Greece salary calculator 2026

Greece rewrote its income tax scale for 2026, and the effect on an ordinary payslip is that income tax has almost disappeared for the typical worker while social contributions have not. On the 1,342 euro average salary the tax line is 39 euros a month and the contribution line is 186 euros. The weight is on EFKA, the unified social security fund, not on the tax office.

The 2026 scale and the employee credit

Under the new law in force from 1 January 2026, income tax is charged in six bands: 9% on the first 10,000 euros of annual taxable income, 20% up to 20,000 euros, 26% up to 30,000 euros, 34% up to 40,000 euros, 39% up to 60,000 euros and 44% above that. Greece does not use a tax-free allowance; instead employees receive a tax credit that is subtracted from the tax due, and the credit for a person without children wipes out the tax on a low salary. The model turns that credit into an equivalent allowance of 8,633 euros a year at the 9% rate. The two are identical for an income that stays in the first band but drift apart above it, and the real credit also grows with the number of children and shrinks as income rises, so the tax column here is an approximation for anyone with a family or a higher salary.

EFKA: the bigger deduction

Employee social contributions go to EFKA at 13.87% of gross, one of the higher employee rates in Europe, and they reduce the base on which income tax is calculated. This single line funds the main pension, health insurance, unemployment and a handful of smaller schemes that were merged into EFKA when Greece consolidated its many occupational funds. At every salary in the table the contribution is larger than the income tax; at the minimum wage of 968 euros it is 134 euros against 10 euros of tax. Greek pay is also traditionally spread across extra instalments at Christmas, Easter and summer, which the calculator folds into twelve equal months.

The numbers at three salaries

Two things stand out. First, the minimum and average wages are close together, only 374 euros apart, so the average Greek worker is not far above the floor and the effective rate barely moves between them. Second, even at 4,000 euros a month, a high salary by Greek standards, the EFKA contribution is still larger than the income tax, and the total deduction is a shade over a quarter of gross. Income tax only overtakes the contribution at the 8,000 euro level, where it reaches 1,907 euros against 1,110 euros of EFKA and the effective rate is 37.7%.

Employer contributions

The employer pays a further 22.29% of gross into EFKA. On the average salary that is 299 euros a month, taking the total cost to 1,641 euros. An employee who takes home 1,117 euros costs 1,641 euros to employ, and the social contributions guide explains why that gap matters more than the headline tax rate.

VAT (FPA)

The standard VAT rate, known locally as FPA, is 24%, among the highest in the EU; 100 euros becomes 124 euros with tax. The reduced rate of 13% covers most food, energy, hotel accommodation and restaurant service, and the super-reduced 6% rate applies to medicines, books and some cultural goods. A number of Aegean islands enjoy lower rates, which the model does not distinguish. The Greek VAT calculator works with the three mainland rates.

Working time and the Orthodox calendar

The statutory full-time week is 40 hours over five 8-hour days, and the EU limit of 48 hours including overtime applies. Greece keeps the Orthodox calendar, so its movable holidays usually fall on different dates from the Western Easter: in 2026 Clean Monday, the start of Orthodox Lent, is 23 February, Orthodox Good Friday and Easter Monday are 10 and 13 April, and Whit Monday is 1 June. The model uses these Orthodox dates. In total there are 12 public holidays in 2026, of which 10 land on a weekday, leaving 251 working days. The fixed dates include two national days that are unmistakably Greek: Independence Day on 25 March, which doubles as the Annunciation, and Ochi Day on 28 October, commemorating the wartime refusal of the Italian ultimatum. Epiphany on 6 January is a working-day holiday; Assumption on 15 August and St Stephen's Day on 26 December fall on a Saturday and are lost. The working days calculator counts any date range against this calendar.

Where the estimate stands

The bands and rates are the new statutory scale, and the EFKA rate is the standard one for a private-sector employee, so the contribution column is solid. The tax column is an estimate because the credit is modelled as a flat allowance and does not vary with children or taper with income. For a single employee, the net figure should be within a few percent of the real payslip. To see how a similar salary fares elsewhere in the region, compare with Cyprus or Bulgaria.