Illinois Minimum Wage 2026
Figure basis: Official Illinois Department of LaborIllinois's minimum wage is $15.00 per hour in 2026, set by the state and above the federal minimum of $7.25. This Illinois minimum wage calculator turns that hourly rate into the numbers that actually matter to you: weekly, monthly and yearly pay. At $15.00 an hour, someone working a full 40-hour week earns about $600.00 before tax, or roughly $31,200.00 across a full year. Enter your own hours per week and weeks worked to see your gross pay, and edit the rate if you are paid above the minimum. The minimum wage is a floor, not a ceiling: employers can pay more, and some cities in Illinois set their own higher local minimums. Tipped workers can be paid a lower cash wage as long as tips bring them up to the minimum; see the tipped calculator for that. The figure here is the state rate for 2026, sourced directly from the Illinois Department of Labor; the pay calculation is simply hours times the rate.
Illinois's 2026 minimum wage is $15.00 per hour. Full time (40 hrs/week) that is about $600.00 a week and $31,200.00 a year before tax.
How Illinois minimum wage pay is calculated
weekly pay = hourly rate x hours per week
annual pay = hourly rate x hours per week x weeks per year
overtime = hourly rate x 1.5 (hours over 40 in a week, FLSA)
These are gross figures before federal and Illinois income tax, Social Security and Medicare. Your take-home pay is lower; see our Illinois paycheck calculator for the after-tax amount.
Illinois hit its ceiling: what the flat $15.00 leaves out
Illinois reached the top of its ladder on January 1, 2025, when the last scheduled step of the 2019 Lifting Up Illinois Working Families Act took the wage to $15.00 an hour. That number is now frozen: Illinois does not index its minimum wage to inflation, so there is no automatic January bump the way indexing states get. Unless lawmakers pass a new bill, $15.00 is what covered adults earn in 2026 and beyond, which works out to roughly $31,200.00 a year at 40 hours a week before tax.
Where you stand matters more here than in almost any neighboring state. At $15.00, Illinois pays more than double Indiana, Iowa, Wisconsin and Kentucky, all of which sit at the federal floor of $7.25. Cross a state line and the legal minimum can nearly halve. Inside Illinois the pressure runs the other way: Chicago and Cook County set their own higher minimums, and Chicago is separately phasing out the tip credit, so the statewide $15.00 is a floor that city employers must beat, not the going rate.
Two carve-outs catch people out. Tipped staff can be paid a cash wage of $9.00 (60% of the minimum) with up to $6.00 counted from tips, but cash plus tips must still reach $15.00 an hour or the employer owes the gap. And workers under 18 who log fewer than 650 hours in a calendar year may be paid a youth rate of $13.00 rather than the full amount.
Illinois minimum wage: frequently asked questions
What is the minimum wage in Illinois in 2026?
Illinois's minimum wage is $15.00 per hour in 2026, set by the state and above the federal minimum of $7.25. At $15.00 an hour, a full-time worker (40 hours a week) earns about $600.00 a week and $31,200.00 a year before tax. This rate took effect on January 1, 2025.
How much is full-time minimum wage in Illinois per year?
At Illinois's $15.00 minimum wage, 40 hours a week for 52 weeks is 2,080 hours, which comes to about $31,200.00 a year ($2,600.00 a month) in gross pay before tax and deductions. Part-time hours scale down from there; use the calculator to enter your own hours.
Is Illinois's minimum wage going up?
Illinois does not automatically index its minimum wage to inflation, so it changes only when the law changes. The figure here is the 2026 rate verified with the Illinois Department of Labor.
What is the tipped minimum wage in Illinois?
Illinois lets employers pay tipped workers a lower cash wage of $9.00 an hour and count up to $6.00 of tips toward the minimum (a "tip credit"). If cash wage plus tips does not reach $15.00 an hour, the employer must make up the difference. See our Illinois tipped minimum wage calculator for the full breakdown.
Is Illinois's minimum wage higher than the federal minimum wage?
Yes. Illinois's $15.00 is $7.75 an hour above the federal minimum of $7.25, which works out to about $16,120.00 more a year for a full-time worker.
Official sources
- Illinois 2026 minimum wage rate: Illinois Department of Labor, as at July 11, 2026.
- Federal minimum wage ($7.25) and overtime rules: US Department of Labor, Wage and Hour Division.
Reviewed by the CalculatorHub team, edited by James Graham, 11 July 2026. See our methodology. General information, not legal or financial advice. Illinois reached its final scheduled $15.00 step on January 1, 2025; no further statewide increase is scheduled and there is no CPI indexing. Local minimums: Chicago and Cook County set their own higher minimum and tipped wage rates.