Virginia · rates effective Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2026 · verified 2026-08-05
Virginia Paycheck Calculator 2026
2-5.75% state brackets on taxable wages in Virginia — no local income tax, no state payroll deduction.
Virginia taxes wages from 2% to 5.75%, with a $8,750 standard deduction ($17,500 joint) and $930 per exemption for 2026. Worth knowing: the raised deduction is scheduled to sunset after 2026. No Virginia locality taxes wages. This calculator applies the official withholding formula.
Official 2026 tables, never copiedSources stamped & dated99 golden tests before publish
CEBy the Calceva data desk · Verified against official sources · Updated 2026-08-05 · 4 min read
Virginia's top tax rate starts at $17,000 — which means it applies to almost everyone
On paper Virginia has four brackets and a modest top rate of
5.75%. In practice it behaves like a flat tax, because that
top rate begins at just $17,000 of taxable income — a threshold set
decades ago and never moved. Anyone working full time at anything above minimum
wage crosses it early in the year, and every dollar after that is taxed at the top
rate. The brackets below the threshold are worth a fixed
$720 in total tax relief, no matter what you earn.
2026 Virginia income tax brackets — identical for every filing status
Taxable income
Rate
$0 to $3,000
2%
$3,000 to $5,000
3%
$5,000 to $17,000
5%
Over $17,000
5.75%
The same ladder applies to every filing status: Virginia does not widen its
brackets for married couples. Marriage changes your standard deduction here, not
your rates.
The deduction that disappears after this year
This is the fact most worth knowing about a Virginia paycheck in 2026, and it is
not on most calculators. The standard deduction is currently
$8,750 single and $17,500 joint — raised
temporarily. It expires after tax year 2026. Absent new legislation it
reverts to $3,000 and $6,000, roughly a third of today's
amount. A single filer would see about
$331
more Virginia tax a year at the same salary, with no rate change at all.
One correction worth making while we are here: several widely-copied summaries
state that the deduction reverts to $4,500 and $9,000. The state's own employer
withholding guide gives the figures above. We read the guide; the reversion figures
are the ones it prints.
Two exemptions, two different amounts
Virginia's Form VA-4 is not a copy of the federal W-4 and does not use the same
arithmetic. It has two separate exemption lines with two different values:
$930 for each personal or dependent exemption, and a
further $800 for each exemption claimed for being age
65 or over, or blind. A married couple both over 65 can claim four exemptions on
two different lines — a case the federal form has no equivalent for.
One small mechanical detail, because it explains cent-level differences between
this page and your stub: the state's withholding formula annualises your pay and
then rounds that annual figure to the nearest dollar before applying the
brackets. We do the same. Your employer's software may not.
What happens to Virginia's standard deduction after 2026?
As the law stands, the $8,750 single deduction sunsets at the end of 2026 and reverts to $3,000 unless lawmakers extend it - roughly a $330-a-year swing at Virginia's top rate. We re-verify and update the moment it is settled.
Why does almost everyone pay Virginia's top rate?
Because the 5.75% bracket starts at just $17,000 of taxable income - the lower brackets are shallow, so ordinary salaries live at the top marginal rate.
Does Northern Virginia add a local income tax?
No. No Virginia city or county taxes wages - Arlington, Alexandria and Fairfax paychecks carry only the state and federal lines.
We never copy another calculator. Each rate is read from the official document, dated, and re-checked when agencies publish changes. This page's paper trail:
Verified 2026-08-05
VA Employer Withholding Instructions (rev. 05/25, PDF read in full) — Brackets: 2% to $3,000; 3% to $5,000; 5% to $17,000; 5.75% above. Withholding formula (current for 2026): standard deduction $8,750 (formula uses it for all statuses; return-side $8,750 single / $17,500 MFJ for TY2025-2026), personal/dependent exemption $930 each, age-65+/blind $800 each. Supplemental flat 5.75%.
Verified 2026-08-05
Virginia Employer Withholding Instructions (Rev. 05/25), formula p.21 — Withholding (Employer Withholding Instructions Rev. 05/25): annualized wages less $8,750 plus $930 per personal or dependent exemption and $800 per age-65/blind exemption, then the 2%/3%/5%/5.75% withholding brackets; the annual tax is rounded to the whole dollar before dividing by the pay periods. Reproduces the worked example to the cent.
Federal lines
Federal income tax, Social Security and Medicare on this page follow IRS Rev. Proc. 2025-32, Publication 15 and Publication 15-T, verified 2026-08-07. Our federal engine reproduces 2,175 of 2,175 Publication 15-T cells on every build. The six federal sources, itemised.
Matches the agency
Reproduces the agency’s own published figures. Our implementation of the Virginia withholding formula reproduces the worked example of Virginia Employer Withholding Instructions (Rev. 05/25), formula p.21 exactly as the agency prints it, re-checked on every build. Check them in the official PDF.
Cite this pageCalceva, “Virginia Paycheck Calculator (2026),” verified 2026-08-05, https://calceva.com/virginia-paycheck-calculator/