Overtime pay is 1.5 times your regular hourly rate for every hour worked beyond 40 in a workweek — a federal requirement for non-exempt employees. Here…
By ExpertPaystubs Editorial Team. Published 2026-08-26
Overtime pay is 1.5 times your regular hourly rate — "time and a half" — for every hour you work beyond 40 in a single workweek. That is a federal requirement under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) for non-exempt employees, which covers most hourly workers in the United States. The formula is:
Overtime pay = regular hourly rate × 1.5 × overtime hours
So if you earn $15 per hour, your overtime rate is $22.50, and six overtime hours add $135 to that week's check. The 40-hour threshold resets every workweek — hours never average across weeks, and a slow week cannot cancel out a busy one.
How Do You Calculate Time and a Half?
Multiply your regular rate by 1.5 to get your overtime rate, then multiply by the overtime hours. Here is what that looks like at common wage levels:
| Regular rate | Time-and-a-half rate | 5 OT hours add | 10 OT hours add |
|---|---|---|---|
| $12.00/hr | $18.00/hr | $90.00 | $180.00 |
| $15.00/hr | $22.50/hr | $112.50 | $225.00 |
| $18.00/hr | $27.00/hr | $135.00 | $270.00 |
| $20.00/hr | $30.00/hr | $150.00 | $300.00 |
| $25.00/hr | $37.50/hr | $187.50 | $375.00 |
| $30.00/hr | $45.00/hr | $225.00 | $450.00 |
A full week works like this: at $15/hr with 46 hours worked, you earn 40 × $15 = $600 in regular pay plus 6 × $22.50 = $135 in overtime, for a gross of $735 — not 46 × $15 = $690.
One nuance that trips up both employees and employers: overtime is calculated on your regular rate, not just your base wage. If you earn non-discretionary bonuses, commissions, or shift differentials, those must be folded into the regular rate before multiplying by 1.5. Our guide to overtime pay calculations walks through those edge cases with worked examples.
Who Qualifies for Overtime Pay?
The FLSA divides workers into two camps:
- Non-exempt employees must receive overtime. Nearly all hourly workers are non-exempt, along with salaried workers earning below the exemption threshold of $35,568 per year ($684 per week).
- Exempt employees do not receive overtime. To be exempt, a worker must be paid on a salary basis, earn at least $35,568 annually, and perform exempt duties — executive, administrative, professional, computer, or outside sales roles.
All three tests must be met. A job title alone never makes you exempt: a "manager" who mostly runs a register, or a salaried employee earning $32,000, is still owed time and a half. Misclassification is one of the most common wage violations the Department of Labor pursues.
Independent contractors (1099 workers) are outside the FLSA entirely — no overtime requirement applies, which is one more reason worker classification matters so much.
Which States Require Daily Overtime?
Federal law only counts hours per week. Four states add a daily trigger, so a long single day can earn overtime even in a sub-40-hour week:
| State | Daily overtime rule | Double time? |
|---|---|---|
| California | 1.5x after 8 hours in a day; 1.5x for the first 8 hours on the 7th consecutive day of a workweek | 2x after 12 hours in a day, and after 8 hours on the 7th consecutive day |
| Alaska | 1.5x after 8 hours in a day | No |
| Nevada | 1.5x after 8 hours in a 24-hour period — but only for employees earning less than 1.5x the state minimum wage (under $18/hr) | No |
| Colorado | 1.5x after 12 hours in a day, or 12 consecutive hours | No |
California is the strictest: a single 13-hour shift there earns 8 hours at regular rate, 4 at time and a half, and 1 at double time, regardless of the weekly total. When state and federal rules differ, the employee gets whichever is more generous. The other 46 states follow the federal weekly-only standard.
How Does Overtime Appear on a Pay Stub?
Overtime shows up as its own earnings line, usually coded OT, OVT, or O.T., listing the hours, the 1.5x rate, and the amount separately from regular pay:
| Earning | Hours | Rate | Amount |
|---|---|---|---|
| Regular | 40.00 | $15.00 | $600.00 |
| Overtime (OT) | 6.00 | $22.50 | $135.00 |
| Gross pay | $735.00 |
Keeping overtime on a separate line is not just convention — it is how you (and any auditor) verify the math, and several states require it on the stub. If your stub lumps everything into one number, ask payroll for an itemized version. Our pay stub codes guide decodes OT and every other abbreviation, and the overtime glossary entry has a quick reference. If you run payroll for your own business, ExpertPaystubs' generator itemizes regular and overtime earnings on separate lines with the rate math shown.
Is Overtime Taxed More Than Regular Pay?
No — this is the most persistent overtime myth. Overtime dollars are taxed under exactly the same brackets as regular wages. The confusion comes from withholding: a paycheck with heavy overtime is a bigger paycheck, so payroll software withholds as if you earned that amount every period, which can nudge some of the check into a higher withholding tier. When you file your return, everything settles at your true annual rate — any over-withholding comes back as a refund. Working overtime never leaves you with less money than declining it.
There is also a genuine tax break in effect right now. For tax years 2025 through 2028, the federal "no tax on overtime" deduction (created by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act) lets workers deduct the half-time premium portion of FLSA-required overtime — the extra 0.5x, not the full 1.5x — up to $12,500 per year ($25,000 for joint filers), phasing out above $150,000 of modified adjusted gross income ($300,000 joint). It applies only to overtime required by the FLSA (not overtime owed solely under state daily rules or a union contract), it is claimed on your federal return rather than removed from paycheck withholding, and Social Security and Medicare taxes still apply to every overtime dollar. For 2026, employers report qualified overtime in Box 12 of the W-2 under code TT.
To see what an overtime-heavy check nets out to after taxes in your state, run it through our free paycheck calculators.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much is time and a half for $18 an hour?
$27.00 per hour ($18 × 1.5). A 10-hour overtime week at that rate adds $270 of gross pay.
Do salaried employees get overtime?
Sometimes. Salary alone does not make you exempt — a salaried worker earning under $35,568 a year, or one whose duties fail the exemption tests, is non-exempt and earns time and a half like any hourly worker. The salary is converted to an hourly regular rate to compute it.
Is working weekends or holidays automatically overtime?
Not under federal law. The FLSA only cares about total hours over 40 in the workweek — a Sunday or holiday shift at hour 35 pays the regular rate unless your employer voluntarily offers a premium (many do). California's seventh-consecutive-day rule is the main exception.
Can my employer require me to work overtime?
Generally yes. Federal law does not cap hours for adult workers or require your consent — it only requires that every overtime hour be paid at 1.5x. Refusing mandatory overtime can be a fireable offense in most states.
Is unpaid overtime ever legal?
For non-exempt employees, no. "Off the clock" work, auto-deducted meal breaks you worked through, and time rounded away are all compensable. If overtime hours are missing from your stub, raise it with payroll in writing — back-wage claims under the FLSA can reach back two to three years.
The bottom line: overtime is 1.5x your regular rate after 40 hours in a week — mandatory for non-exempt workers, calculated as rate × 1.5 × OT hours, and itemized on your stub under the OT code. Four states (California, Alaska, Nevada, Colorado) add daily triggers, and through 2028 the federal overtime deduction lets many workers deduct the premium portion at filing time. Overtime is never taxed at a special higher rate — the bigger bite on an overtime check is just withholding, and it comes back when you file.