Time Card Calculator

How to calculate hours worked

For each day, subtract the clock-in time from the clock-out time, then subtract unpaid breaks. A shift from 8:45 AM to 5:30 PM is 8 hours 45 minutes; minus a 30-minute lunch, that is 8 hours 15 minutes, or 8.25 hours.

Converting to 24-hour time makes the subtraction easier: 5:30 PM is 17:30, and 17:30 − 8:45 = 8:45. For shifts that cross midnight, add 24 hours to the end time: 10:00 PM to 6:30 AM is (6:30 + 24:00) − 22:00 = 8:30. The calculator does this automatically and counts the shift on the day it starts.

You can type times loosely. 9, 9:00, 900 and 9am all mean 9:00 AM. In AM/PM mode, an end time without AM or PM is read as whichever gives the shorter shift, so 9 to 5 is 8 hours, not 20.

Hours and minutes vs. decimal hours

Payroll systems usually want decimal hours, not hours and minutes. Divide the minutes by 60: 15 minutes = 0.25, 30 = 0.50, 45 = 0.75, 20 = 0.33, 40 = 0.67, 10 = 0.17 and 50 = 0.83 hours. So 41 hours 15 minutes is 41.25 hours.

Don’t write 7 hours 30 minutes as 7.30; it is 7.50. Mixing the two formats is the most common timesheet mistake, and at $20 an hour that slip costs $4 on a single day.

This calculator shows every total both ways, for example 41:15 and 41.25, and the pay breakdown uses the decimal figure.

Overtime: federal 40-hour rule and California daily overtime

Under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act, non-exempt employees must be paid at least 1.5 times their regular rate for hours over 40 in a workweek. There is no federal daily overtime, so a 12-hour day is not overtime by itself. The workweek is any fixed, recurring seven-day period your employer sets, which is why you can choose whether it starts on Sunday or Monday.

Example: five 9-hour days is 45 hours. At $20 an hour that is 40 × $20 = $800 regular plus 5 × $30 = $150 overtime, for $950 gross.

California adds daily overtime: 1.5× for hours over 8 in a day and 2× for hours over 12, plus 1.5× for the first 8 hours and 2× beyond 8 on the seventh consecutive day of work in a workweek. Four 10-hour days total 40 hours, so there is no federal overtime, but in California 8 of those hours are overtime: 32 × $20 + 8 × $30 = $880 instead of $800. Alaska, Nevada and Colorado have their own daily overtime rules, and some union contracts do too.

Rounding punches and the 7-minute rule

Federal rules (29 CFR 785.48) let employers round clock times to the nearest 5 minutes, tenth of an hour or quarter hour, as long as the rounding is neutral over time. With quarter-hour rounding, 1 to 7 minutes rounds down and 8 to 14 minutes rounds up, which is known as the 7-minute rule: 8:07 counts as 8:00 and 8:08 as 8:15.

Pick the same rounding as your employer’s time clock in Round punches to check your paycheck, or leave it on No rounding to see your exact hours. California courts have been stricter about rounding, so many California employers now pay to the minute.