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Tax savings calculator

What a donation is worth is not what it saves you. This walks the chain in the open: what you gave, what is actually deductible, and what that is worth on a federal return, as a range with the assumption behind every step named. It runs in your browser, and it will tell you when the answer is nothing.

Your situation

Nothing you type here is uploaded, saved, or sent anywhere.

Tax year 2026, generally filed in 2027. Three charitable rules changed for 2026: a deduction of up to $1,000, or $2,000 on a joint return, for cash gifts by people who do not itemize, a 0.5% floor that itemizers' charitable contributions have to clear, and a limit on the tax benefit of itemized deductions at the top of the rate table.

On this return, do you itemize?

The standard deduction for Single in tax year 2026 is $16,100. You itemize when your Schedule A total beats that. Work out which side you are on.

$

Money: cash, check, card, payroll giving. Not the value of donated goods.

$

Clothing, furniture, household goods, at fair market value. The donation value calculator is where that figure comes from.

$

Taxable income, not gross pay and not adjusted gross income. It is what is left after the standard deduction or your itemized deductions come off. The rate tables are written against that figure, so anything else overstates the rate.

  1. 1

    What you gave

    $0

    $0 in cash gifts and $0 in donated goods.

    The assumption: these are your figures, taken as given. This tool does not value anything and does not know whether the organizations you gave to are qualified.

  2. 2

    What is deductible

    $0

    Cash only, capped at $1,000 for Single. Donated goods count for nothing here.

    The rule: the IRS states that beginning with tax year 2026, if you do not itemize, you may deduct up to $1,000, or $2,000 filing jointly, of your cash contributions to certain qualified organizations. Publication 526 has not been revised for 2026, so this is the current published position rather than settled filing instructions.

    Source: Topic no. 506, Charitable contributions, Topic no. 506, and Publication 505 (2026), What's New. Stated as IRS guidance rather than in the publication that normally governs it, so treat it as the current published position.

  3. 3

    What that is worth on a federal return

    $0

    Enter what you gave to see the chain.

An estimate is evidence of scale, not a ruling. What a donation is worth on your return depends on your own facts, including whether the organization is qualified, what records you kept, and figures this tool never sees. This is record-keeping software, not tax advice.

How this is calculated

Four steps, and the arithmetic in each one

A calculator output looks more authoritative than a paragraph saying the same thing, so every figure here arrives with the assumption that produced it.

  1. 1

    Start with what you actually gave

    Cash gifts and donated goods, entered separately, because the rules treat them differently. Fair market value is what a willing buyer would pay a willing seller for the goods, not what you paid for them.

  2. 2

    Say whether you itemize

    This is the step that decides almost everything. The IRS position is that charitable contributions are deductible only if you itemize on Schedule A, with one narrow exception beginning in tax year 2026 for cash gifts by people who do not itemize.

  3. 3

    Turn the donation into a deductible amount

    An itemizer deducts what they gave. For a standard-deduction filer, the IRS states that beginning with tax year 2026 the deduction is for cash contributions only, up to $1,000, or $2,000 filing jointly, and nothing at all for donated goods. That second figure is usually smaller than the first, and often it is zero.

  4. 4

    Turn the deductible amount into a tax effect

    A deduction reduces taxable income, not tax, so its worth depends on your marginal rate. Enter your taxable income and the tool shows a range with the rate assumption stated next to it, plus the arithmetic behind the top of the range.

The arithmetic, written out

For an itemizer: the deductible amount is the donation total, and the estimated federal effect is that amount multiplied by the marginal rate for the taxable income entered, capped by that income. The low end of the range uses the rate one bracket below.

For a standard-deduction filer: the deductible amount is the lesser of your cash gifts and the cap for your filing status, and zero for donated goods, so the effect is that figure multiplied by the same rate. In tax year 2026 the cap is $1,000, or $2,000 on a joint return. For tax year 2025 there is no such deduction at all, so the answer for a standard-deduction filer is zero either way.

Figures the tool applies for tax year 2026. Standard deduction from Revenue Procedure 2025-32, inflation adjustments for tax year 2026 and the 2025 amounts as amended by Public Law 119-21, section 4.14. The cash cap for people who do not itemize from Topic no. 506, Charitable contributions, stated as guidance rather than in Publication 526, which has not been revised for that year.
Filing statusStandard deductionCash cap without itemizing
Single, unmarried$16,100$1,000, cash only
Married filing jointly, or qualifying surviving spouse$32,200$2,000, cash only
Married filing separately$16,100$1,000, cash only
Head of household$24,150$1,000, cash only
What it does not do

The honest limits of a tax calculator

A tool that overstates what it can do is worth less than one that says where it stops.

