Income Tax Calculator — Old vs New Regime

Questions people actually ask

Which regime is better, old or new?

It depends entirely on how many deductions you actually claim. The calculator shows the break-even deduction figure: below it the new regime costs less on your numbers, above it the old regime does. We show the arithmetic; the choice is yours — and the break-even moves whenever your salary or the Budget changes.

Will earning more push my whole income into a higher tax bracket?

No. This is the most common misconception about Indian income tax. Slabs are marginal — only the income inside each slab is taxed at that slab’s rate. A raise never leaves you with less take-home pay. The slab-by-slab breakdown on this page shows exactly how that works.

What happens just above ₹12 lakh under the new regime?

Marginal relief applies. Without it, one rupee over the threshold would cost tens of thousands in tax. With it, the tax is capped at the amount by which your income exceeds ₹12 lakh, so you can never be worse off for earning slightly more.

Where these numbers come from

Every rate this tool uses, its source, and the date a human last checked it against that source.

• Union Budget 2026-27; slab structure unchanged from FY 2025-26 · checked 2026-04-05
• Income-tax Act — standard deduction for salaried taxpayers, new regime · checked 2026-04-05

  Salaried taxpayers and pensioners only. Not available against business or freelance income.

• Rebate under s.87A, new regime · checked 2026-04-05

  Applies to total income AFTER the standard deduction, which is why a salary of ₹12.75 lakh can still pay nil tax.

• Rebate under s.87A, new regime · checked 2026-04-05
• Surcharge rates, new regime. The 37% band does not apply under the new regime. · checked 2026-04-05
• Deduction against family pension, new regime · checked 2026-04-05
• Old regime slabs, unchanged since FY 2014-15 · checked 2026-04-05
• Standard deduction for salaried taxpayers, old regime · checked 2026-04-05
• Rebate under s.87A, old regime · checked 2026-04-05
• Rebate under s.87A, old regime · checked 2026-04-05
• Surcharge rates, old regime · checked 2026-04-05
• Basic exemption limit, resident senior citizen, old regime · checked 2026-04-05

See every figure on the site and its source →

Understand what the number means

A figure on its own decides nothing. These explain what is being calculated and what changes it.

• Course

  How income tax actually works

  Slabs are marginal, so a raise never leaves you worse off — and just above the ₹12 lakh rebate sits a marginal relief that almost nobody mentions.

• Course

  HRA: the rent money the taxman leaves alone

  The least-of-three formula, why only four cities count as metro, and how rent paid to your parents holds up — if the money and the paperwork really move.

• Course

  Old regime vs new regime

  The one tax choice a salaried person makes every year: which deductions survive where, the break-even arithmetic, and how switching actually works.

• Article

  A joining bonus is a loan in disguise

  It arrives as cash and behaves like debt: leave inside the clawback window and you repay it. Variable pay is the mirror image — a target, not a promise.

• Article

  Reconcile your AIS, or expect a notice

  The department already knows about your interest, dividends, fund sales and large transactions. A return that disagrees with your AIS becomes correspondence.

• Article

  Income-tax Act 2025: new section numbers

  From 1 April 2026 the Act that governed Indian income tax for 65 years is replaced. The tax you pay is largely the same. Almost every section number is not.

All 24 calculators → · Glossary →