Take Home Pay Calculator Singapore

How to use this calculator

1. Enter gross, not basicCPF applies to Ordinary Wages, which includes basic salary and most regular allowances. Genuine reimbursements are excluded, but a fixed monthly allowance generally is not.
2. Pick the right age bandCPF rates step down as you get older, and the reduction is substantial past 60. That is a deliberate policy to keep older workers employable, and it raises take-home pay meaningfully.
3. Set the CPF statusForeigners on Employment Passes and S Passes do not contribute to CPF at all, which is why their take-home is much closer to gross. Citizens and permanent residents contribute at full rates, with PRs on graduated rates in their first two years.
4. Check the ceiling and ratesBoth have been revised on announced schedules recently. The fields are editable so the tool follows the current figures rather than going stale.

How CPF actually works

CPF is not a tax, and treating it as one leads to the wrong conclusions. The money goes into your own accounts — Ordinary, Special and MediSave — and is used for housing, healthcare and retirement. You do not lose it; you lose access to it for a period, and to specific uses.

The employee contribution is deducted from gross pay and the employer contributes on top. Both are calculated on the Ordinary Wage, capped at a monthly ceiling. Above that ceiling, no further CPF is payable on ordinary wages at all — which is why the marginal take-home rate on a high salary jumps once the ceiling is passed.

That ceiling effect is worth understanding. Someone earning at the ceiling and someone earning well above it pay the same absolute CPF, so every dollar above the ceiling is taken home in full. A pay rise that crosses the ceiling delivers more net cash than one below it.

Age bands step the rates down progressively, with the sharpest reductions past 60. The employer's rate falls too, which is the policy intent — reducing the cost of employing older workers.

Bonuses are Additional Wages and are subject to a separate annual ceiling calculated across the year. This calculator applies the ordinary rate to a bonus, which is a simplification: the real Additional Wage ceiling depends on your total ordinary wages for the year.

Worked example

A monthly gross of S$6,000 for someone aged 40, a citizen, with an Ordinary Wage ceiling of S$7,400.

The full S$6,000 is below the ceiling, so all of it is subject to CPF. The employee contribution at 20 per cent is S$1,200, leaving take-home pay of S$4,800.

The employer contributes 17 per cent on top — S$1,020 — so the total cost of employing you is S$7,020, and S$2,220 a month goes into your CPF accounts.

Now raise the gross to S$10,000. Only S$7,400 is subject to CPF, so the employee contribution is S$1,480 rather than S$2,000. Take-home is S$8,520 — 85 per cent of gross, against 80 per cent at the lower salary.

That rising take-home percentage is the ceiling working. The S$2,600 above the ceiling is taken home in full, which makes the effective CPF rate on total pay fall as salary rises.

Where the money goes

The split between accounts changes with age, shifting progressively toward Special and MediSave as you get older. The Ordinary Account is the one most people interact with, because it funds HDB purchases — which is why CPF feels less like a deduction to a Singaporean homeowner than the raw percentage suggests.

What this calculator deliberately leaves out

Income tax is the largest omission and it is intentional. Singapore does not operate PAYE — IRAS assesses tax on the previous year's income and bills it separately, usually payable by GIRO instalments across the following year. So take-home pay and after-tax income are different figures, and the gap catches people arriving from countries where tax is deducted at source.

The practical consequence is that a new arrival's first year feels unusually generous and the second year less so, because the first tax bill arrives after a full year of untaxed take-home. Setting money aside for it from the start is standard advice and frequently ignored.

The Additional Wage ceiling is a second simplification. Bonuses are subject to an annual cap that depends on your total ordinary wages for the year, so a large bonus may be partly or wholly outside CPF. This calculator applies the ordinary rate, which will overstate the deduction on a substantial bonus.

Permanent residents pay graduated CPF rates in their first two years, at reduced levels, which this calculator does not model — select the full-rate option and adjust the rates manually if that applies.

Skills Development Levy, CDAC, MBMF, SINDA and ECF contributions are small and are not modelled either. They are typically a few dollars a month.

Assumptions and limitations

• CPF rates and the Ordinary Wage ceiling are set by the CPF Board and change — check and edit them
• Does not deduct income tax, which Singapore assesses separately rather than at source
• Simplifies the Additional Wage ceiling, so bonus CPF may be overstated
• Does not model graduated PR rates applying in the first two years of permanent residence
• Excludes SDL and self-help group contributions, which are small
• Not financial advice — your payslip and CPF statement are the authoritative record

Questions people ask about this in Singapore