GS Pay Calculator 2026

Updated August 8, 2026. Choose your locality pay area, grade and step to see what a 2026 General Schedule job pays — a year, a fortnight and an hour — and when your next within-grade increase falls due. Every rate here is the figure OPM published for January 2026. None of them is worked out by this page.

How 2026 GS pay is worked out

A General Schedule salary is built from two pieces. The first is the base rate for your grade and step, which is the same everywhere in the country. The second is a locality payment — a percentage added on top that depends on where the job is. For 2026 the general increase was 1% and the new rates took effect in January 2026.

There are 58 locality pay areas in 2026. If your duty station is not inside one of them you are paid the Rest of U.S. rate, 17.06% above base, which covers more federal employees than any single metropolitan area. The percentages run from 17.06% up to 46.34% in San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland, CA.

Two limits shape the numbers. Locality pay cannot push a rate above the salary for level IV of the Executive Schedule — $197,200 in 2026 — and OPM flags the affected cells with an asterisk and the footnote “Rate limited to the rate for level IV of the Executive Schedule (5 U.S.C. 5304 (g)(1)).” That cap bites on 97 of the 8,700 locality cells, all at GS-15 or the top of GS-14 in the highest-paying areas. Rates are also rounded to whole dollars, with a half-dollar rounded up.

Hourly and fortnightly figures follow OPM’s own formula, set out in its 2,087-hour divisor fact sheet and required by 5 U.S.C. 5504(b): the hourly rate is the annual rate divided by 2,087 hours, rounded to the nearest cent “counting one-half cent and over as the next higher cent”, and the biweekly rate is that hourly rate multiplied by 80 hours.

That formula has a consequence which catches people out: 26 fortnightly payments do not add up to the annual rate. OPM’s own worked example takes a $89,033 annual rate, which pays $3,412.80 a fortnight and therefore $88,733 across 26 pay dates. The annual figure is a rate, not a promise of what reaches your account.

2026 GS base pay table

Annual base rates, before any locality payment. The final column is what one within-grade increase is worth at that grade; GS-1 and GS-2 have no single figure because their steps are not evenly spaced.

Swipe sideways to see every column.

Source: OPM 2026 General Schedule base salary table. Effective January 2026.

2026 GS pay table — Rest of U.S.

The rates paid at duty stations outside all 58 named locality areas: base pay plus 17.06%.

Swipe sideways to see every column.

Source: OPM Salary Table 2026-RUS. Effective January 2026. Hourly and overtime rates for these same cells are on our 2026 GS pay scale page.

All 58 locality pay areas for 2026

Every locality pay area OPM publishes for 2026, with its percentage and two sample salaries so the areas can be compared at a glance. Use the calculator above for any other grade and step.

Source: the caption of each OPM 2026 locality salary table — the percentages are published only on the individual tables, never on the index page. Where the highest-paying areas show identical figures at the top of the scale, the rate has hit the $197,200 cap.

When your next step increase is due

A within-grade increase is not automatic in the sense of arriving whenever you like. Each one needs a set period of creditable service in your current step, and the periods get longer as you climb: three one-year waits, then three two-year waits, then three three-year waits. Step 1 to step 10 therefore takes 936 weeks — just under 18 years.

Source: OPM within-grade increases fact sheet.

Meeting the waiting period is one of three conditions. Your most recent rating of record must also be at least Level 3 (“Fully Successful” or equivalent), and you must not have received an “equivalent increase” in pay during the waiting period — a promotion, for instance — which restarts the clock (5 CFR 531.407). That is why the calculator’s projected dates are a planning estimate rather than a payroll date.

Base rates. In a locality pay area every step is worth proportionally more — in the Rest of U.S. area, 17.06% more. Use the calculator above for the exact figures where you work.

Questions people ask

Why is my GS-15 step 10 salary the same in several cities?

Because it has hit the cap. Locality pay cannot take a General Schedule rate above level IV of the Executive Schedule, $197,200 in 2026, so the top cells in the highest-paying areas all flatten out at the same number. In 2026 that affects 97 of the 8,700 locality cells.

Which locality pay area am I in?

It follows your duty station, not where you live. If the duty station is not within one of the 58 defined areas, the Rest of U.S. rate applies. OPM publishes the county-level definitions alongside the 2026 salary tables.

Is this my take-home pay?

No. Every figure here is gross basic pay. It comes before federal and state tax, FERS retirement contributions, TSP, FEHB premiums and every other deduction, and it excludes overtime, night and Sunday differentials, law-enforcement availability pay, and any recruitment or retention incentive.

How current are these figures?

They are the 2026 tables, effective January 2026, read straight from OPM’s published salary tables. The 2027 tables are normally released in late December to take effect in January, and this page is rebuilt from the source files when they land.

Related pay pages

• 2026 GS pay scale tables — the full base, Rest of U.S. and hourly tables in one place
• How the General Schedule works — grades, qualifications and how jobs are classified
• Senior Executive Service — the pay system above GS-15
• USPS pay scales — postal jobs are not on the General Schedule

Every figure on this page comes from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management: the 2026 salary tables, the within-grade increases fact sheet and the 2,087-hour divisor fact sheet. Updated August 8, 2026.