Salary conversions and overtime pay
Two small pay engines sit behind this guide. One converts a single pay amount into every common period — hourly, daily, weekly, bi-weekly, semi-monthly, monthly, quarterly, and annual. The other turns regular hours, overtime hours, and a multiplier into a period's gross pay. Both deal only in gross, pre-tax amounts, and both are unit-free, so the figures work in any currency. This page explains what each engine does, why its conventions are what they are, where it deliberately stops, and the misreadings that cost real money. Every number below is computed at build time by the same functions behind the salary calculator and the overtime calculator, using labelled example inputs.
Converting a rate through the year
The converter never jumps straight from one period to another. It first annualizes the amount you enter using a standard 52-week year, then divides that annual total back into each period. A rate of 30 per hour on a 40-hour, 5-day week annualizes as 30 × 40 × 52 = 62,400, and every other period is that annual figure shared out:
- Hourly — 30
- Daily — 240
- Weekly — 1,200
- Bi-weekly — 2,400
- Semi-monthly — 2,600
- Monthly — 5,200
- Quarterly — 15,600
- Annual — 62,400
Hourly and daily pay depend on the schedule you give: the hourly figure divides the annual total by hours-per-week × 52, and the daily figure by days-per-week × 52. The four calendar periods — weekly, bi-weekly, semi-monthly, and monthly — use fixed counts that do not depend on the schedule at all. That single annual pivot is what keeps the conversions mutually consistent: run any output back through the converter and you land on the same annual total you started from.
Why the periods are not simple multiples of each other
A common conversion error is treating the periods as round multiples. A month is not four weeks: with 52 weeks and 12 months, each month averages about 4.33 weeks, so the monthly figure of 5,200 is noticeably more than four times the weekly 1,200. Bi-weekly and semi-monthly are easily confused, because they sound interchangeable and are not. Bi-weekly pays every two weeks — 26 times a year — while semi-monthly pays twice a month, 24 times a year. The same annual pay therefore splits into a smaller bi-weekly cheque of 2,400 and a larger semi-monthly one of 2,600, with the bi-weekly schedule making up the difference through 2 extra cheques. Neither is more money over the year; they divide the same annual total into a different number of pieces.
The schedule is part of the number
Hours and days per week are not decoration — they change the annual total directly, which is why a quoted "annual equivalent" for anything less than full time can mislead. The same 30 per hour worked on a 20-hour week annualizes to 31,200, exactly half the full-time 62,400, and the monthly figure falls from 5,200 to 2,600. The hourly rate has not changed at all; the yearly figure has halved because half as many hours feed it. Whenever an annual number is compared against an hourly one, the schedule behind each has to match, or the comparison is between two different working years.
Reading a salary backward to an hourly rate
The converter runs in both directions, because the annual pivot is symmetric. Enter 78,000 as an annual salary on a 40-hour, 5-day week and it resolves to 37.5 per hour, 1,500 weekly, and 6,500 monthly. This is the move that makes two offers comparable: convert both to the same period — annual for the headline, hourly for what an hour of your time actually earns — before judging them. An offer with the larger annual figure but longer standard hours can hide a lower hourly rate, and only the conversion makes that visible.
Everything here is gross
Both engines return gross, pre-tax amounts, and they say so rather than pretending otherwise. Withholding, payroll taxes, pension contributions, and benefit deductions depend on jurisdiction and personal election, and cannot be inferred from a rate and a schedule. The converter also assumes a full 52-week year with no unpaid leave; if you expect unpaid time off, multiply the hourly rate by the hours you will truly work rather than trusting the annualized figure, which counts every week as worked.
Overtime is a premium on hours, not a new standing rate
The overtime engine adds two pieces: regular hours at the base rate, and overtime hours at the base rate scaled by a multiplier. Take 40 regular hours at 30 with 8 overtime hours at a 1.5× multiplier. The overtime rate is 30 × 1.5 = 45 per hour, so the 8 overtime hours add 360 on top of 1,200 in regular pay, for a 1,560 gross total across 48 hours. The multiplier lifts the rate on the overtime hours only; the regular hours are untouched. That is why overtime is best read as a premium on particular hours, not as a higher wage for the whole period.
