New York Unemployment Calculator

New York unemployment insurance

How New York figures your weekly benefit rate

Your weekly benefit rate, the amount you get for a full week of unemployment, depends on the wages you were paid during a base period. A base period is one year of work, four calendar quarters. The basic base period is the first four of the last five completed calendar quarters before the quarter you file in. If your wages there are not enough to qualify, the New York State Department of Labor (NYSDOL) uses the alternate base period: the last four completed quarters. Wages from the quarter in which you file never count. For a claim filed in late September 2026, the basic base period runs from April 2025 through March 2026, and the calculator relabels the wage boxes whenever you change the filing date.

If you were paid wages in all four quarters of the base period and your high quarter (the quarter with the most pay) was more than $3,575, your rate is your high quarter wages divided by 26, and never less than $143. If the high quarter was $3,575 or less, the rate is the high quarter divided by 25. If you were paid in only two or three quarters, a high quarter above $4,000 uses the average of your two highest quarters divided by 26; NYSDOL's example is $4,500 and $4,288, an average of $4,394, for a rate of $169. The maximum rate is $869 a week for claims filed since the first Monday of October 2025, and the minimum is $140. Rates are rounded down to the whole dollar.

Source: NYSDOL fact sheet P832 (2/26), How Your Weekly Unemployment Insurance Benefit Payment Is Calculated. Maximum $869 a week.

Do you earn enough to qualify?

NYSDOL applies three earnings tests to the base period. You must have been paid wages from jobs covered by unemployment insurance in at least two calendar quarters. For claims filed in 2026 you must have been paid at least $3,500 in one quarter, up from $3,400 for claims filed in 2025. And your total base period wages must be at least 1.5 times your high quarter wages. There is one exception to that last rule: if your high quarter was $19,118 or more, you qualify when the other three quarters add up to at least $9,559. The calculator runs all three tests on both base periods and tells you which one failed.

Wages are only part of it. To be eligible you also must have lost work through no fault of your own, be ready, willing and able to work, and be actively looking for work. The calculator cannot judge those conditions.

Basic or alternate base period

When the basic base period qualifies, NYSDOL uses it and does not automatically check whether the alternate base period would pay more. You can ask for the alternate base period instead, but wages from the fifth quarter that you use on this claim cannot be used again for a future claim, which can make it harder to qualify later. The calculator shows both rates side by side so you can see whether asking is worth it. In the default example the basic period pays $500 a week and the alternate period would pay $519.

Our calculation with the NYSDOL formula for wages in all four quarters. The $869 maximum is reached at a high quarter of $22,594 (26 x $869).

Working part time while you collect

Since 2021 New York reduces benefits by the hours you work in a week, not by the days. If you work 30 hours or fewer and earn no more than the maximum benefit rate in gross pay, you can still collect part of your benefit. Count at most 10 hours for any calendar day, add the week up and round up to the next hour. Up to 10 hours means you report 0 days and keep your full rate. From 11 to 16 hours you report 1 day and receive 75 percent; 17 to 21 hours is 2 days and 50 percent; 22 to 30 hours is 3 days and 25 percent. At 31 hours or more, or with gross pay above $869 for the week, you receive nothing for that week. Enter a week's hours and pay in the calculator to see the result for that week.

How long benefits last and when they arrive

New Yorkers receiving unemployment insurance benefits can get up to 26 weeks of benefits, so the calculator multiplies your weekly rate by 26 for the most you could collect on a regular claim. If you are eligible, your first payment generally arrives two to three weeks after your claim is completed and processed. You must certify for benefits each week and keep a record of your work search. After you file, NYSDOL sends a monetary determination that states your actual rate.

Taxes on unemployment benefits

Unemployment compensation generally counts as taxable income for federal purposes, and you receive a Form 1099-G showing what you were paid. You can have federal income tax withheld at 10 percent of each payment by giving Form W-4V to the payer, which is what the last line of the result shows; otherwise you may need to make quarterly estimated payments. For the full tax picture see are unemployment benefits taxable and the unemployment benefits tax calculator. If you were paid for unused vacation or received severance when you left, the PTO payout calculator and the severance pay tax calculator show what those payments net after tax, and final paycheck laws by state covers when your last check is due. When you go back to work, the New York salary calculator shows your take-home pay.