What is my internship offer actually worth?
Hourly, stipend or one payment for the term. See what you clear, what payroll holds back and gives back, what housing takes, and what the summer actually leaves you.
How it pays
Where it is
Housing
Anything else
Put in the pay and the answer appears here — what the term leaves after housing.
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How these numbers are worked out
Six rules, all published. Two of them are the reason this is its own page rather than a mode of the job-offer tool.
An internship has none of the parts a full-time package is priced on — no match, no equity, no bonus — and the question is different: not what it is worth a year, but what the term clears and whether you can afford to live there. This puts the pay on one footing, takes off what payroll actually withholds, shows what comes back at filing, takes off rent for the term, and leads with what is left.
Pay is put on one footing first
An hourly rate, a monthly stipend and a single payment for the term are three shapes of the same thing. Hourly is rate × hours × weeks, with any overtime at time and a half; a stipend is the monthly figure × the months in the term; a lump sum is taken as given. The term is in weeks because that is how offers are written, and rent is monthly because that is how leases are written, so weeks are converted at 52 ÷ 12.
What payroll takes is worked out the way payroll works it out
Withholding tables assume each paycheck's rate continues all year. So $25 an hour for 40 hours is withheld as though it were $52,000 of income, and the federal and state tax on that is charged for the share of the year you actually work. Social Security and Medicare are 7.65% on every dollar from the first. A one-off relocation or travel allowance is withheld at the flat 22% federal rate for supplemental pay rather than annualised, which is what payroll does with it. Brackets and the standard deduction are 2026 single-filer figures, the same table every other calculator on this site reads.
What is actually owed is a different, smaller number — and it is shown
The term’s income, taken as the whole year’s, is taxed far less than the annualised figure: $12,000 on its own is under the standard deduction and owes no federal tax at all. The gap between what was withheld and what is owed comes back as a refund when you file, and this page shows that figure under the take-home rather than leaving it to a footnote. The one assumption is that this is the year’s only income, which for a student it usually is. Social Security and Medicare are never refunded.
A cash stipend is wages, and so is an allowance
A housing stipend paid in cash is taxable income and goes through the same tax as pay here. A relocation or travel allowance has been taxable since 2018 and is treated the same way. Housing the employer provides directly is counted as costing you nothing for the term; it is often a taxable benefit as well, which this page does not model and says so below.
Rent is a year-lease market rate, labelled as such
Once a city is chosen, the rent field is filled with the median rent in that metro from Zillow’s observed rent index. That is the price of a twelve-month lease. There is no reliable data source for summer sublets, which can be cheaper or dearer, so the figure is labelled rather than adjusted by a made-up factor, and the field takes whatever you actually know. The cash you need before the first paycheck — a deposit and the first month, usually due two to three weeks before any pay lands — is shown as a rule of thumb.
The headline is what is left, not what is earned
Pay, minus what payroll takes, minus rent for the term. That is the figure that decides how the summer feels, and it is the one on which two offers most often swap places: a higher hourly rate in a more expensive city can leave less. The annualised equivalent is shown last and small, as a comparison aid against a full-time offer — it is the number recruiters use to make $45 an hour sound like $93,000, and it is not what you will earn.
Where this stops These are estimates for planning, not personalised financial, tax or legal advice, and WeLeap is not a registered investment adviser. Federal figures are 2026 single-filer brackets and the standard deduction; the refund estimate assumes this is your only income for the year, so a part-time job during the semester changes it. State tax is an approximate flat rate for a single filer rather than a bracket calculation, and does not include city or county tax or the credit your home state may give for tax paid where you work. Employer-provided housing is often a taxable benefit; this page does not model that. Rent figures are year-lease market medians, not summer sublet prices. International internships and cities are outside what this works out.
Questions people actually ask
How do I compare two internship offers?
