Time card and timesheet guides
Start with the question you need to answer, then follow the worked examples and open the matching calculator. These guides explain manual time calculations and their limits; they do not replace employer records or payroll and legal advice.
How do I find paid hours from clock times?
Begin with elapsed time, then deduct only unpaid time that is still included in the work period. The break and lunch guides explain why a gap between punches must not be subtracted twice.
How to Calculate Hours Worked
Calculate elapsed work time, unpaid breaks, overnight shifts and weekly totals with worked examples. Learn the difference between H:MM and decimal hours.
How to Calculate Time Cards with Multiple Breaks
Learn to calculate work hours with lunch and multiple unpaid breaks. Follow examples, check daily and weekly totals, and try the free time card calculator.
How to Calculate Time Cards with Lunch Breaks
Learn to calculate time cards with unpaid lunch breaks. Follow the steps and examples, check paid hours, and use the free calculator to print your timesheet.
Which dates and workweeks belong in my record?
Compare weekly, biweekly and calendar-based periods before totaling them. A biweekly total is not an eighty-hour overtime threshold, and a calendar month can start or end partway through a workweek.
How to Calculate a Biweekly Time Card
Learn to calculate a biweekly time card with daily punches, lunch deductions, weekly overtime, and two-week totals, then use the free tool to print your record.
Weekly vs Biweekly vs Semi-Monthly Pay
Compare seven-day, fourteen-day and twice-monthly pay periods. See why calendar pay periods do not replace the workweek used for overtime.
How to Complete a Monthly Timesheet
Record actual calendar dates, work periods and unpaid breaks. Check month lengths, monthly totals and incomplete workweeks at the edges of a month.
How do I read different time formats or overnight shifts?
Keep clock notation separate from worked duration. Use conversion examples for AM/PM, 24-hour time and decimal hours, then review the limits of clock-only arithmetic when a shift crosses midnight or a daylight saving change.
How to Convert Minutes to Decimal Hours
Divide minutes by 60, convert H:MM durations and avoid common payroll rounding mistakes. Includes a reference table and reverse-conversion examples.
How to Read Military Time
Convert AM/PM to the 24-hour clock and back. Check noon, midnight and leading zeros, then distinguish a clock time from a duration in decimal hours.
How to Calculate Overnight Shift Hours
Calculate shifts crossing midnight, deduct unpaid breaks once and understand clock-only limits for dates, daylight saving changes and long shifts.
How do I turn hours into an overtime pay estimate?
Apply a known workweek, threshold and rate rule to the correct hours. Learn why an hourly-rate estimate cannot establish coverage, exemptions, the legal regular rate, or every local wage requirement.
How to Calculate Overtime Pay
Calculate regular and overtime pay with clear examples. Understand weekly thresholds, two-week periods and the limits of a simple hourly-rate estimate.
Ready to work through your own record?
Choose a calculator, converter or blank timesheet
Clock-only calculations do not adjust for time zones or daylight saving changes. Keep the original punches and review incomplete or invalid entries before using a total. Pay estimates depend on the settings and workweek information you provide.