VAT and sales tax calculator
Add tax to a price, or work out the tax already inside one.
- Runs in your browser — nothing you enter is uploaded
- No sign-up, no quotas, free to use as often as you like
How it works
Tax calculations go in both directions and people routinely do the wrong one. Adding 20% to a price and removing 20% from a price give different answers, and the second is the one most often got wrong.
Both directions, always shown
Rather than making you pick a mode, both are calculated. If your figure excludes tax you get the tax and the total. If it already includes tax you get the tax portion and the amount before tax.
Why removing tax is not subtracting the percentage
To remove 20% tax from a gross price you divide by 1.2, not multiply by 0.8. On 120 that gives 100 of net and 20 of tax — whereas subtracting 20% would wrongly give 96. This is the single most common tax arithmetic error on invoices.
Any rate
Set whatever rate applies where you are: 20% in the UK, 19% in Germany, 5% in the UAE, or a local sales tax rate. The maths is identical.
Rounding
Results are rounded to two decimal places. Tax authorities sometimes specify particular rounding rules for invoices; check yours if the figures must match to the penny.
VAT and sales tax calculator — questions
How do I remove VAT from a price?
Divide by one plus the rate — for 20%, divide by 1.2. Subtracting 20% gives the wrong answer.
Why is subtracting the percentage wrong?
Because the tax was calculated on the smaller net figure, not on the gross one.
Which rate should I use?
Whichever applies where you are. The calculation is the same at any rate.