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🇮🇳 India Salary & Tax Calculator — Take-Home Pay 2026

Enter your salary to see your estimated take-home pay after the old and new income tax regimes. Pre-filled with a typical India salary so it's ready to use.

Quick answer: On a 12 LPA salary in India, you take home approximately ₹94,992 per month after tax and contributions (0.2% deducted).

India new-regime tax slabs FY 2026-27

New regime (default), taxable income after the ₹75,000 standard deduction. FY 2026-27.
Taxable incomeRate
Up to ₹4,00,0000%
₹4,00,000 – ₹8,00,0005%
₹8,00,000 – ₹12,00,00010%
₹12,00,000 – ₹16,00,00015%
₹16,00,000 – ₹20,00,00020%
₹20,00,000 – ₹24,00,00025%
Over ₹24,00,00030%

A §87A rebate makes taxable income up to ₹12 lakh effectively tax-free. The old regime has fewer, higher slabs but allows deductions. A 4% cess applies on tax.

Full India tax brackets 2026 →

How your Indian in-hand salary is calculated

In India, your take-home pay turns on two choices: which tax regime you use, and how your CTC is structured. The new regime is now the default and, after the 2025 budget, makes income up to about ₹12.75 lakh effectively tax-free for salaried employees. The old regime keeps higher rates but lets you claim deductions like 80C, HRA and home-loan interest.

Crucially, the salary on your offer letter (CTC) is not what reaches your bank. Employer PF, gratuity and other provisions sit inside CTC but never become cash, and your own PF, professional tax and income tax are deducted before in-hand pay. Our India tools handle both the regime choice and the CTC bridge.

Start with gross salary (CTC minus employer-side contributions). A standard deduction is subtracted (₹75,000 under the new regime, ₹50,000 under the old), and under the old regime you can also subtract deductions you claim. The result is your taxable income.

Tax is applied slab by slab. The new regime has slabs from 0% up to 30%, with a §87A rebate that zeroes tax for taxable income up to ₹12 lakh. The old regime has fewer, higher slabs but a much smaller rebate ceiling. A 4% health-and-education cess is added on top of the tax.

Your own deductions then reduce in-hand cash: employee Provident Fund (12% of basic pay, which accrues to your retirement account rather than being lost) and professional tax (up to ₹2,500 a year in many states, none in others).

House Rent Allowance can be partly tax-exempt if you pay rent, and the exemption is larger in the four metro cities (Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai) than elsewhere. This is why salary structure, not just CTC, decides your take-home.

India take-home pay by state

Across India's states, tax and cost of living can vary — pick yours for a take-home figure tuned to local rules:

Where a 12 LPA salary goes India

On 6 LPA India, the largest single line is employee epf at ₹28,800 a year — 4.8% of gross, and 92% of the ₹31,300 that leaves your pay across all 2 lines.

Not all of that ₹31,300 is tax: employee epf accounts for ₹28,800 of it, money that leaves your monthly pay but stays yours. Add it back before comparing India against a country with no equivalent, or the 0.2% headline overstates the loss.

Every line deducted from a 12 LPA gross salary in Maharashtra under 2026 rules — an estimate for a single earner with the calculator's India defaults.
DeductionPer yearPer monthShare of gross
Employee EPF (saving, not tax)₹28,800₹2,4004.8%
Professional tax₹2,500₹2080.4%
Total leaving your pay₹31,300₹2,6085.2%

Which state keeps the most?

On the same 12 LPA salary, Delhi (NCT) leaves the most in your account (₹95,200 a month) and Jharkhand the least (₹94,992) — a gap of ₹208 a month on identical gross pay.

