How to Read a Pay Stub: Every Section Explained

A pay stub is the itemized record of one payment: what you earned, what came out, and what reached your account. To read a pay stub, work down it in order: the header dates, then gross pay, then the tax lines, then the deductions, then net pay at the bottom. Each block answers a different question, and the year-to-date column beside every line is where an error shows up first.

Learning to read a pay stub properly is worth twenty minutes, because the stub is the first place a payroll error becomes visible, and an error is easier to correct in the period it happens than at year end.

This article explains what appears on a pay stub. It is not tax or financial advice, and the figures change every year.

What a pay stub is and where to find yours

A pay stub, also called a pay slip or an earnings statement, accompanies each payment your employer makes, and where it arrives by direct deposit it records what that deposit was made up of.

Most people now find it in a payroll portal rather than on paper. Providers such as ADP, Workday, Paychex and Gusto keep a running archive you can open and download. If your employer still issues a paper check, the stub is the perforated section attached to it, and our guide to how to write a check covers the check itself.

Whether an employer has to provide one at all depends on where you work, since the requirement is set at state level and states differ on both the obligation and the format.

The header: who, when, and for which period

The top of the stub identifies the employer, identifies you, and sets the dates.

You will find the employer name and address, your own name, and a partial identifier standing in for your Social Security number. Alongside those sit two dates that are not the same: the pay period, which is the span of work being paid for, and the pay date, when the money moves.

Confusing those two dates is what makes a payment look missing. Work done in the final days of a pay period appears on the following stub rather than the current one.

There is often a check or advice number here too. Quote it when you contact payroll.

Gross pay and how it breaks down

Gross pay is what you earned before anything is taken out, and it is the figure every deduction works from.

For hourly work the stub itemizes it: regular hours at your rate, overtime hours at the overtime rate, and any shift differential on its own line. For salaried work it is your annual salary divided by the number of pay periods.

That divisor explains a question people ask every year. A biweekly schedule pays twenty-six times, so two months contain three paychecks rather than two. A semimonthly schedule pays twenty-four times and never produces a third. Neither pays more over the year.

Bonuses, commission and paid leave payouts appear as separate earnings lines. Expense reimbursements can appear here too and are treated differently from wages, so check whether a line counts toward your taxable wages before assuming it was taxed.

Income tax withholding, federal, state, and local

Federal income tax withholding is not a flat rate and it is not your tax bill. It is an estimate your employer calculates from your earnings and from what you filed on your Form W-4.

That makes the W-4 the control on this line. If your withholding looks wrong in either direction, the form is where it gets changed, not the stub. We cover completing the form separately.

State income tax sits below it where your state levies one, and several states do not. Some cities, counties and school districts add their own, so a stub can carry three or four income tax lines depending on where you live and work.

FICA: Social Security and Medicare

These two are fixed percentages, which makes them the easiest lines to check yourself.

Social Security may be labeled Social Security, OASDI, or FICA-SS. The employee rate is 6.2 percent of your wages, applied up to an annual ceiling. The Social Security Administration set that ceiling at 184,500 dollars for 2026, up from 176,100 dollars for 2025, which puts the maximum an employee pays for the year at 11,439 dollars.

Medicare may be labeled Medicare, HI, or FICA-Med. The employee rate is 1.45 percent on every dollar, with no ceiling. Together the two come to 7.65 percent.

Higher earners see a third component. An additional Medicare tax of 0.9 percent applies to wages above 200,000 dollars, and employers must start withholding it once they have paid you more than that in a year, regardless of how you file. There is no employer match on it. The IRS sets out both rates and that threshold.

Your employer pays its own 6.2 percent and 1.45 percent alongside yours, which never appears as a deduction because it does not come out of your pay.

Pre-tax and post-tax deductions

Deductions divide into those taken before tax is calculated and those taken after, and the order changes what you owe.

Pre-tax deductions come out of gross pay first, which lowers the wage figure tax is calculated on. Health, dental and vision premiums sit here, along with traditional retirement contributions, a health savings account, a flexible spending account, and commuter benefits.

