Estimate self-employment tax and separate federal + state quarterly payments on 1099 income from Uber, DoorDash, freelancing, and more.
Self-employment tax and QBI deduction rules verified against IRS guidance; state income tax uses each state's top marginal rate, not a full bracket table. Full methodology.
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Mileage, supplies, phone bill, home office, etc. Reduces your taxable net profit.
Net profit from any other self-employment activity, already after its own expenses.
Affects your remaining Social Security wage base and Additional Medicare Tax threshold — W-2 withholding alone doesn't cover self-employment tax.
Interest, dividends, or other taxable income — affects your federal bracket.
Made permanent by OBBBA. Applies the lesser of 20% of QBI or 20% of taxable income before QBI, including SSTB phase-out where applicable.
Determines whether your QBI deduction phases out to $0 above the threshold, or hits the (unmodeled) wage/UBIA limitation instead.
Child Tax Credit, education credits, etc. Reduces federal income tax owed directly.
From a W-2 job, if any. Reduces only your federal required payment — never applied against state tax.
Without this, results are labeled a current-year estimate, not a safe-harbor payment.
Self-employment (SE) tax is 15.3% — 12.4% Social Security plus 2.9% Medicare — applied to 92.35% of your net profit (Schedule SE), not the full amount. The 12.4% portion stops once your Social Security wage base is used up ($184,500 for 2026, shared with any W-2 wages you already had this year); the 2.9% Medicare portion has no cap. Half of the SE tax you owe is then deducted from your taxable income (an above-the-line adjustment, not a reduction to your business profit itself), before the Qualified Business Income (QBI) deduction is applied: 20% of your business profit, but capped at 20% of your taxable income before the QBI deduction — whichever is smaller. Federal income tax is then calculated on what's left, using the real progressive brackets for your filing status and tax year. Above roughly $201,750 of taxable income (single/HoH, 2026), the QBI deduction starts phasing out for service businesses (SSTB) and may face an unmodeled wage/property limitation for others.
Worked example: a single freelancer nets $80,000 in 2026 (no W-2 job, no other income). SE tax comes to $11,304 on the 92.35% base of $73,880. Half of that ($5,652) is deducted, and after the standard deduction, taxable income before QBI is $58,248. The QBI deduction looks like it should be $14,870 (20% of the $74,348 business-income base) — but it's capped at 20% of the $58,248 taxable-income figure instead, so only $11,650 is actually allowed. Federal income tax on the remaining $46,599 comes to $5,344. Total federal liability for the year: $16,647 ($11,304 SE tax + $5,344 income tax). With no prior-year data entered, the calculator defaults to the safe-harbor floor of 90% of this year's tax — $14,983 — split into four quarterly payments of $3,746 each.
Assumptions and edge cases: if you provide a prior-year total tax figure, the calculator switches to the safe harbor that actually protects you from a penalty — the smaller of 90% of this year's tax or 100% of last year's (110% if last year's AGI was over $150,000) — rather than always using the current-year estimate. No quarterly payments are suggested at all if your expected balance after withholding is under $1,000 (IRS Publication 505's General Rule). State tax is a rough reserve at your state's top marginal rate, not a full state calculation, and is flagged as such. For a non-SSTB business above the QBI threshold, the separate wage-paid/UBIA-of-property limitation isn't modeled — the result is flagged rather than silently assumed to not apply. See the full methodology page for source citations.
Self-employment tax and QBI deduction rules verified against IRS guidance; state income tax uses each state's top marginal rate, not a full bracket table.
See the full methodology page for how every calculator on this site is sourced and how confidence levels are assigned.
Limitations and disclaimer
DueMATH provides estimates for educational purposes only and is not tax, legal, or financial advice. Tax laws change frequently and every situation is different — confirm any number here with a licensed CPA, tax attorney, or your state's Department of Revenue before making a financial decision.
This mirrors how a traditional employee's payroll tax works: an employer's half of Social Security and Medicare tax is never counted as part of the employee's own wages in the first place. Since a self-employed person is effectively both employer and employee, the IRS lets you subtract that same notional "employer half" — 7.65% — before applying the 15.3% self-employment tax rate, leaving 92.35% of net earnings as the taxed base (Schedule SE).
Not necessarily. The 12.4% Social Security portion of self-employment tax only applies up to the annual Social Security wage base, and that cap is shared across all your earnings for the year — W-2 wages and self-employment income combined. If your W-2 job already pushed you past the wage base, the Social Security portion on your self-employment income can be reduced or eliminated. The 2.9% Medicare portion has no cap and always applies in full to every dollar of self-employment income, regardless of W-2 wages.
Only if you expect to owe $1,000 or more after any withholding for the year — that's the IRS's blanket exemption (Form 1040-ES's "General Rule"). If you clear that threshold, the safe harbor is paying the smaller of 90% of this year's total tax or 100% of last year's total tax (110% if last year's adjusted gross income was over $150,000). Meeting either one avoids the underpayment penalty even if you owe a balance when you file.
The IRS charges an underpayment penalty calculated separately for each quarter you fell short, based on the federal short-term rate plus 3 percentage points, compounded daily — it isn't a single flat fee. Paying late but before the next quarter reduces the penalty versus not paying at all, but it's still cheaper to catch a missed payment up immediately than to wait until the next due date.
Most gig work qualifies, but the deduction phases out for specified service trades or businesses (SSTBs — think consulting, or businesses built around your own reputation or skill) once your taxable income clears the phase-in threshold for your filing status, and disappears entirely once you're past the phase-in range. Most driving, delivery, and freelance creative gig work isn't an SSTB, but if your work leans on personal expertise as the product itself, check whether it's classified as one before assuming the full 20% applies at higher income.
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