Comparing a salaried job offer to an hourly one — or figuring out what your current salary actually works out to per hour — comes down to one formula, but the assumptions you plug into it matter more than the math itself.
The formula
hourly rate = annual salary ÷ (hours per week × weeks worked per year)The standard US full-time default is 40 hours/week and 52 weeks/year, giving 2,080 hours/year. A $52,000 salary at that schedule works out to:
52,000 ÷ (40 × 52) = 52,000 ÷ 2,080 = $25.00/hour
Why the defaults matter
That 2,080-hour default assumes you work every single week of the year with no unpaid time off. If your actual schedule differs, your real hourly rate does too:
- Paid time off doesn’t change the math — you’re still being paid for those hours, so they count toward your annual hours worked.
- Unpaid time off does. If you take two unpaid weeks a year, you’re actually working 50 weeks, not 52 — plug in 50 instead, and your effective hourly rate goes up slightly, since the same salary is spread across fewer worked hours.
- A different weekly schedule (say, 37.5 hours instead of 40) also changes the result — always use your actual scheduled hours, not just the generic default.
Going from weekly to monthly
Once you have an hourly rate, the other figures follow:
- Weekly = hourly rate × hours per week
- Biweekly = weekly × 2
- Monthly = annual salary ÷ 12 (not weekly × ~4.33, though that gives a very close estimate — dividing the annual figure directly is more precise since months don’t all have the same number of weeks)
Comparing a salaried offer to an hourly job
This is where the calculation earns its keep. A $60,000 salaried offer and a $28/hour hourly offer look hard to compare directly — but convert the salary to an hourly rate first ($60,000 ÷ 2,080 = $28.85/hour) and now they’re on the same footing. From there, also consider what salaried compensation often includes that hourly doesn’t (paid holidays, benefits) and what hourly sometimes offers that salaried doesn’t (overtime pay for hours over 40/week, which a fixed salary usually does not include).
This is a pre-tax estimate
Every figure here is gross pay — before taxes, insurance, retirement contributions, or any other deductions. Two jobs with the same gross hourly rate can result in different take-home pay depending on benefits and withholding, so use this as a starting point for comparison, not a final answer on what you’ll actually bring home.
Calculate your own numbers
Our salary-to-hourly calculator lets you adjust both the hours-per-week and weeks-per-year assumptions instead of locking you into the 40/52 default, and shows weekly, biweekly, and monthly figures at once. If you’re a freelancer or contractor figuring out what to invoice instead, the billable hours calculator turns a rate and tracked time directly into an invoice total.