61 calculators Data last checked 12 October 2026
How we check the numbers
Anyone can put a tax table on a web page. What matters is whether the number is still right in December, whether it applies to you, and whether you can check it without taking our word for it. Here is exactly how every figure on this site is produced.
The six steps
- Read the source, not a summary Every figure starts on an official page — the ATO, Services Australia, the Department of Social Services, a state revenue office or a tenancy authority. We read the whole page, not a search result snippet, and we read the tables rather than the sentence that introduces them.
- Write down where it came from and when Each calculator page names its source and the date we last read it. Most Australian figures move on 1 July, some in March and September, and student payments move on 1 January — so a calculator without a date is one you cannot trust by December.
- Check the rule as well as the number Copying a rate is the easy part. The mistakes on this site have never been wrong digits — they have been wrong scope: a payment we said had expired, a threshold applied to the wrong kind of land, a levy taper we did not model at all. When we find one, we fix the text that explained it too.
- Show the arithmetic Every calculator has a "How this was worked out" panel listing the bands, the rates and the tapering it applied. If a number looks wrong to you, you can follow it line by line — and if you disagree, you can tell us.
- Cross-check against a second source Where a figure matters we look for it in two places — a revenue office page and the states own legislation, or a rate table and a worked example. The ATO example that $29,000 of income attracts $98.90 of Medicare levy is what confirmed our levy taper.
- Leave a gap rather than fill it If we cannot read a figure from a source we can access, the page says so and links to the official one. The gaps are listed further down this page — we would rather be visibly incomplete than quietly wrong.
Where the figures come from
Every calculator is built from named official sources, and no page is published without one:
- Australian Taxation Office — tax rates, the Medicare levy and surcharge, super caps, study loan thresholds, depreciation and work-related deductions.
- Department of Social Services — the Social Security Guide and the Family Assistance Guide, which are the legal-detail versions of the Centrelink payment rules.
- Services Australia — current payment rates and free areas, where we can reach them.
- State and territory revenue offices — land tax, payroll tax, first home owner grants and stamp duty.
- Tenancy authorities — rental bond caps in all eight jurisdictions.
- Department of Home Affairs — the skilled migration points test and visa conditions.
The site covers 61 calculators across seven topics: Pay & tax (11) · Superannuation (10) · Study loans (7) · Family & child care (8) · Property & renting (7) · Centrelink & payments (11) · Visas & migrants (7).
What we deliberately leave out, and why
These are the gaps, listed so that a missing number never looks like a finding.
| What is missing | Why |
|---|---|
| Income and assets free areas | Services Australia publishes these, and they are the figures most people actually want. Its site blocks automated access from our network, so we cannot re-check them before publishing — and we will not copy a number we cannot stand behind. We link to the official tests instead. |
| Parenting Payment, single rate | The official table uses the basic amount of the pension supplement rather than the full supplement, and we could not confirm how the two combine. We publish the partnered rate, which we could verify, and say so. |
| Payroll tax in South Australia and the ACT | South Australia publishes a variable rate expression rather than a threshold and a rate we could split cleanly. The ACT publishes its rates in a table rendered by JavaScript that would not load for us. Both are shown as gaps rather than guesses. |
| ACT land tax | Same problem: the ACT rates are published in a JavaScript-rendered table we could not read. |
| NT first home owner grant | This one used to be here, and it was wrong of us. The NT does not call its payment a "first home owner grant" — it is the HomeGrown Territory grant, and at $50,000 it is the largest in the country. We found it, and it is on the site now. |
| The PR points pass mark | The 65 points everyone quotes is not written on any of the Department of Home Affairs points test pages. We publish the points table and say that invitations are ranked by score, because that is what the department actually says. |
What this site is not
It is not tax advice, and it is not a substitute for a registered tax agent, a financial adviser or the agency that assesses you. It is a calculator that shows its working. Where a figure decides something for you — a grant, a benefit, a debt — check it against the source named on the page.
We are not a registered tax agent and we do not prepare returns. If you think a number is wrong, hello@aussiecalculators.com — corrections are the most useful thing you can send us.