Minimum Wage by State: Current Rates, Tipped Wages, and What’s Changing in 2026

The federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour and hasn’t moved since July 24, 2009. States are free to set their own floor above that, and most do — from Texas and Pennsylvania, still at the federal rate, up to $17.13 in Washington (and $18.40 in the District of Columbia). This page covers the 16 states where Boostpoint runs the most hiring campaigns: California, Florida, Texas, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Virginia, New York, Washington, Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona, Colorado, Massachusetts, and New Jersey. Each has its own page below with the tipped wage, local overrides, and what’s scheduled to change next.

The 16 states, at a glance

Full pages, with local overrides and compliance notes: California, Florida, Texas, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Virginia, New York, Washington, Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona, Colorado, Massachusetts, and New Jersey.

Minimum wage in the other 34 states and D.C.

The table above covers the 16 states where we run the most hiring campaigns. These are the rest, verified against each state’s labor agency and statute on September 24, 2026. Each state name links to its full page, with tipped-wage rules, local rates and exceptions.

The minimum wage is one line of a state’s employment law. For breaks, overtime, final paychecks, pay frequency and hiring rules, see the labor-law guide for your state: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming.

Why the same question has nine different answers

Federal law sets a floor of $7.25 an hour that applies everywhere. States can set a higher floor, and 30 states plus D.C. currently do. Cities and counties can go higher still, on top of the state rate — California alone has dozens of local minimums above its $16.90 state rate, some over $20. The rule for a multi-location employer is simple even when the math isn’t: pay whichever rate is highest for where the work actually happens — federal, state, or local.

How often these numbers move

Some states raise their minimum wage on a fixed legislative schedule — Michigan and Florida are both mid-way through multi-year increases set by law. Others adjust automatically every year for inflation, usually announced in late summer or fall for the following January 1st — Ohio and California both work this way. California has already announced $17.40 for January 1, 2027; Ohio’s 2027 rate had not been published as of September 24, 2026. And several states, including Texas and Pennsylvania, haven’t moved from the federal rate since 2009 and have no scheduled change at all. The pattern that catches employers off guard is the states that adjust automatically: there’s no vote to watch for, just a new number that takes effect on schedule.

What the tipped wage number actually means

A tipped cash wage is the least an employer can pay in direct wages before tips, on the assumption that tips make up the difference to the full minimum wage. If a tipped employee’s wages plus tips don’t reach the full minimum in a given workweek, the employer has to make up the shortfall — that’s true in every state on this list. California and Washington don’t allow a tip credit at all, so tipped employees there get the full state minimum ($16.90 and $17.13) in direct wages regardless of tips; in the second table, Alaska, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada and Oregon also allow no tip credit. Everywhere else, the gap between the tipped cash wage and the full minimum is the tip credit.

Tip pooling and tip credit rules

Federal law settles one point for every employer: “An employer may not keep tips received by its employees for any purposes, including allowing managers or supervisors to keep any portion of employees’ tips, regardless of whether or not the employer takes a tip credit” (29 U.S.C. 203(m)(2)(B)). A mandatory tip pool is lawful, but who may be in it depends on whether you take the tip credit. The details are in 29 CFR 531.54 and the Department of Labor’s Fact Sheet #15.

The federal tip credit is capped at $5.12 an hour ($7.25 minus the $2.13 cash wage), and a card processing fee may be deducted from a tip only up to the actual fee. States can be stricter, and several are:

• California allows no tip credit, and Labor Code 351 declares every gratuity “the sole property of the employee or employees” it was left for. Credit card tips must be paid in full, with no deduction for processing fees, by the next regular payday.
• New York bars any employer or agent from taking any part of a gratuity, while preserving “the sharing of tips by a waiter with a busboy or similar employee” (Labor Law 196-d).
• Massachusetts limits a tip pool to wait staff, service employees and service bartenders, and requires tips paid through the employer to reach them by the end of the same business day (G.L. c. 149, §152A). A back-of-house pool that is lawful federally is not lawful there.

For a job ad, a tipped role reads better with both numbers: the cash wage you guarantee, and a typical tips range if your records support one. Our hospitality recruiting page covers the rest of that pitch, and restaurant labor costs shows where the tip credit sits in the payroll line. General information, not legal advice; check the state labor agency before changing a pool.

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