Salary Hike Calculator
See what a CTC hike actually means for your monthly take-home pay — the two numbers almost never match.
Your In-Hand Pay Increases By
+₹11,476/month in-hand
Before
After
Your in-hand pay grows slower than your CTC because income tax is progressive — a higher CTC pushes more of your income into higher tax slabs, eating into part of the raise.
Why CTC Hikes and In-Hand Hikes Diverge
When a hike is announced as a percentage, it's calculated on your CTC — the full cost to the company, including components like employer PF contribution and gratuity that you never see as monthly cash. As your gross salary rises with the hike, a larger share of it gets taxed at higher slab rates, since India's income tax slabs are progressive. The combination of these two effects — CTC inflation from non-cash components, and rising marginal tax rates — means the percentage increase in your bank balance is almost always smaller than the percentage increase quoted in your appraisal letter.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why does a 20% hike not mean 20% more in-hand salary?
Because income tax is progressive — as your taxable income rises, a larger portion of the increase falls into higher tax slabs. A CTC hike also doesn't all flow through to your gross salary, since components like employer PF and gratuity often scale up too, without reaching your monthly cash pay at all.
Does the hike percentage apply to CTC or basic salary?
Almost always to CTC. When an employer says "you're getting a 15% hike," they mean your total CTC increases by 15% — not your basic salary, and definitely not your in-hand pay, which typically increases by a smaller percentage.
How can I estimate the hike I need to reach a target take-home?
Because tax slabs are non-linear, there's no simple percentage you can back-calculate by hand — you generally need to try different CTC values (or use a calculator that solves for this) until the resulting in-hand figure matches your target.