Take-home on a 12 LPA gross salary in each state, 2026 rules. Estimates.
#StateNet / monthDeducted
1Delhi (NCT)₹95,2000.0%
2Uttar Pradesh₹95,2000.0%
3Rajasthan₹95,2000.0%
4Haryana₹95,2000.0%
5Uttarakhand₹95,2000.0%
6Goa₹95,2000.0%
7Himachal Pradesh₹95,2000.0%
8Chandigarh (UT)₹95,2000.0%
9Jammu & Kashmir (UT)₹95,2000.0%
10Karnataka₹95,0000.2%
11Gujarat₹95,0000.2%
12Punjab₹95,0000.2%
13Chhattisgarh₹95,0000.2%
14Maharashtra₹94,9920.2%
15Tamil Nadu₹94,9920.2%
16West Bengal₹94,9920.2%
17Telangana₹94,9920.2%
18Kerala₹94,9920.2%
19Andhra Pradesh₹94,9920.2%
20Madhya Pradesh₹94,9920.2%
21Bihar₹94,9920.2%
22Odisha₹94,9920.2%
23Assam₹94,9920.2%
24Jharkhand₹94,9920.2%

What different jobs pay India

Of the 8 roles benchmarked India, product manager sits highest at a median of 18 LPA — 3.0× the 6 LPA national median, and ₹1,30,025 a month after tax. Software Engineer closes the list at 12 LPA, or ₹94,992 a month.

Treat the gap between 18 LPA and 12 LPA as the middle of two wide ranges rather than a going rate for either: seniority, sector and city move India salaries enough that a single role's own range often spans more than the 6 LPA separating these two.

Published role medians for India, taxed under 2026 rules. Benchmark estimates, not survey data.
RoleMedian grossTake-home / monthvs national median
Product Manager18 LPA₹1,30,0253.0×
Machine Learning Engineer18 LPA₹1,30,0253.0×
Sales Manager16 LPA₹1,17,3002.7×
Project Manager15 LPA₹1,10,6672.5×
Data Scientist14 LPA₹1,04,0332.3×
Marketing Manager14 LPA₹1,04,0332.3×
DevOps Engineer13 LPA₹97,4002.2×
Software Engineer12 LPA₹94,9922.0×

How the rate changes as your salary rises

Between 3 LPA and 30 LPA India, the effective rate climbs 15.1 points — 0.8% to 15.9% — gradually, because it averages every band beneath you rather than switching at a threshold.

The marginal column is where the steps show: it jumps 21 points around 18 LPA, a India band boundary. Crossing it re-rates only the pay above 18 LPA, never the income beneath, which is why take-home still rises from ₹94,992 to ₹1,30,025 a month through it.

Effective rate = everything deducted as a share of gross; marginal rate = the share taken from the next unit of INR. Maharashtra, 2026 rules. Estimates.
Gross salaryTake-home / monthEffective rateMarginal rate
3 LPA₹23,5920.8%5%
4.5 LPA₹35,4920.6%5%
6 LPA₹47,3920.4%5%
9 LPA₹71,1920.3%5%
12 LPA₹94,9920.2%5%
18 LPA₹1,30,0258.5%26%
30 LPA₹1,98,14215.9%36%

What you need to earn to take home a given amount

Job adverts India quote annual gross while budgets are built on monthly take-home, and progressivity means you cannot convert between them by dividing. Clearing ₹20,000 a month here needs about ₹2,54,727 gross — 1.06× the naive annual figure — while ₹1,20,000 needs ₹16,40,704, or 1.14×.

That climb from 1.06× to 1.14× is the point of the table: each step costs proportionally more gross than the last, because the extra is taxed at the India marginal rate while the target is measured after tax. It also turns "I need another ₹20,000 a month" into the ₹2,52,101 of extra India gross you can actually put in front of an employer.

Gross salary required to reach each monthly take-home figure in Maharashtra under 2026 rules, solved against the calculator above. Estimates.
Target take-home / monthGross needed / yearGross / monthDeducted
₹20,0002.5 LPA₹21,2271.0%
₹40,0005.1 LPA₹42,2360.5%
₹60,0007.6 LPA₹63,2440.3%
₹80,00010.1 LPA₹84,2520.2%
₹1,20,00016.4 LPA₹1,36,7257.4%

What that take-home buys, city by city

Take-home on 6 LPA is ₹47,392 a month everywhere India, but rent is not: Mumbai runs ₹42,000 for a one-bedroom city-centre flat against ₹22,000 in Hyderabad, a factor of 1.9 across 4 cities.

