Your salary isn't your paycheck. Here's everything that happens between the number in your offer letter and the number that actually lands in your account. General information, not personalized tax advice.
A salary is an annual number. A paycheck is what's left after a specific, ordered sequence of deductions runs against a slice of it, every single pay period. Here's each step in that sequence.
Gross pay is your full earnings for the period, before anything comes out: salary divided by pay periods, or hours times rate for hourly work. Net pay (take-home pay) is what actually deposits, after every deduction. In between sit two very different categories: pretax deductions (money that never counts as taxable income in the first place) and taxes (money withheld from what's left after that). The order matters, since it changes how much tax you owe, not just how much lands in your account.
A traditional 401(k) contribution and a pretax (Section 125) health insurance premium both come out of gross pay before taxes are calculated, which is what "pretax" means: that money is never counted as taxable income for federal or state tax. A 401(k) deferral still counts as Social Security/Medicare wages, though; a Section 125 health premium is the one deduction that reduces all of it, federal, state, and payroll taxes alike. A Roth 401(k) contribution works differently: it comes out of already-taxed pay, so it lowers your take-home amount the same way, but doesn't lower this paycheck's tax bill at all, in exchange for tax-free withdrawals in retirement.
Together called FICA, these come out of every paycheck regardless of deductions or filing status. Social Security withholds 6.2% of wages, but only up to a cap, $184,500 for 2026: earn more than that from one employer and the extra isn't Social Security-taxed at all. Medicare withholds 1.45% of every dollar with no cap, plus an extra 0.9% once this employer has paid you over $200,000 for the year. These aren't optional and don't depend on your W-4. (See How Do Taxes Actually Work for the other kinds of tax outside your paycheck.)
Unlike FICA, income tax withholding is an estimate your employer calculates from your Form W-4. Steps 1 and 5 (name and signature) are required; steps 2 through 4 are optional and only apply if they fit your situation: Step 2 for a second job or a working spouse, Step 3 to reduce withholding for dependents ($2,200 per qualifying child under 17), Step 4 for other income, itemized deductions, or extra withholding you want taken out. If you never submit a W-4 at all, your employer is required to withhold as if you were Single with no adjustments, generally the highest default rate. States with their own income tax layer on a separate withholding, usually via a similar state-specific form.
The same $75,000 salary looks like a very different number depending on how often you're paid: weekly (52 paychecks a year), biweekly (26, literally every two weeks), semimonthly (24, twice a month on fixed dates), or monthly (12). Biweekly and semimonthly are the pair people mix up most: biweekly pays less per check than semimonthly for the same salary, since the same annual total is split into 26 pieces instead of 24, but twice a year (whenever a month has three paydays 14 days apart) you get what feels like a "bonus" extra paycheck.
Withholding is a running estimate of your annual tax bill, made one paycheck at a time from a W-4 that may not perfectly reflect your actual year. Overestimate along the way (common with a high default withholding, a second job, or life changes your W-4 never caught up to) and you get a refund at tax time, effectively an interest-free loan you gave the government all year. Underestimate and you owe a balance instead. The average 2026 refund ran about $3,275, and in the most recent complete year of data roughly 68% of filers got one, meaning most people are somewhat over-withheld, not exactly on target.
5% to a traditional 401(k), a $150/mo pretax health premium. Hover a segment for the exact numbers.
| Frequency | Paychecks/yr | Gross per check |
|---|---|---|
| Weekly | 52 | $1,442.31 |
| Biweekly | 26 | $2,884.62 |
| Semimonthly | 24 | $3,125.00 |
| Monthly | 12 | $6,250.00 |
Your W-4 only changes withholding, how much is set aside each paycheck, not your actual tax liability, which is calculated the same way regardless. Claiming more on your W-4 means a bigger paycheck now and a smaller refund (or a bill) later; it doesn't lower what you actually owe for the year.
Federal brackets are marginal: only the income above each threshold gets taxed at the higher rate, not your entire paycheck. A raise that pushes part of your income into a new bracket still results in more take-home pay overall, just a smaller bump than the raise's full dollar amount.
Biweekly is 26 paychecks a year on a fixed 14-day cycle; semimonthly is 24 paychecks on fixed calendar dates (like the 1st and 15th). For the same salary, biweekly checks run smaller, but land two "extra" paychecks a year that semimonthly never has.
A refund is your own money, returned: it means you had more withheld all year than you actually owed. Adjusting your W-4 to withhold closer to your real liability puts that same money in each paycheck instead of handing the government an interest-free loan until tax season.
A Roth contribution still leaves your paycheck, same as a traditional one; the difference is that it comes out after taxes instead of before. Since it doesn't lower this year's taxable wages, a Roth deferral actually shrinks take-home pay a bit more than an equal traditional contribution would, in exchange for tax-free withdrawals later.
National figures, not a prediction for your own paycheck or return. Your state, filing status, deductions, and W-4 elections all move these numbers.
Every deduction on a pay stub is doing one of two things: permanently reducing what you owe (a pretax 401(k) or health premium) or estimating and setting aside money you'll reconcile later (federal and state income tax withholding). FICA is the one piece that's neither an estimate nor adjustable, a fixed percentage that funds Social Security and Medicare directly.
The practical takeaway is that your W-4 is worth revisiting after any real change, a raise, a second job, a marriage, a new dependent, since it's the one input in this whole chain that's actually in your control day to day. Getting it closer to accurate doesn't change what you owe the government over a year, it just changes whether that money shows up in each paycheck or arrives as a lump sum months later. Run your own numbers through the calculator above to see where your actual paycheck lands.
Nothing is saved or sent anywhere; this just checks your answers in the page itself.
This page explains how paycheck withholding generally works; it isn't personalized tax advice, and it isn't a substitute for a real pay stub, a tax professional, or the IRS Tax Withholding Estimator. Your actual withholding depends on your specific W-4 elections, state, and employer.