The 24% vs 25% tax bracket question has a straightforward answer: the 25% federal bracket doesn’t exist anymore. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act replaced it with a 24% rate starting in 2018, and the One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act made that change permanent in 2025. For tax year 2026, single filers hit the 24% bracket on taxable income between $105,701 and $201,775, and married couples filing jointly reach it between $211,401 and $403,550.1Internal Revenue Service. Rev. Proc. 2025-32 The 24% rate isn’t just a percentage point lower. It covers a much wider slice of income and starts at a higher threshold, so most earners pay less tax on the same real income than they would have under the old structure.
What Happened to the 25% Bracket
Before 2018, the federal income tax used seven rates: 10%, 15%, 25%, 28%, 33%, 35%, and 39.6%. The 25% bracket was the workhorse rate for middle-income households. Single filers entered it at roughly $37,950 in taxable income, and married couples filing jointly reached it around $75,900.
The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (Public Law 115-97) replaced those seven rates with 10%, 12%, 22%, 24%, 32%, 35%, and 37%.2Congress.gov. Public Law 115-97 Income that had been taxed at 25% got redistributed to either 22% or 24%, depending on where it landed. Those new rates were originally set to expire after December 31, 2025, which would have brought the 25% bracket back.
That reversion didn’t happen. The One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act was signed on July 4, 2025 (Public Law 119-21) and made the TCJA’s individual rate structure permanent.3Internal Revenue Service. One, Big, Beautiful Bill Provisions The 25% bracket is off the books unless Congress rewrites the rates again.
How the Old 25% Bracket Compares to Today’s 24%
The gap between the two brackets isn’t really about the one-point rate difference. It’s about where each bracket starts. In 2017, the last year the 25% rate applied, the thresholds looked like this:
- Single filers: $37,950 to $91,900
- Married filing jointly: $75,900 to $153,100
- Head of household: $50,800 to $131,200
The 2026 24% bracket doesn’t start until $105,701 for a single filer. A person earning $90,000 in taxable income in 2017 was well into the 25% bracket. That same taxpayer in 2026 sits entirely inside the 22% bracket, paying a lower rate on the same inflation-adjusted earnings. Income that used to face 25% now faces either 12% or 22%.
For taxpayers who do earn enough to reach the 24% range, they pay one percentage point less on every dollar inside it. On $96,000 of income sitting fully within the bracket, that one point saves $960 a year.
The 24% Bracket in 2026
The IRS adjusts bracket thresholds every year for inflation. For tax year 2026, the 24% rate applies to these taxable income ranges:1Internal Revenue Service. Rev. Proc. 2025-32
- Single filers: $105,701 to $201,775
- Married filing jointly: $211,401 to $403,550
- Married filing separately: $105,701 to $201,775
- Head of household: $105,701 to $201,750
These are taxable income figures, not gross income. Taxable income is what’s left after the standard deduction (or itemized deductions) and any above-the-line adjustments come out. A single filer earning $130,000 in gross wages subtracts the $16,100 standard deduction to arrive at $113,900 in taxable income, which puts only $8,200 of that income in the 24% bracket.4Internal Revenue Service. IRS Releases Tax Inflation Adjustments for Tax Year 2026, Including Amendments From the One, Big, Beautiful Bill
What Reaching the 24% Bracket Actually Means
Landing in the 24% bracket does not mean 24% of your income goes to federal tax. The system taxes income in layers, and each layer has its own rate. Only the dollars that fall inside a bracket are taxed at that bracket’s rate.5Internal Revenue Service. Federal Income Tax Rates and Brackets
Here’s the math for a single filer with $150,000 in taxable income in 2026:1Internal Revenue Service. Rev. Proc. 2025-32
- 10% on the first $12,400: $1,240
- 12% on $12,401 to $50,400: $4,560
- 22% on $50,401 to $105,700: $12,166
- 24% on $105,701 to $150,000: $10,632
Total federal income tax: $28,598. That’s an effective rate of about 19.1%, well below the 24% marginal rate. The lower brackets drag the average down. Moving into a higher bracket never leaves you with less take-home pay, because only the income above each threshold gets taxed at the higher rate.
How the Standard Deduction Changes the Answer
The standard deduction decides how much gross income avoids tax altogether, and that determines whether you even reach the 24% bracket. For 2026, the amounts are:4Internal Revenue Service. IRS Releases Tax Inflation Adjustments for Tax Year 2026, Including Amendments From the One, Big, Beautiful Bill
- Single filers: $16,100
- Married filing jointly: $32,200
- Married filing separately: $16,100
- Head of household: $24,150
A single filer needs gross income above roughly $121,800 before any of it hits the 24% rate. For married couples filing jointly, the number is about $243,600. Before the TCJA, the standard deduction was nearly half its current size, so the lower deduction combined with the lower bracket threshold pushed the old 25% rate much further down the income scale. Retirement account contributions, HSA deposits, and student loan interest all reduce taxable income before the bracket math starts, which can keep you out of a higher bracket entirely or shrink how much of your income sits inside it.
Why the 25% Bracket Still Shows Up
Older tax planning guides, retirement projections, and financial software often warned that the TCJA rates would expire and the 25% bracket would return. That was a reasonable projection when it was written, because the TCJA really was scheduled to sunset. The One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act eliminated that risk by making the current rates permanent.3Internal Revenue Service. One, Big, Beautiful Bill Provisions
The 25% figure also appears in older capital gains guidance, because long-term capital gains rates are tied to where you fall in the ordinary income brackets. Under current law, those breakpoints follow the 2026 structure, not the pre-2018 rates. Congress can change the rates again in the future, but as of 2026 there is no scheduled reversion and no 25% bracket waiting in the wings.