The multiplier is an editable convention
The engine defaults the multiplier to 1.5× — the common time-and-a-half convention — but treats it as plain arithmetic, so any positive value works and nothing special happens at the conventional numbers. Holding the example's hours fixed and moving only the multiplier shows the effect cleanly: at 1.25× the overtime hours add 300 for a 1,500 total; at 1.5× they add 360 for 1,560; at 2× they add 480 for 1,680. The regular pay stays at 1,200 in all three, because the multiplier never reaches the regular hours. Which hours count as overtime in the first place is a classification this tool does not make: thresholds and eligibility vary by jurisdiction and contract, so you count the regular and overtime hours under the rules that govern your work, and the engine does the multiplication on the hours you supply.
A second tier for arrangements like double time
Some arrangements pay a higher premium past a further threshold — double time on a holiday, for instance. The engine takes an optional second tier: a block of hours at its own multiplier, added on top. Adding 4 hours at a 2× multiplier to the running example introduces a second-tier rate of 60 per hour, contributing 240 more and bringing the gross total to 1,800 across 52 hours. Left blank, the tier simply does not apply, and a single overtime rate covers the whole overtime block.
Where the two engines should not be chained
The converter and the overtime engine answer different questions, and joining them carelessly produces a confident wrong number. An overtime total is the gross pay of one specific period — 1,560 for the example week — not a rate that recurs every week. Running it through the salary converter as a weekly amount assumes 52 such weeks and annualizes the overtime along with the base, which overstates the year unless the overtime is genuinely constant. Convert the steady base rate to see the annual picture, and keep overtime as the per-period addition it is. A second caution is purely arithmetic: conversions often land on repeating decimals. The 2,000/month example resolves to a weekly 461.538462, which the screen rounds to 461.54 for money while the engine holds the fuller value internally. For how that rounding is defined, see the methodology page.
Frequently asked questions
Are these figures before or after tax?
Before tax. Every amount the salary converter and the overtime engine return is gross pay, exactly as the engine documents it. Income tax, social contributions, and other deductions depend on jurisdiction and personal situation, so a take-home figure needs a dedicated, jurisdiction-aware tool — this arithmetic stops at the gross number.
Why is the monthly figure not simply the weekly one times four?
A year holds 52 weeks but only 12 months, and 52 ÷ 12 ≈ 4.33 weeks per month. The converter routes every amount through the annual total first, so monthly pay is the annual figure ÷ 12. In the 30/hour example that is 1,200 weekly but 5,200 monthly — more than four weekly cheques, because the month is a touch longer than four weeks.
What is the difference between bi-weekly and semi-monthly?
Bi-weekly means every two weeks — 26 pay periods a year. Semi-monthly means twice a month — 24 periods. The same annual pay therefore gives a smaller bi-weekly amount (2,400 in the example) than semi-monthly (2,600), but 2 more cheques across the year.
Does changing the overtime multiplier change my regular pay?
No. The multiplier scales only the overtime hours. Across the example's 1.25×, 1.5×, and 2× runs the regular pay stays at 1,200 throughout; only the overtime portion moves — 300, 360, then 480.
Can I annualize an overtime week with the salary converter?
Only with care. The overtime total is the gross pay of one specific period, not a standing rate that recurs every week of the year. Feeding a heavy week such as the example's 1,560 into the salary converter as a weekly amount assumes 52 identical weeks, which overstates the year unless the overtime genuinely repeats. Convert the steady base rate, and treat overtime as the per-period addition it is.
What happens when a conversion produces a repeating decimal?
The engine keeps full internal precision and the display rounds to at most six decimal places. Converting the 2,000/month example to weekly gives 461.538462 — 461.54 once rounded to two places for money. The underlying value carries more digits than the screen shows; the methodology page documents the policy in full.
More guides and the full list of calculators are on the guides hub. The calculator implements the general definition of each conversion and premium; your jurisdiction's or contract's conventions — which hours qualify, how currency is rounded, what tax applies — may differ, and the tool knows none of them. See the methodology page for how these engines are implemented, tested, and rounded.