Compliance & Payroll Basics · Policy-manual review
Payroll Tax Deposit Schedule: Monthly or Semiweekly?
Monthly or semiweekly? The IRS decides from a lookback period, not your payday. See the $50,000 test, 2026 due dates, the holiday shifts and late penalties.
At a glance
If the payroll taxes you reported from July 2024 through June 2025 came to $50,000 or less (or your 2024 annual return did), you're a monthly depositor in 2026. Each month's taxes are due by the 15th of the next one, and weekends and holidays push a few of those dates a day or two later. If the total was above $50,000, you're on the midweek-and-Friday schedule, and several holidays this year, one each in April, September and November, stretch semiweekly deadlines by a business day. Either way, a single $100,000 day forces a next-day deposit and moves a monthly depositor to semiweekly, and a payroll provider making the deposits doesn't take the penalty off your name. Recheck your schedule every January against your lookback total, and log in to your federal tax payment account once a quarter.
- Add up line 12 of your four Form 941 returns for July 1, 2024 through June 30, 2025 (or use calendar year 2024 if you file Form 944) and compare the total to $50,000
- If the total is $50,000 or less, deposit wages paid in each month by the 15th of the next month, and use the shifted dates for 2026 when the 15th lands on a weekend or DC holiday
- If the total is more than $50,000, deposit Wednesday-to-Friday paydays by the next Wednesday and Saturday-to-Tuesday paydays by the next Friday
- Count three business days after each semiweekly period closes and add a day for every DC legal holiday inside them (DC Emancipation Day in April, Labor Day and Thanksgiving all move 2026 deadlines)
- Track daily accumulated tax so you notice the moment a day reaches $100,000, which forces a next-day deposit and flips a monthly depositor to semiweekly
- Make a separate deposit for wages in each calendar quarter when a semiweekly period straddles a quarter end, and file Schedule B with Form 941 if you're semiweekly
- Schedule EFTPS payments ahead of the cutoff (8 p.m. Eastern the day before is the safe rule, and same-day payments of $1 million or less must go in before 3 p.m. Eastern), or confirm that your payroll provider is doing it and on which schedule
- Create an EFTPS login and compare deposits to each Form 941, because a provider's missed deposit is still your penalty
§1Your deposit schedule comes from a lookback period, not your payday
Federal employment taxes go to the IRS on one of two schedules, monthly or semiweekly. Which one you follow in 2026 depends on how much tax you reported during a past 12-month window. If you reported $50,000 or less in that window, you're a monthly depositor. If you reported more than $50,000, you're a semiweekly depositor [IRS, Topic no. 757]. A business in its first year starts as monthly, because tax before you opened counts as zero, unless the $100,000 next-day rule covered below kicks in first [IRS, Publication 15 (2026)].
The labels are easy to misread. Each one names a set of due dates that applies whenever you pay wages, and neither predicts how many deposits you'll make. A semiweekly depositor who pays staff once a month still deposits once a month, just against a Wednesday or Friday deadline instead of the 15th. Deposits also follow the date wages are paid, not the date payroll was calculated or the tax was booked [IRS, Publication 15 (2026)]. One thread in the Intuit TurboTax community is titled "I just became a 941 semiweekly schedule depositor. Monthly paychecks go out on the 10th every month. I only have to deposit taxes once monthly even though I'm semiweekly?" and it asks that exact question. Publication 15 answers it with a worked example of an employer that pays wages on one Friday a month.
ADP's semiweekly deposit guide and OnPay's lookback period guide describe the same Wednesday and Friday split. The place employers slip is in working out which window counts.
§2How to find your 2026 lookback period, with a worked example
If you file Form 941 each quarter, the 2026 lookback period is the four quarters from July 1, 2024 through June 30, 2025. Add up the total taxes reported on line 12 of those four returns. If you filed Form 944 in 2024 or 2025, or you file it in 2026, the lookback is calendar year 2024 instead. The same window applies to Form 943 and Form 945 filers [IRS, Publication 15 (2026)].
A later correction doesn't change the lookback figure. Adjustments filed on Form 941-X don't change the liability used for the lookback, so the amounts originally reported are the ones that count. Publication 15 gives an example of an employer that reported $45,000, found in January 2026 that one quarter was understated by $10,000, and filed a 941-X. That employer is still monthly for 2026 [IRS, Publication 15 (2026)].
Publication 15 also shows how fast a small business can cross the line. Rose Co. reported $12,000 a quarter across its 2025 lookback quarters, $48,000 in all, so it was monthly for 2025. For 2026 the window shifted forward, one $12,000 quarter dropped out and a $15,000 quarter came in, and the total reached $51,000. Rose Co. landed on the semiweekly schedule in 2026 on the strength of a $3,000 increase in one quarter [IRS, Publication 15 (2026)].
