GS Pay Calculator 2026

Your grade, step by step

2026 pay at every step of your grade

This table follows your choices in the calculator. It lists the annual rate, the pay for an 80-hour biweekly pay period and the hourly rate for all 10 steps of the selected grade in your locality pay area.

GS-11, Rest of U.S. (17.06% locality), 2026.

How the GS pay calculator works

General Schedule pay starts from one base table of 15 grades with 10 steps each. OPM then publishes a separate table for every locality pay area. Federal rules build your locality rate in a fixed order: take the base rate for your grade and step, increase it by the locality percentage for the area of your official worksite, round the result to the nearest whole dollar (50 cents and over rounds up), and then apply the pay cap (5 CFR 531.604). The calculator follows the same steps, so its figures match the rates printed in the OPM 2026 tables.

Take a GS-11 at step 1. The 2026 base rate is $63,795. In the Rest of U.S. locality area the percentage is 17.06%, so the rate becomes $74,678. The same grade and step in the Washington-Baltimore-Arlington area, at 33.94%, pays $85,447.

The 2026 raise: 1% on the base, locality held at 2025 levels

Each 2026 locality table carries the same heading: it incorporates the 1% General Schedule increase, the total increase is 1%, and the rates take effect in January 2026. The alternative pay plan the President announced on August 28, 2025 set a 1% base increase and kept 2026 locality rates at their 2025 levels. OPM also used its special salary rate authority to give certain law enforcement officers an additional increase of about 2.8%, in line with the planned 3.8% military raise. Those law enforcement rates come from separate special rate tables and are not part of this calculator.

Hourly, biweekly and overtime rates

Federal payroll does not divide your salary by 2,080. Under 5 U.S.C. 5504, the hourly rate is the annual rate divided by 2,087, and the biweekly rate is that hourly rate times 80, both rounded to the nearest cent. For a GS-11 step 1 in the Rest of U.S., $74,678 divided by 2,087 is $35.78 an hour, and an 80-hour pay period pays $2,862.40. Twenty-six pay periods at that rate add up to $74,422.40, slightly less than the annual figure, because 26 periods of 80 hours cover 2,080 hours while the hourly rate is based on 2,087.

Title 5 overtime depends on where your rate sits against the minimum rate for GS-10 in your area. If your rate is at or below that line, overtime is 1.5 times your hourly rate. Above it, the overtime rate is the greater of 1.5 times the GS-10 step 1 hourly rate or your own hourly rate (5 U.S.C. 5542(a)). In the Rest of U.S. area, GS-10 step 1 pays $67,970, or $32.57 an hour, so above that line the Title 5 overtime rate is $48.86 an hour, or your own hourly rate once it is higher than $48.86. A GS-12 step 1 who earns $42.89 an hour is paid $48.86 an hour for overtime, not 1.5 times $42.89.

These Title 5 overtime rules do not apply to employees who are subject to the overtime provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act (5 U.S.C. 5542(c)). If your position is nonexempt under that law, your overtime is figured under FLSA rules, so read the overtime line as the Title 5 rate that OPM lists in its tables.

Locality pay areas and the 2026 pay cap

The 2026 salary tables cover 58 locality pay areas. The Rest of U.S. area takes in every location that is not inside another locality pay area (5 CFR 531.603) and has the lowest percentage, 17.06%. The highest is San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland at 46.34%. Alaska (32.36%) and Hawaii (22.21%) each have one statewide rate. The table shows GS-12 step 1 in some of the largest areas.

Source: OPM 2026 General Schedule locality pay tables, effective January 2026.

Locality pay also has a ceiling. A locality rate cannot exceed the rate for level IV of the Executive Schedule (5 U.S.C. 5304(g)(1)), and the OPM tables mark every limited rate at $197,200 for 2026. The cap reaches GS-15 step 10 in 37 of the 58 areas. In the Washington-Baltimore-Arlington area, GS-15 steps 6 through 10 all pay $197,200. In San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland it starts at GS-15 step 3 and also covers GS-14 steps 9 and 10. In the Rest of U.S. no rate is capped; GS-15 step 10 pays $192,331.

Step increases: when your pay rises within a grade

Within a grade, you move to the next step after a waiting period of creditable service (5 CFR 531.405):

• 52 weeks to reach steps 2, 3 and 4
• 104 weeks to reach steps 5, 6 and 7
• 156 weeks to reach steps 8, 9 and 10

That adds up to 936 weeks, or 18 years, from step 1 to step 10. Each increase also depends on performance: your most recent rating of record has to be at least Level 3, Fully Successful or its equivalent (5 CFR 531.404). In the Rest of U.S., a GS-11 who moves from step 1 to step 2 gains $2,490 a year, from $74,678 to $77,168. The result card shows the next step and the time left to step 10 for your selection.

Source: OPM Salary Table 2026-GS and Salary Table 2026-RUS (17.06% locality payment), effective January 2026.

From GS salary to take-home pay

The calculator shows gross pay. Each biweekly check then has taxes, your retirement contribution and any benefit deductions you choose taken out. Our federal employee FERS deductions guide explains those line items, the TSP contribution guide shows how a Thrift Savings Plan percentage changes a check, and the paycheck calculator estimates income tax and FICA on your annual rate. To compare a GS offer with a private job paid by the hour, use the salary to hourly calculator.