West Virginia Paycheck Calculator

West Virginia's rates were cut by 21.25% across the board in 2023, and a revenue-trigger mechanism written into the same legislation has produced further reductions since. The top rate has fallen from 6.5% to 4.82%, a reduction of roughly a quarter, with the cuts applied proportionally across all brackets rather than concentrated at the top.

The trigger works by comparing general revenue collections against a base year adjusted for inflation. When collections exceed the threshold, a reduction is calculated and applied the following year. Because it is formula-driven rather than discretionary, the cuts arrive without a separate legislative vote.

West Virginia offers no standard deduction, so its low rates apply from the first dollar. It does provide personal exemptions per taxpayer and dependant, which are fixed dollar amounts.

No West Virginia municipality levies a percentage income tax. Several — including Charleston, Huntington and Morgantown — charge a municipal service fee instead: a flat weekly amount deducted from the pay of anyone working in the city, regardless of where they live.

The fee is typically a few dollars a week and funds police, fire and street maintenance. Because it is flat rather than proportional, it takes a much larger share of a low income than a high one, and it does not scale with hours or earnings.

It is small enough not to change a take-home estimate meaningfully, but it explains an otherwise unexplained line on a Charleston or Huntington payslip, and it applies to commuters as well as residents.

West Virginia completed a three-year phase-out of state tax on Social Security benefits, with benefits fully exempt from 2026. Previously the exemption applied only below income thresholds.

The state also offers a modest exemption for other retirement income, and a fuller one for military retirement pay and certain public pensions.

West Virginia maintains reciprocal agreements with Kentucky, Maryland, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia. Given the state's shape and the number of residents who work in the Pittsburgh, Washington and Columbus commuter belts, this affects a substantial share of the workforce — a West Virginia resident working across any of those borders pays West Virginia rates and files a single resident return.