To see what $50,000 looks like in wages, we ran the arithmetic ourselves. Line 12 is mostly employee income tax withholding plus 15.3% in Social Security and Medicare (6.2% and 1.45% from the employee and the same from the employer, at the 2026 rates in Publication 15). The Social Security wage base is $184,500 per employee, so this estimate only holds if nobody earns above it, and it ignores Additional Medicare Tax and any credits. The withholding percentages are assumptions, not IRS figures, and anything that lowers taxable wages, such as pre-tax benefit deductions, pushes the wage figure higher. Use the table as a rough guide and read your real line 12.
| Average income tax withholding | Total tax as % of wages | Annual wages that reach $50,000 | Per quarter |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5% | 20.3% | $247,000 | $61,750 |
| 10% | 25.3% | $198,000 | $49,500 |
| 15% | 30.3% | $166,000 | $41,500 |
Under those assumptions, a business paying roughly $166,000 to $247,000 in wages across the 12-month window crosses into semiweekly, with the low end applying to higher earners whose paychecks carry more withholding. For employees earning $40,000 to $45,000 that is a payroll of roughly four to six people. The window closed on June 30, 2025, so a business that hired heavily in the second half of 2025 won't see the effect until the 2027 schedule.
§3Monthly depositors: the 15th, and the 2026 dates that shift
A monthly depositor deposits taxes on wages paid during a month by the 15th of the following month. Wages paid in January are due February 15. If the 15th lands on a Saturday, Sunday or legal holiday in the District of Columbia, the deadline moves to the next business day. A holiday that only your state observes doesn't move a federal deadline [IRS, Topic no. 757]. We checked each month of 2026 against the DC legal holidays listed in Publication 15:
| Wages paid in | Deposit normally due | 2026 deadline |
|---|---|---|
| January | Feb 15 (Sunday) | Tue Feb 17 (Feb 16 is Washington's Birthday) |
| February | Mar 15 (Sunday) | Mon Mar 16 |
| March | Apr 15 | Wed Apr 15 |
| April | May 15 | Fri May 15 |
| May | Jun 15 | Mon Jun 15 |
| June | Jul 15 | Wed Jul 15 |
| July | Aug 15 (Saturday) | Mon Aug 17 |
| August | Sep 15 | Tue Sep 15 |
| September | Oct 15 | Thu Oct 15 |
| October | Nov 15 (Sunday) | Mon Nov 16 |
| November | Dec 15 | Tue Dec 15 |
| December | Jan 15, 2027 | Fri Jan 15, 2027 |
A month with no wages has no deposit. Publication 15 uses a seasonal employer that paid every Friday in March and nothing in April. It deposits the March liability by April 15 and has nothing due May 15 [IRS, Publication 15 (2026)]. Small employers get a second break. If your liability for the current or previous quarter is under $2,500, you may pay with your timely filed Form 941 instead of depositing, as long as you didn't hit the $100,000 next-day rule in the quarter [IRS, Topic no. 757].
§4Semiweekly depositors: Wednesday, Friday, and the holiday extra day
Semiweekly depositors work from the payday. Wages paid on Wednesday, Thursday or Friday are due the following Wednesday. Wages paid Saturday, Sunday, Monday or Tuesday are due the following Friday [IRS, Publication 15 (2026), Table 2]. The rule underneath is that you get at least three business days after the period closes. If one of those three weekdays is a DC legal holiday, you get one extra day for each holiday [IRS, Publication 15 (2026)].
That extra-day rule moves several 2026 deadlines. Applying the IRS rule to the 2026 holiday list gives these results. The April, Labor Day and Thanksgiving rows are our own application of the rule. The May 29 row and the Sep 30 and Oct 2 row come straight from IRS examples.
| Wages paid | Normal deadline | 2026 deadline and why |
|---|---|---|
| Sat Apr 11 to Tue Apr 14 | Fri Apr 17 | Mon Apr 20, DC Emancipation Day is Thu Apr 16 |
| Fri May 29 | Wed Jun 3 | Wed Jun 3, no holiday (IRS example) |
| Wed Sep 2 to Fri Sep 4 | Wed Sep 9 | Thu Sep 10, Labor Day is Mon Sep 7 |
| Wed Sep 30 and Fri Oct 2 | Wed Oct 7 | Two deposits, one for Q3 wages and one for Q4, both due Wed Oct 7 |
| Sat Nov 21 to Tue Nov 24 | Fri Nov 27 | Mon Nov 30, Thanksgiving is Thu Nov 26 |
The Sep 30 and Oct 2 row shows the quarter-spanning rule. When two paydays fall in the same semiweekly period but in different calendar quarters, each gets its own deposit even though the due date is shared [IRS, Publication 15 (2026)]. Semiweekly depositors also file Schedule B with Form 941 to report the liability by day.
Deposits are made by electronic funds transfer through EFTPS, IRS Direct Pay or your IRS business tax account. Topic 757 says to schedule the payment by 8 p.m. Eastern the day before the due date. Publication 15 adds that EFTPS accepts same-day payments of $1 million or less submitted before 3:00 p.m. Eastern on a business day, that the 8 p.m. day-before cutoff applies above $1 million, and that a third party making deposits for you may set different cutoffs [IRS, Topic no. 757; Publication 15 (2026)].
§5The $100,000 next-day rule can change a monthly depositor's schedule
Whichever schedule you're on, if you accumulate $100,000 or more in taxes on any day of a deposit period, that amount is due by the next business day. A monthly depositor who hits it becomes semiweekly from the following day, for the rest of that year and all of the next [IRS, Topic no. 757].
