Find the gross salary needed to cover a monthly budget after deductions.
Required gross salary (monthly)
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Annual gross
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Monthly PAYE
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Pension + NHF
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Working backwards from your budget
Most salary tools start with your pay and tell you what survives the deductions. This one runs in reverse. You tell it the monthly budget you actually need to live on, and it finds the gross salary whose take-home, after PAYE, pension and the National Housing Fund, lands exactly on that figure. The gross always has to be bigger than the budget, because tax and statutory deductions come out first. The useful question this answers is not "what is my take-home" but "what offer do I need to accept to fund the life I want."
It suits someone weighing a job offer, negotiating a raise against a rising cost of living, or planning a move to a more expensive city. Because PAYE is administered by the internal revenue service of the state where you live, the deductions modelled here mirror the system your state revenue service applies to employees.
How a search finds the answer
There is no neat formula to invert a progressive tax system, so the tool does something cleverer. It guesses a gross salary, calculates the resulting net, checks whether that net is above or below your target, and narrows its guess. It repeats that squeeze until the net pay matches your budget to the naira. This binary search is why the answer is precise rather than a rough estimate, and why it copes with the rising tax bands without you doing any of the work.
Which deductions you switch on changes everything
The result depends entirely on which deductions you tick. Pension at 8 percent is on by default, because for most formal-sector employees it is mandatory. The National Housing Fund at 2.5 percent is off by default, reflecting that private-sector participation has become voluntary rather than compulsory. Both contributions also reduce the income that PAYE is charged on, so they cut your tax even as they take money off your pay. The headline result here uses pension only unless you tick the NHF box, and ticking NHF raises the required gross, because you need more salary to cover an extra deduction and still hit the same budget.
One honest caveat the tool itself flags: pension and NHF are estimated on gross pay for simplicity. In strict practice pension is based on a defined emolument and NHF on basic salary, which are usually narrower than total gross. So read the required-gross figure as a well-grounded guide for negotiation, not a payroll-exact number. Confirm the precise treatment with your employer's payroll team and your state internal revenue service, especially since the 2025 reform reshaped the bands and reliefs that feed into this.
Funding a NGN 500,000 monthly life
Take the default. You want NGN 500,000 a month in your hand, with pension included and NHF left off. Using the bands and rates this calculator applies, the search settles on a required gross of about NGN 639,581 a month, which is roughly NGN 7,674,973 a year. Out of that monthly gross, PAYE takes about NGN 88,415 and the 8 percent pension takes about NGN 51,166. What is left is your NGN 500,000 budget. Because NHF is switched off in this scenario, that NGN 51,166 statutory line is pension alone.
| Monthly line | Amount |
|---|---|
| Required gross salary | NGN 639,581 |
| Less PAYE | NGN 88,415 |
| Less pension (8%) | NGN 51,166 |
| Less NHF (off here) | NGN 0 |
| Net pay, equals budget | NGN 500,000 |
The gap between gross and net is the wedge you need to negotiate around. To clear a NGN 500,000 budget you must ask for roughly NGN 640,000, and if you also opt into NHF you would need to ask for a little more again. Knowing that wedge before you walk into a salary conversation is the practical payoff of running this in reverse.
Why is the required gross so much higher than my budget?
Because three things stand between gross and net: income tax, your pension contribution, and optionally the housing fund. Each takes a slice before you see the money. The higher your target budget, the larger the tax slice grows, since more of your income reaches the upper bands, so the gap widens as budgets rise.
Should I include the National Housing Fund?
It depends on your situation. NHF participation is voluntary for private-sector employees now, so the default leaves it off. Tick it if you contribute or plan to, and the tool will lift the required gross to keep your take-home on target. It is a deduction, but it also builds access to subsidised mortgage lending.
Does this account for the cost of items like rent and food directly?
No. You supply the budget figure that already reflects your own rent, food, transport and savings. The tool's job is to translate that lived cost into the salary that funds it after deductions, not to estimate prices for you. Build your budget first, then bring the total here.