So the same 6 LPA leaves ₹25,392 a month after rent in Hyderabad and ₹5,392 in Mumbai — a ₹20,000 gap no India tax band comes close to. India's most expensive city and an HRA metro (50% exemption).

Representative monthly rents against take-home on a 12 LPA salary. Rent figures are benchmark estimates, refreshed on the maintenance cadence.
City1-bed city-centre rentShare of take-homeLeft after rent
Hyderabad₹22,00046%₹25,392
Bangalore (Bengaluru)₹25,00053%₹22,392
Delhi (NCR)₹30,00063%₹17,392
Mumbai₹42,00089%₹5,392

Compare cities properly with the cost-of-living tool →

Freelancers & the self-employed India

Self-employment India is a structurally different calculation, not the same one with different paperwork: you carry contributions an employer would otherwise share, and you deduct business expenses an employee cannot. On the same 12 LPA, our estimate leaves a freelancer about ₹14,400 a year ahead of an employee before any expenses are deducted.

India freelancer tax calculator →

India salary breakdowns

Estimated take-home for common salaries in India (Maharashtra, 2026).
Gross salaryNet per yearNet per month
3 LPA₹2,83,100₹23,592
7 LPA₹6,63,900₹55,325
10 LPA₹9,49,500₹79,125
15 LPA₹13,28,000₹1,10,667
20 LPA₹17,09,100₹1,42,425
30 LPA₹23,77,700₹1,98,142
50 LPA₹36,57,700₹3,04,808

Is this a good salary in India?

Salary in India is discussed in LPA (lakhs per annum), and 15 LPA is a strong package well above the organised-sector median. But in-hand depends on regime and structure: 15 LPA under the new regime takes home far more than the same figure would have a few years ago. City matters too — 15 LPA stretches further in Hyderabad than in Mumbai.

Compare with another country

See how India take-home pay stacks up against United States.

India vs US take-home →

Frequently Asked Questions

+Is 12 lakh salary tax free in India?

Under the new regime, taxable income up to ₹12 lakh gets a full §87A rebate, so income tax is zero. With the ₹75,000 standard deduction, a gross salary up to about ₹12.75 lakh can be tax-free — provided you choose the new regime.

+What is the difference between CTC and in-hand salary?

CTC is the employer's total cost, including employer PF and gratuity you never receive as cash. In-hand salary is what reaches your account after employer contributions are excluded and your PF, professional tax and income tax are deducted — typically 70–85% of CTC.

+Should I choose the old or new tax regime?

The new regime wins for most people because of its lower rates and large rebate. The old regime can be better if you claim large deductions (80C, HRA, home-loan interest). Compute both with our Old vs New Regime calculator before deciding.

+How much is 15 LPA in hand per month?

On a 15 LPA package under the new regime in a state with professional tax, monthly in-hand is roughly ₹1.0–1.1 lakh after income tax, PF and professional tax — though it depends on your exact salary structure and basic pay.

+What is professional tax?

Professional tax is a small state-level tax on salaried income, capped at ₹2,500 a year in most states that levy it. Some states (such as Delhi, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh) don't charge it at all, which slightly raises in-hand pay there.

+Does employee PF reduce my take-home?

Yes, but it isn't lost. Your 12% PF contribution lowers monthly cash but accumulates in your EPF account with employer matching and interest — forced retirement saving rather than a tax. Our breakdown shows it separately.

Estimate only — not tax advice. Figures are estimates based on publicly available tax rules and may not reflect your full circumstances. See our methodology & sources (last reviewed June 2026). Always confirm with an official tax authority or a licensed adviser before making decisions.