Canada taxes personal income at the federal level using progressive brackets administered by the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA), plus a non-refundable basic personal amount credit that shelters the first portion of income. This free calculator applies the federal brackets to your taxable income, subtracts the basic-personal-amount credit, and reports your federal tax payable along with your average and marginal rates — useful for planning and comparing offers.
How it works
- Split taxable income across the federal brackets. Each slice is taxed at its own rate: 15%, 20.5%, 26%, 29%, then 33% on the top slice.
- Sum the per-bracket tax to get gross federal tax.
- Subtract the basic-personal-amount credit, calculated as 15% of the basic personal amount.
- The result, floored at zero, is your federal tax payable.
The marginal rate is the rate of your highest occupied bracket; the average rate is total tax divided by total income.
Example
For a taxable income of $80,000, the first bracket is taxed at 15%, the portion above it at 20.5%, and so on. Gross federal tax is then reduced by the BPA credit (15% of the basic personal amount). The marginal rate is 20.5% (the next dollar is taxed at the second bracket), while the average rate is noticeably lower thanks to the credit.
Notes
This covers federal tax only — your province adds its own tax and credits, and payroll deductions like CPP and EI are separate. Treat the figure as a planning estimate, not a filed return. Everything runs locally in your browser.