Start from what each one leaves after housing for the term, not from the hourly rate. An hourly rate, a monthly stipend and a lump sum are three shapes of the same thing — pay for the weeks you work — so first put them on the same footing: rate times hours times weeks, stipend times months, or the lump as given. Then take off what payroll withholds, then take off rent for the term in that city, unless the employer houses you. The number that is left is the one that decides how the summer feels, and it is common for the offer with the higher rate to come out behind once a more expensive city is in the picture.
What is $25 an hour for a 12-week internship worth?
At 40 hours a week, $25 an hour is $12,000 for a 12-week term. Payroll will withhold roughly $1,850 of that — about $920 in Social Security and Medicare, which is final, and about $940 in federal tax, most of which comes back at filing because $12,000 on its own is below the standard deduction. So about $10,150 lands in your account across the term, and a further $900 or so arrives after you file. In a state with income tax both figures move a little.
Why does an internship paycheck have so much tax taken out?
Because withholding tables assume each paycheck's rate continues for the whole year. $25 an hour for 40 hours is treated as though you earn $52,000 a year, and taxed accordingly, even though you will earn it for twelve weeks. The money is not lost — it is a prepayment, and the difference between what was withheld and what you actually owe comes back as a refund when you file. Social Security and Medicare are the exception: those are charged on every dollar and are not refunded.
Is an internship housing stipend taxable?
A housing stipend paid to you in cash is wages, and it is taxed and reported like the rest of your pay. The same applies to a relocation or travel allowance, which stopped being tax-free in 2018. Housing the employer provides directly is different in form, though it is often a taxable benefit as well. The practical point is that a $1,500-a-month stipend adds about $4,150 to taxable income over twelve weeks, not $4,150 of free rent.
How much rent can I afford on an internship salary?
The honest answer is that internship housing is a cash-flow question rather than an affordability ratio. You need the deposit and first month's rent before the first paycheck arrives, which is usually two to three weeks in, so the number to check first is whether you have roughly two months' rent available up front. After that, take the term's take-home, subtract rent for the term, and the remainder is what the summer actually leaves you. Market rents quoted for a city are for year-long leases; summer sublets and furnished short-term places can be cheaper or dearer.
Should I annualise my internship pay to compare it with a full-time offer?
Only as a rough comparison, and knowing what it hides. Multiplying an hourly rate by 2,080 hours — $45 an hour becomes $93,600 — is how recruiters make an internship sound like a salary, but an intern is paid for the weeks worked, with no paid holiday, no benefits, no match and no job at the end unless one is offered. The annualised figure is useful for one thing: holding an hourly offer up against a salaried one on the same scale. It is not what you will earn.
Do interns pay Social Security and Medicare tax?
Almost always, yes. FICA is charged at 7.65% on every dollar of wages from the first one, with no deduction and no refund, and it applies to interns at ordinary employers. The one exception is a student working for the school they are enrolled at, which has its own rule. On $12,000 for a term that is about $920 you will not see again, which is why take-home for an internship is lower than people expect even when the income tax on it is close to zero.
How many weeks is a typical internship or co-op?
A summer internship is usually ten to twelve weeks; a co-op is commonly a full academic term, around sixteen weeks, sometimes longer. The length matters more than it looks because rent is charged by the month while pay is earned by the week, so a sixteen-week term carries roughly 3.7 months of rent against twelve weeks' worth of 2.8. Put the actual number of weeks in your offer letter rather than a guess.
Estimates to help you think, not financial advice. See all 11 free calculators.
Once the term is priced
This page covers one internship and one summer. These cover what sits either side of it.
- Offer Letter AnalyzerWhen the full-time offer arrives it has parts an internship never does — a 401(k) match, equity, a bonus target. This prices those, so the hourly figure above and a salary can be held on the same scale.
- Rent AffordabilityThis page takes a rent figure and tells you what is left. That one works the other way: from a salary to the rent range that fits it, plus the cash you need before you get keys.
- Money PlanWhat the term leaves is the first money most people have had that is not already spoken for. This puts a buffer, any debt and a first savings habit in order for it.
All of them are free and need no account. Browse every WeLeap money calculator.