Publication 15 gives two examples. Elm, Inc. started in May 2026 and accumulated $40,000 in tax liability on Wednesday, May 6 and another $60,000 on Friday, May 8. Its lookback was zero, so it began as a monthly depositor, but the $100,000 total on May 8 made it semiweekly from May 9. Fir Co. is already semiweekly and accumulated $110,000 on a Monday, so that amount was due Tuesday. The extra $30,000 accumulated Tuesday started a fresh count and followed the normal Friday deadline [IRS, Publication 15 (2026)]. Accumulation stops at the end of the deposit period, so a $95,000 Tuesday followed by $10,000 on Wednesday doesn't trigger the rule.
§6What a late or short deposit costs
The IRS charges a penalty on the amount that wasn't deposited on time, and the rate climbs with lateness [IRS, Publication 15 (2026)]:
| Deposit made | Penalty on the late amount |
|---|---|
| 1 to 5 days late | 2% |
| 6 to 15 days late | 5% |
| 16 or more days late, but before 10 days after the first IRS notice | 10% |
| Paid directly to the IRS or with the return when it should have been deposited | 10% |
| Still unpaid more than 10 days after the first IRS notice | 15% |
A small shortfall isn't penalized if it stays within the greater of $100 or 2% of the tax due and you make it up by the deadline. A monthly depositor can pay the shortfall with the return. A semiweekly depositor makes it up by the first Wednesday or Friday on or after the 15th of the following month, or the return due date if that comes first [IRS, Publication 15 (2026)].
Penalties aren't automatic when you have reasonable cause. The IRS may also waive a penalty if you inadvertently deposited late in the first quarter you were required to deposit at all, or the first time after your deposit frequency changed, as long as you filed the return on time and meet the size limits (net worth up to $7 million for a business and no more than 500 employees). Both waivers cover only a first slip, so the January check on your schedule matters.
The heavier exposure is the trust fund recovery penalty. Withheld income tax and the employee share of Social Security and Medicare are trust fund taxes, and if they aren't paid over, the penalty is 100% of the unpaid amount. It can attach to any responsible person who acted willfully, including an officer, a partner, an accountant or anyone who signs the checks [IRS, Publication 15 (2026)].
§7If a payroll provider makes the deposits for you
Most small employers never touch EFTPS because their payroll platform pays the IRS. That's convenient, and it doesn't move the liability. The IRS says an employer's use of a payroll service provider or reporting agent doesn't relieve it of employment tax obligations, and these third parties don't assume the employer's liability [IRS, Third party payer arrangements]. In practice a late deposit by your provider is still your problem to fix. Reporting agents must send clients a quarterly written statement that says so and recommends enrolling in EFTPS to monitor deposits.
In January, when your lookback period changes, confirm your provider has your correct schedule. A business that crossed $50,000 in the window should now be depositing on Wednesdays and Fridays. It also helps to create an EFTPS login and glance at it each quarter to see that deposits match your Form 941. If you're mid-move between providers, our guide to how to switch payroll providers recommends starting a new provider at the beginning of a quarter, so each provider owns complete quarters. For a breakdown of what makes up the tax you're depositing, see payroll tax vs. income tax.
FUTA has its own deposit rule and is excluded from everything above. Publication 15 notes that the monthly and semiweekly rules don't apply to it. We cover the $500 quarterly FUTA threshold in our SUTA and FUTA guide.
§8Frequently asked questions
What is the semi-weekly deposit schedule for Form 941 in 2026? The deadline depends on the weekday of the payday. A payday from Wednesday through Friday puts the tax due by the Wednesday after. Pay on any day from the weekend through Tuesday and it's due that Friday. A DC holiday inside the three-business-day window pushes the date out a day (IRS Pub. 15, 2026 edition, Table 2).
Who is a semi-weekly depositor for 941? Any employer whose four-quarter lookback total topped $50,000. For 2026 that window runs from mid-2024 to mid-2025. Anyone who piles up $100,000 of liability in one day joins the group too, and stays there through the following year as well (IRS Topic 757).
What decides which deposit schedule an employer uses? Only the lookback total, compared with the $50,000 line. Payroll frequency plays no part. Form 944 filers look at calendar 2024 for this year (IRS Pub. 15, 2026 edition).
Can I choose the monthly schedule if I'm over $50,000? No. Publication 15 tells employers to work out, before each calendar year starts, which schedule they're required to use, and the lookback total answers that (IRS Pub. 15, 2026 edition).
If my payroll software makes the deposit late, who pays the penalty? You do, as the employer. The IRS says handing the work to an outside processor or filing agent leaves the employer's payroll tax duties and liability in place, and that these firms take none of that liability on (IRS employment tax guidance for examiners on outside payroll processors).
Do state payroll taxes follow the same schedule? Not necessarily. Publication 15 is a federal guide, and it puts FUTA outside these two schedules as well. State withholding and unemployment accounts run through state agencies with their own calendars, so confirm dates with your state before assuming they line up (IRS Pub. 15, 2026 edition, covers federal deposits only).