full-time earners almost always get the full 26 weeks. Someone whose only wages were $8,000 in one quarter would get $308 a week, but half of the base period wages is $4,000, so the claim runs out after about 13 weeks at the full amount. The table below shows equal wages in every quarter of the base period.

Our calculation with the EDD table and the 26-week or one-half rule. With equal quarters the 26-week limit is always the lower one.

Your claim ends on the Saturday 52 weeks after it begins, even if money is left on it. Every claim has a one-week unpaid waiting period that you serve by certifying for the first eligible week; your first certification usually covers the waiting week and one week of payment, and the waiting week does not change the total you can receive. EDD says it takes about three weeks to process a new application and issue the first payment, and you certify for benefits every two weeks.

Working part time while you collect

You must report any work, but you may still get a partial benefit. EDD does not count the first $25 or 25 percent of your gross earnings for the week, whichever is greater, and deducts the rest from your weekly benefit amount. EDD's two examples: with a $50 weekly benefit and $30 of earnings, $5 is deducted and you receive $45; with a $400 weekly benefit and $200 of earnings, $150 is deducted and you receive $250. Put a week's gross earnings into the calculator to see the result for that week.

Taxes on California unemployment benefits

Unemployment benefits are taxable income on your federal return, and EDD sends you a Form 1099G showing what it paid. You do not report the Form 1099G on your California state return. You can ask for federal income tax to be withheld at 10 percent of each payment, which the last line of the result shows; otherwise you may need to make quarterly estimated payments. For the full picture see are unemployment benefits taxable and the unemployment benefits tax calculator. If you received severance or unused vacation pay when you left, the severance pay tax calculator and the PTO payout calculator show what those checks net, and final paycheck laws by state covers when your last check is due. When you go back to work, the California salary calculator shows your take-home pay. Filing in New York instead? Use the NY unemployment calculator.