How do you use this tool?
- Pick your region — United States or United Kingdom. The choice is remembered for the next visit.
- Enter the amount you're calculating against.
- US: pick your state from the dropdown. For city/county combined rates (e.g. NYC 8.875%) tick 'Custom rate' instead. UK: choose the VAT band — Standard 20%, Reduced 5%, Zero, or Exempt.
- Choose the direction: 'Add tax to net' (amount is pre-tax) or 'Extract tax from gross' (amount already includes tax).
- Read the net amount, tax amount, and gross total in the results panel below.
What This Tool Does
The tool runs as two calculators behind one URL — the region toggle at the top of the page picks which one is active, and your choice is remembered for next time.
- United States (default for
en-USbrowsers) — a 50-state plus DC dropdown with each state’s official sales-tax rate. Five states have no state-level sales tax: Alaska, Delaware, Montana, New Hampshire, and Oregon. For city- or county-combined rates (NYC 8.875%, LA 9.5%, Chicago 10.25%), tick “Custom rate” and type the combined value. - United Kingdom (default for
en-GBbrowsers) — the four official HMRC bands as radio buttons: Standard 20%, Reduced 5%, Zero 0%, and Exempt. Each band shows a short example list so you know which one applies.
Both regions support the same two calculation directions: adding tax to a net (pre-tax) amount, or extracting tax from a gross (tax-inclusive) total.
How Does the Calculation Work?
Adding Tax to a Net Price
The amount you enter is the pre-tax amount.
tax = net × rate
gross = net + tax = net × (1 + rate)Example: $200 net at California’s 7.25% state rate → tax $14.50, gross $214.50. £100 net at UK Standard VAT 20% → VAT £20, gross £120.
Extracting Tax from a Gross Total
The amount you enter is the tax-inclusive total.
net = gross ÷ (1 + rate)
tax = gross − netExample: $214.50 gross at 7.25% → net $200, tax $14.50. £120 gross at 20% VAT → net £100, VAT £20.
The calculator rounds to two decimals at each step using commercial rounding (half-up), which matches what you’d see on a printed receipt.
When Do You Need Each Mode?
Add mode is what US shoppers use most: the price tag is pre-tax, you want to know the after-tax total. It’s also what businesses do when invoicing a B2C customer in the US.
Extract mode is what UK shoppers use most: the price tag already includes VAT, you want to know what portion was VAT — typically because you’re claiming an expense, doing bookkeeping, or comparing the net price across vendors.
It’s also what US sellers do when reconciling tax-inclusive totals from a point-of-sale system that prints a single line.
What Are the Common US State Sales-Tax Rates in 2026?
These are state-level rates only. Cities, counties, and special districts add their own rates on top — for combined rates use the “Custom rate” field.
- 0% — Alaska, Delaware, Montana, New Hampshire, Oregon
- 2.9% — Colorado (lowest non-zero state-level rate)
- 4.0% — Alabama, Georgia, Hawaii (general excise tax), New York, Wyoming
- 6.0% — Florida, Idaho, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, Michigan, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Vermont, West Virginia, DC
- 6.25% — Illinois, Massachusetts, Texas
- 6.5% — Arkansas, Kansas, Washington
- 7.0% — Indiana, Mississippi, Rhode Island, Tennessee
- 7.25% — California (highest state-level rate)
Once you add city and county rates, several California, Tennessee, and Louisiana jurisdictions push past 10% combined.
What Are the UK VAT Bands in 2026?
The standard VAT rate has been 20% since January 2011. The reduced rate of 5% has applied to domestic energy since 1997. The zero-rate on most food and children’s clothing predates VAT itself, having survived from the older Purchase Tax.
| Band | Rate | Common examples |
|---|---|---|
| Standard | 20% | Most goods and services |
| Reduced | 5% | Domestic energy, child car seats, mobility aids for the elderly |
| Zero | 0% | Most food, books and newspapers, children’s clothing, exports outside the UK |
| Exempt | — | Insurance, postage stamps, health services, education |
Zero-rated and exempt look identical from a customer’s point of view (no VAT on the receipt), but they differ for the seller: a zero-rated supply lets the business reclaim input VAT, an exempt supply does not.
Where Do the Rates Come From and What About Privacy?
The calculator runs entirely in your browser — your amounts, state choices, and VAT-band picks never leave your device. There’s no analytics fingerprint and no signup. The region you pick (US or UK) is stored only in your own browser’s localStorage so you don’t have to pick again next visit.
US rates were verified against state revenue-department publications and the Tax Foundation’s 2026 mid-year review. UK rates come straight from HMRC. We update the data when statutory rates change; the rate displayed in the dropdown is what the tool actually uses for the calculation.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why state-level only for the US instead of resolving by ZIP code? There are over 13,000 US sales-tax jurisdictions and they change every quarter. Resolving by ZIP requires a paid tax-rate API and a continuously updated dataset, neither of which is compatible with a free, no-signup, runs-in-your-browser tool. State-level rates are public, stable, and accurate for the cases where the city/county portion is zero. For everything else, type the combined rate into “Custom rate” — the math handles it identically.
Can I use this for B2B cross-border VAT (reverse charge)? The calculator is consumer-grade. Reverse charge, partial exemption, the EU One-Stop-Shop scheme, and Northern Ireland’s protocol-specific rules need an accountant or specialist software, not a free web tool. Use this for the basic VAT-on / VAT-off cases.
Does the calculator handle EU VAT or just UK? Just UK. EU VAT rates vary by country (Germany 19%, France 20%, Italy 22%, etc.) and the rules around B2C distance selling and the One-Stop-Shop have been changing since the 2021 reforms. We picked UK because the user need is concentrated and the rates are stable. For German VAT use the Mehrwertsteuer-Rechner on the German side of the site.
Why is “Exempt” listed if it gives the same answer as zero-rate? The customer-facing math is the same — no VAT shown on the receipt. But the bookkeeping side differs sharply: a VAT-registered business can reclaim input VAT on zero-rated supplies and cannot on exempt supplies. The calculator labels them separately so the result is unambiguous when you copy-paste it into accounting notes.
Which Related Tools Pair Well With This One?
If you’re working through a price, you may also need a discount calculator for percent-off promotions, a gross-to-net calculator for paycheck math, or an interest calculator for loan or savings totals.
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