  • It does not compute your tax bill. It estimates the effect of one deduction at the margin. Doing the other thing credibly would need your credits, phaseouts, capital gains, and alternative minimum tax, none of which this product knows, so the underlying data deliberately does not carry the figures that would make it possible.
  • It is federal only. That is said in the output rather than here, because a limitation a reader meets after they have read the number is not a limitation. A federal zero is not automatically a state zero.
  • It does not model the AGI limits or the 2026 floor. It asks for taxable income, not adjusted gross income, so it cannot. Both are surfaced as notices when your inputs suggest they are in play, with the IRS source attached.
  • It assumes you were going to itemize anyway. If a donation is what carries you past the standard deduction, only the part above that line changes anything, and the tool says so next to the figure. Work out which side of the line you are on.
Then what

The number, the rule, and the form

This tool answers what a donation is worth on a return. Three other pages answer where the donation value came from, what the 2026 change actually says, and which form the total triggers.

FAQ

Questions about donation tax savings

How much do I save by donating to charity?
Generally, a donation reduces your taxable income rather than your tax, so what it saves is the deductible amount multiplied by your marginal rate, and only if you itemize. For a lot of people the honest answer is nothing, because they take the standard deduction. The calculator above shows that chain step by step rather than printing a single number, because the steps are where the answer actually gets decided.
Do I get a tax break for donating clothes if I take the standard deduction?
Generally no. The IRS states that beginning with tax year 2026, a taxpayer who does not itemize may deduct up to $1,000, or $2,000 filing jointly, of cash contributions to certain qualified organizations. A bag of clothing is not cash, so on the face of that guidance donated goods produce no federal deduction for a standard-deduction filer, in 2026 or in 2025. The published guidance is quoted in full here.
Why does the result show a range instead of one number?
Because one number would be more confident than the facts support. The top of the range values every dollar of the deduction at your marginal rate, which is the most it can generally be worth. The bottom values it at the rate below your bracket, which is roughly where it lands if part of the deduction crosses into that bracket, if your taxable income estimate is high, or if credits have already reduced part of your tax to zero. The arithmetic behind the top of the range is printed underneath so nothing is hidden.
Why does it ask for taxable income rather than salary?
Because the rate tables are written against taxable income, which is what is left after the standard deduction or your itemized deductions come off. Feeding gross pay or adjusted gross income into a bracket table overstates the rate for almost everybody, and a calculator that quietly does that produces a friendlier answer than the reader is entitled to.
Does this include state tax?
No. Federal only, and the tool says so next to the figure rather than in a footnote. States set their own rules, and a donation that produces no federal benefit is not automatically worthless on a state return. Confirm your state's treatment with a qualified tax professional.
Does it apply the AGI limits and the new 0.5% floor?
No, and it names both where they would matter. Charitable deductions are capped as a share of adjusted gross income, and the IRS states that beginning in 2026 an itemizer may deduct only the contributions that exceed 0.5% of adjusted gross income. This tool asks for taxable income rather than AGI, so it does not compute either, and it flags them instead of pretending. Publication 526 sets out the percentage limits.
Which tax years does it cover?
Tax years 2025 and 2026, because those are the years whose standard deductions, rate tables, and charitable provisions were read from the IRS revenue procedures and publications listed at the foot of this page. Earlier years and 2027 are absent rather than estimated: a year offered with guessed figures is worse than a year not offered.
Is this tax advice?
No. DeductiBee builds record-keeping software. This page estimates the scale of a federal tax effect from figures you type, using published IRS tables, and it cannot see your credits, phaseouts, other deductions, or whether the organizations you gave to are qualified. This is record-keeping, not tax advice.

Where every figure in this tool comes from

  1. Topic no. 506, Charitable contributionsIRS, IRS guidance
  2. Publication 505 (2026), Tax Withholding and Estimated Tax, What's New, full textIRS, IRS publication
  3. Publication 526 (2025), Charitable Contributions, full textIRS, IRS publication
  4. Revenue Procedure 2025-32, inflation adjustments for tax year 2026 and the 2025 amounts as amended by Public Law 119-21IRS, IRS guidance
  5. Revenue Procedure 2024-40, inflation adjustments for tax year 2025 (section 2.01, rate tables)IRS, IRS guidance
  6. Public Law 119-21 (One Big Beautiful Bill Act), enrolled text of H.R. 1, secs. 70111, 70424, 70425U.S. Congress, Statute

The standard deductions, rate tables, and charitable provisions this tool applies were read from the sources above on August 9, 2026, and none of them was typed in from memory. This page is general information, not tax advice, and its author is not a CPA, an enrolled agent, or an attorney. The 2026 charitable provisions are new and the guidance may be superseded; confirm anything that affects a return with a qualified tax professional. This is record-keeping software, not tax advice.

You cannot answer this without a total

The itemizing question is arithmetic, not a hunch.

DeductiBee keeps a running annual total of everything you gave, valued from a cited dataset and photographed at the time, so December is a decision rather than a guess.

One total, all year

Every drop-off logged as you go, so the standard-deduction question has a number behind it in December.

Sourced values, offline

The same cited valuation dataset ships inside the app, with no account and no connection required.

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