US federal overtime rules (FLSA): the 40-hour week and how overtime is paid

When does US federal law require overtime? After 40 hours in one workweek, at 1.5 times the regular rate (29 U.S.C. 207(a)(1)); federal law has no daily overtime.

The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) sets the overtime floor for most private and public jobs in the United States. A state can add to it. It cannot take anything away.

The rule

29 U.S.C. 207(a)(1) says an employer may not employ a covered worker "for a workweek longer than forty hours unless such employee receives compensation for his employment in excess of the hours above specified at a rate not less than one and one-half times the regular rate at which he is employed."

What that means for the calculator:

• Threshold: hours over 40 in one workweek. There is no daily overtime under federal law, so a 12-hour day inside a 40-hour week earns no overtime.
• Rate: 1.5 times the regular rate, not 1.5 times the base wage. The two differ when a worker earns bonuses, commissions or shift pay.
• Period: one fixed workweek of seven days. Weeks are not averaged, so 30 hours one week and 50 the next still owes 10 overtime hours in the second week.

What goes into the regular rate

207(e) says the regular rate "shall be deemed to include all remuneration for employment paid to, or on behalf of, the employee," and then lists exclusions, such as gifts, pay for time not worked (vacation, holidays, sick days) and expense reimbursements. Our overtime calculator takes an hourly rate. If you also earn a production bonus or commission, the true regular rate is higher than your base rate.

Who is not covered

Some workers are exempt. The best known exemption is for executive, administrative and professional staff, who must pass a duties test and be paid a salary of at least $684 a week (29 CFR 541.600(a)). Salary alone does not make someone exempt. Other exemptions cover specific jobs, such as some farm work and some transport work. If you are not sure whether you are covered, the U.S. Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division answers coverage questions (https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd).

When a state rule is stricter

29 U.S.C. 218(a) says the FLSA does not "excuse noncompliance with any Federal or State law or municipal ordinance establishing ... a maximum work week lower than the maximum workweek established under this chapter." In practice the worker gets whichever rule pays more. California's daily overtime and Alaska's 8-hour day are examples; see the state rules table.

States that follow only federal rules

These states have no overtime rule of their own that changes the calculation for private-sector work. For them, use the federal setting in the calculator.

Texas

The Texas Labor Code sets a minimum wage by pointing to the federal one (section 62.051) and then says the chapter does "not apply to a person covered by the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938" (section 62.151). We searched the whole Labor Code, as compiled by the Texas Legislative Council after the 2025 session, and found no section that requires overtime pay. Private employers in Texas follow the FLSA.

Public employers are different. State agency staff covered by the FLSA are owed, for hours over 40, either "compensatory time off at the rate of 1-1/2 hours off for each hour of overtime" or, where time off is impractical, pay at 1.5 times the regular rate (Texas Government Code 659.015(c)). Firefighters and fire department staff in cities over 10,000 people have their own overtime rule in Local Government Code 142.0015. Our calculator does not model these public-sector rules.

Florida

Florida has no overtime rate of its own, so the FLSA's 40-hour rule applies. One old statute remains on the books. Fla. Stat. 448.01 says ten hours is a legal day's work for "any person employed to perform manual labor of any kind by the day, week, month or year," and that without a written contract signed by both sides, the worker "shall be entitled to extra pay for all work performed by the requirement of his or her employer in excess of 10 hours' labor daily."

Three limits matter:

• It names no rate, so there is nothing to calculate. Our calculator leaves it out.
• It names pay "by the day, week, month or year." It does not mention hourly pay. Whether it reaches hourly workers is not settled by the text, and we found no court decision or state agency guidance that answers it.
• It names no agency that enforces it. We found no recent case applying it.

Other states

More states may belong here. We list a state only after reading its own statute or regulation. The state rules table shows which states have been checked so far.

How we checked

Each rule above was read on October 27, 2026: the U.S. Code on Cornell's Legal Information Institute (checked again on October 28, 2026 against the official 2024 edition on GovInfo, which the links now point to), the Texas Legislative Council's published code PDFs (read through the Internet Archive copy dated November 21, 2025, because the state site refused our connection), and the Florida Senate's 2024 statutes (Internet Archive copy dated March 23, 2026). The Florida text has not changed since 1997, according to its history line.

Not legal, tax or payroll advice. Laws change; check the linked official source before relying on a figure.