How this instrument works
Most of the country pays overtime by the week: work under 40 hours and every hour is straight time, no matter how long any single shift ran. California Labor Code Section 510 works differently — it counts hours inside a single workday. Cross 8 hours in one day and the next hours pay at 1.5x, whether or not the week ever reaches 40. Cross 12 hours in that same day and the rate doubles. This instrument prices exactly that: one workday, three tiers.
The formula reads the shift in bands rather than one lump total. The first 8 hours price at the plain hourly rate. Hours 9 through 12 — up to 4 of them — price at 1.5 times that rate. Anything past hour 12 prices at double. Stacking the bands this way, rather than applying one multiplier to the whole shift, matches how a California pay stub itemizes a long day: regular, overtime, and double-time appear as separate lines because state law treats them as separate obligations, not one blended average.
Payroll clerks at California employers, hourly workers checking a stub against a schedule, and managers pricing out a long shift before it happens all reach for a calculation like this one. It covers a single non-exempt employee's single workday only — it does not track a weekly 40-hour total, the separate rule covering a seventh consecutive workday, or whether a job even qualifies as non-exempt in the first place. Those are real limits on what one day's arithmetic can tell you.
- Enter your straight-time pay in Hourly rate, $ — the rate before any premium is applied.
- Enter the hours actually worked that single calendar day in Hours worked in the day.
- Read Regular pay (up to 8 hrs) for the first eight hours, priced at the plain rate.
- Check Overtime pay (8-12 hrs, 1.5x) and Double-time pay (over 12 hrs, 2x) for the premium bands.
- Total pay for the day adds the three together — the full wage that shift earned.
Worked example — a 10-hour shift at $20 an hour
Set Hourly rate, $ to 20 and Hours worked in the day to 10. The first 8 hours fall in the Regular pay (up to 8 hrs) band and price at $20 flat, giving $160.00. The remaining 2 hours sit inside the 8-to-12-hour window, so they price at 1.5x — $30 an hour — for $60.00 in Overtime pay (8-12 hrs, 1.5x). The shift never reaches hour 12, so Double-time pay (over 12 hrs, 2x) reads $0.00.
Total pay for the day comes to $220.00. A worker logging that identical 10-hour day under a purely weekly overtime rule — the standard most other states and the federal Fair Labor Standards Act apply — would see no overtime at all unless the week's total passed 40 hours. California's daily threshold pays the extra $60 the same day it is earned, two hours worth of premium pay that a weekly-only calculation would not surface until, and unless, the week ran long.
Questions
Why does California count overtime by the day instead of the week?
State law adds a daily threshold on top of the federal weekly one. Labor Code Section 510 sets 1.5x pay past 8 hours worked in a single day and 2x pay past 12, regardless of the week's running total. Federal law and most other states look only at whether a week crosses 40 hours. A worker can clear a daily threshold on Tuesday and still finish a light week under 40 hours — California still owes the premium for Tuesday.
I work four 10-hour days — do I get overtime every day?
Only without a valid alternative workweek schedule. Employers can adopt a 4/10 or similar schedule through a formal process under Labor Code Section 511 — a written proposal and a two-thirds employee vote — that exempts the 9th and 10th hour from daily overtime as long as the week stays at 40 hours. Without that adopted schedule on file, hours 9 and 10 each day still earn 1.5x even though the week totals exactly 40.
Does every hourly worker in California qualify for this?
No — only non-exempt employees. Executive, administrative, professional, and outside-sales roles meeting salary and duties tests are exempt from daily overtime entirely, and some unionized workers are covered by a collective agreement with its own premium-pay schedule instead. This calculator prices a non-exempt hourly worker's shift; confirm exemption status against your actual job duties and pay structure before assuming the result applies.
What happens on the seventh consecutive day of work in a week?
A separate rule applies that this single-day tool does not model. The first 8 hours worked on the seventh consecutive day in one workweek pay at 1.5x even if none of those hours individually crossed 8 in a day, and anything past 8 hours on that seventh day pays at 2x. Run this calculator for each day worked and check the seventh-day pattern against your schedule separately.
When does double-time pay actually start?
Only after 12 hours worked in one calendar day. Hours 9 through 12 fall in the 1.5x overtime band, not double time — the rate does not jump to 2x until a 13th hour begins. A 10-hour or an 11-hour day, however long, never triggers Double-time pay (over 12 hrs, 2x); that field only moves once a shift genuinely runs past the 12-hour mark.
Does this calculator also cover weekly overtime past 40 hours?
No — it prices one workday only. California also requires 1.5x pay for hours worked past 40 in a week, which can apply even on days that individually stayed under 8 hours, for example five 9-hour days. Add up several days of Total pay for the day and compare the week's combined hours against 40 separately; this instrument does not run that weekly check for you.
References
- California DIR — Overtime FAQ (Division of Labor Standards Enforcement)
- U.S. Department of Labor — Overtime Pay
Read this first: This instrument shows arithmetic, not advice. Real offers add fees, taxes and terms that vary by lender and place — verify the figures against your actual paperwork before deciding anything.