Freelance Hourly Rate Calculator
Enter the take-home you want, your business overhead, a tax cushion, and your honest billable hours. You'll get the minimum hourly rate to charge, the gross revenue it implies, and a matching day rate.
What you want left for yourself after taxes and expenses
Software, gear, insurance, workspace
Self-employment + income tax cushion
Most freelancers bill about half their working hours
Charge at least
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Enter your target take-home
Gross revenue target
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Day rate
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Why "double your employee rate" is the folk formula
Freelancers pass the advice around because it lands surprisingly close to this calculator's math. An employee's hourly wage hides everything the employer pays for: the other half of payroll taxes (as a freelancer, that's self-employment tax), benefits, equipment, and slack time between tasks. Stack a tax set-aside on top of overhead, then spread the total across only the hours clients actually pay for, and the rate that comes out is usually 1.5 to 2.5 times the equivalent salary's hourly rate. The taxes also arrive on a different rhythm: quarterly estimated payments instead of paycheck withholding, which is why the set-aside has to happen every time an invoice clears, not every April.
Billable-hours honesty
The rate above is only as truthful as the hours you fed it. A 40-hour freelance week might contain 20 to 25 billable hours once proposals, calls, invoicing, marketing, and dry spells take their share, and the scenario table shows how hard that assumption works: the same income target at 15 billable hours needs roughly double the rate it needs at 30. When you're setting a rate for the first time, err low on hours and let a busy year be the pleasant surprise. The hourly to salary calculator runs the same conversion from the employee side if you want to sanity-check an offer against your freelance floor.
Raising rates beats adding hours
Once your weeks are full, the only lever left is price, and it's the better lever anyway: a 20% raise flows almost entirely to take-home because your overhead doesn't grow with it. The harder freelance problem is that revenue arrives in lumps while rent doesn't, so pair the rate with a system for smoothing: our guides on budgeting irregular income and managing money on an irregular income cover paying yourself a steady baseline from a buffer. Stoia was built with irregular earners in mind, tracking the lumpy months so you can see your real run rate instead of guessing from the last invoice.
Frequently asked questions
Why is my freelance rate so much higher than my old hourly wage?
Because your wage never had to cover what an employer used to: both halves of payroll taxes, health insurance, retirement, equipment, software, and all the unpaid hours spent finding and managing work. A freelance rate that merely matches your old wage is a large, quiet pay cut.
What percentage should freelancers set aside for taxes?
A common cushion is 25 to 30 percent of gross income, covering self-employment tax plus federal and state income tax. Your real number depends on your income, state, and deductions, so treat the slider as a planning cushion and confirm the exact figure with a tax professional.
How many billable hours a week is realistic?
Most full-time freelancers bill 20 to 30 hours out of a 40-plus hour week. The rest goes to proposals, marketing, invoicing, admin, and the gaps between projects. Pricing as if all 40 hours were billable is the most common way freelancers undercharge.
Should I charge hourly or per project?
Per project usually earns more once you're fast, but you still need this hourly floor to price projects: estimate the hours, multiply by your rate, then add margin for revisions and scope creep. If a project quote works out below your floor rate, it's underpriced.
What about health insurance and retirement?
Fold them into the calculator: premiums and other benefit costs belong in annual business expenses (or in a higher take-home target), and retirement contributions belong in the take-home number you aim for. If your rate doesn't fund benefits, the rate is too low, not the benefits too expensive.
Does this calculator save my numbers?
No. Everything runs in your browser and disappears when you leave. Nothing is uploaded or stored.
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