Post-tax deductions come out of what is left. Roth contributions belong here, as do union dues, wage garnishments, charitable payroll giving, and some voluntary insurance.

One detail explains a confusing figure. Not every pre-tax deduction reduces every tax, which is why a stub can show more than one taxable wage figure, each feeding a different tax line. Where the taxable wages beside your federal line and beside your Social Security line disagree, that is the reason rather than an error.

Employer contributions, which are not deductions

Many stubs include a column or a separate block showing what your employer paid on your behalf: its share of Social Security and Medicare, any retirement match, and its portion of your insurance premiums.

Read that block as information rather than money leaving your pay. It is sometimes labeled memo or employer paid, and subtracting it a second time is one way to arrive at the wrong net figure.

The year-to-date columns

The stub carries two columns for each line: one for the current period, one as a running total for the calendar year.

The year-to-date column is the more useful of the two. It shows when Social Security withholding stops for anyone who reaches the annual ceiling, it lets you project your annual figures partway through the year, and it is what lenders and landlords ask for as proof of income.

At year end the final stub should broadly reconcile with your W-2, though the figures will differ, because a W-2 reports taxable wages while a stub reports gross pay.

Net pay, and what to do when the math does not work

Net pay is gross pay minus taxes minus deductions, and it should equal what landed in your account. Where a direct deposit is split across more than one account, those amounts are listed at the bottom and add up to the same total.

When the number does not reconcile, work through the changes rather than the arithmetic. Look for a benefit election that took effect this period, a retroactive adjustment correcting an earlier one, or a deduction taken twice. Comparing this stub against the last one line by line is faster than recalculating either from scratch.

What a pay stub will not tell you

A stub records what was withheld, not what you owe. Withholding is an estimate, and the reconciliation happens when you file, which is why a correct stub can still sit alongside a refund or a bill.

It does not explain why a figure changed, only that it did. And because every payroll provider designs its own layout, the labels on your stub may differ from the ones used here even though the sections are the same.

For figures specific to you, your payroll team has the detail behind every line.

Guidy reads what is on your screen and explains what a line means while you look at it, which covers payroll portals as well as forms. The AI form filler page shows how.

Key takeaways

• The pay period and the pay date are different, and work done at the end of a period appears on the following stub
• Gross pay is the figure every deduction works from, and net pay is what remains after taxes and deductions
• Social Security is 6.2 percent up to an annual ceiling of 184,500 dollars for 2026, while Medicare is 1.45 percent with no ceiling
• Pre-tax deductions reduce the wages your tax is calculated on, which is why a stub can carry more than one taxable wage figure
• To read a pay stub end to end, work down it in order, and remember your Form W-4 controls federal withholding, so a figure you disagree with is corrected on that form rather than on the stub

Frequently asked questions

Why did my Social Security deduction stop partway through the year?

Because your year-to-date wages passed the annual ceiling, which is 184,500 dollars for 2026. Social Security withholding stops for the rest of the calendar year once you cross it, and restarts in January. Medicare has no ceiling and continues at 1.45 percent throughout.

What does OASDI mean on a pay stub?

OASDI stands for Old-Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance, which is the formal name for Social Security. A stub showing OASDI and one showing Social Security are showing the same deduction at the same rate.

Why is my take-home pay different this month when my salary has not changed?

Look for a change in deductions rather than in pay. A benefit election that took effect, a new retirement contribution rate, hitting the Social Security ceiling, or an extra pay period in the month on a biweekly schedule all move net pay without touching your salary.

How long should I keep my pay stubs?

Keep them until you have checked the final stub of the year against your W-2 and are satisfied the two agree. After that the year-end stub is the one worth keeping, and it is what lenders and landlords ask for as proof of income.

Who do I contact if a deduction looks wrong?

Your payroll or human resources team, and do it in the same pay period if you can. Bring the stub, the check or advice number from the header, and the previous stub, since the difference between the two identifies the change.