Salary Sacrifice Super Calculator 2026–27

How the salary sacrifice calculator works out your saving

Salary sacrifice saves tax because each dollar goes into super before income tax and is taxed at 15% in the fund instead of at your marginal rate plus the 2% Medicare levy. The calculator runs your pay twice through the 2026–27 resident rates, with and without the sacrifice, and compares the drop in take-home pay with what lands in super.

Worked example: on a $95,000 salary with a HELP debt, sacrificing $8,000 a year cuts take-home pay by $5,440, while $6,800 reaches super after contributions tax. That is $1,360 more of your own money each year, because the sacrificed dollars would otherwise have been taxed at 32% at the margin (income tax plus the Medicare levy). The compulsory HELP repayment itself does not fall: it stays at $3,821, because salary-sacrificed super is added back into repayment income.

The benefit shrinks at lower incomes. On $42,000, sacrificing $3,000 leaves you only $210 better off a year, since the 15% bracket plus Medicare is barely above the 15% fund tax. If your adjusted taxable income is $37,000 or less, the low income super tax offset refunds up to $500 of contributions tax, which can make contributions effectively tax-free for low earners.

Concessional contributions cap and the super guarantee

Your concessional contributions cap is $32,500 in 2026–27, and it covers everything taxed at 15% going in: the employer super guarantee, salary sacrifice, any personal contributions you claim as a deduction, and fees or insurance premiums your employer pays to the fund. On $95,000 the 12% super guarantee is $11,400, leaving $21,100 of room for sacrifice before carry-forward amounts are counted.

Your employer cannot use salary sacrifice to cut the super guarantee it owes. The ATO's Payday Super guidance says salary sacrificed to super is still counted in "qualifying earnings" if it would have been qualifying earnings when paid as wages, so the 12% is worked out on your pre-sacrifice pay. The opposite is true of a novated car lease or other benefits: salary sacrificed to non-super benefits is not qualifying earnings, so super is calculated on the reduced amount.

Contributions count towards the cap in the year your fund receives them, not the year you earned the salary. The ATO suggests writing the payment timing into your salary sacrifice agreement if you need an amount received by 30 June. Under Payday Super, Moneysmart says contributions should reach your fund within 7 business days of payday, so a sacrifice from a pay in the last week of June can fall into the next year's cap.

Carry-forward concessional contributions: using unused cap

You can use unused concessional cap amounts from the previous 5 years if your total super balance was under $500,000 at 30 June of the previous year, according to the ATO. For 2026–27 that means amounts unused in 2021–22 to 2025–26, tested against your balance at 30 June 2026. The oldest amounts are used first and each year's amount expires after 5 years, so anything left from 2021–22 is lost after 2026–27.

Example: if your concessional contributions were $10,000 in each of the last 5 years, your unused amounts total $92,500. Add the $32,500 general cap and you could contribute up to $125,000 this year without excess contributions. People use this in a year with a large capital gain or bonus, either through a bigger salary sacrifice or a personal contribution claimed as a deduction.

Division 293 tax for high earners

Division 293 adds a further 15% tax on concessional contributions when your income plus those contributions exceeds $250,000. It is charged on the smaller of the amount over the threshold and your concessional contributions, so salary sacrifice for these earners saves less: the effective rate in super becomes 30% instead of 15%, which is still below the 45% top rate plus Medicare.

Example: $240,000 of income plus $28,800 of super guarantee is $268,800, which is $18,800 over the threshold. Division 293 tax is 15% of $18,800, or $2,820. The ATO issues a separate notice once both your tax return and fund reports are in, and you can pay it yourself or elect to release money from super within 60 days.

Income for Division 293 uses the Medicare levy surcharge income test without reportable super contributions: taxable income, reportable fringe benefits, net investment and rental losses. A one-off capital gain, a back-pay lump sum or an employment termination payment can push you over the threshold for a single year.

Reportable employer super: what it affects

Salary-sacrificed super is reported on your income statement as reportable employer super contributions. It does not change your taxable income, but the ATO lists the Medicare levy surcharge, study loan repayments, some tax offsets, child support and some government benefits as things a sacrifice arrangement may affect. The calculator adds it back for the surcharge test and HELP, as the ATO does.

• Set the arrangement up before you do the work: the ATO says an effective arrangement cannot cover salary, leave, bonuses or commissions already earned.
• Get it in writing, and confirm when the employer will pay each sacrificed amount to the fund.
• You cannot access sacrificed salary for the period of the arrangement. Amounts cashed out become ordinary taxable pay.
• If you go over the cap, the excess is added to your assessable income and taxed at your marginal rate less a 15% offset. You can release up to 85% of the excess from your fund to pay the bill.
• Salary packaging of non-super benefits (cars, laptops and similar) is a separate fringe benefits question. The ATO notes that from 1 April 2027 work-related items provided through salary sacrifice will no longer be exempt from FBT.