The General Schedule pay scale sets salaries for most white-collar federal employees using three moving parts: a grade (GS-1 through GS-15) that reflects the job’s difficulty, a step (1 through 10) within that grade that reflects tenure, and a locality percentage that adjusts pay based on where you work. For 2026, base salaries run from $22,584 at GS-1, Step 1 to $164,301 at GS-15, Step 10 before locality pay is applied.1U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Salary Table 2026-GS Almost no one actually earns the base figure. Locality adjustments add somewhere between 17% and 46% on top, depending on the duty station.
How Grades and Steps Work
Federal law establishes 15 grades, each with 10 steps.2Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 5 USC 5332 – The General Schedule Grade reflects the job. An entry-level clerk might sit at GS-3; a senior policy analyst could hold a GS-14 or GS-15 position. Steps reflect tenure within the same job. A GS-12, Step 1 and a GS-12, Step 10 do the same work at the same level of responsibility, but the Step 10 employee has logged years in that grade and earns more for it.
Each step is worth roughly 3% of salary.3U.S. Office of Personnel Management. General Schedule Someone who enters at Step 1 and eventually reaches Step 10 earns about 30% more in the same grade without ever changing positions. The base pay table is the same nationwide.
2026 Base Pay Rates
Every January, base pay receives an across-the-board adjustment tied to the Employment Cost Index. For 2026 that increase was 1.0%.4Federal Register. January 2026 Pay Schedules A selection of 2026 base figures shows the range:1U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Salary Table 2026-GS
- GS-1, Step 1: $22,584
- GS-5, Step 1: $34,799
- GS-7, Step 1: $43,106
- GS-13, Step 1: $90,925
- GS-15, Step 10: $164,301
Treat these as the floor. Locality pay applies on top in every part of the country.
How Locality Pay Changes the Number
Locality pay is a percentage-based supplement designed to close the gap between federal salaries and private-sector wages in the same geographic area. For 2026 there are 58 locality pay areas: 57 named metropolitan and state-based regions plus a “Rest of United States” area covering everything else. The geographic definitions are unchanged from 2025.5U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Locality Pay Area Definitions
The percentages vary enormously. The 2026 Rest of U.S. rate is 17.06%,6U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Salary Table 2026-RUS the Washington-Baltimore-Arlington area sits at roughly 33.94%, and the San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland area leads at about 46.34%. The practical effect is large. A GS-13, Step 1 earning $90,925 in base pay takes home roughly $106,440 in the Rest of U.S. area but jumps to $121,785 in the Washington, D.C. area.7U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Salary Table 2026-DCB Same grade, same step, same duties, over $15,000 difference based on geography alone.
Change duty stations, and your locality percentage changes with you. Grade and step stay the same, but the paycheck moves up or down. Worth thinking through before accepting a transfer to a lower-cost region.
How You Move Up Steps
Once you’re in a grade, you advance through its 10 steps by logging time and maintaining satisfactory performance. These raises are called Within-Grade Increases, and the waiting periods grow as you climb:8eCFR. 5 CFR 531.405 – Waiting Periods for Within-Grade Increase
- Steps 1 through 4: 52 weeks between each step.
- Steps 4 through 7: 104 weeks between each step.
- Steps 7 through 10: 156 weeks between each step.
Adds up to 18 years from Step 1 to Step 10 if every increase lands on schedule. The final stretch from Step 7 to Step 10 alone takes nine years.
Time isn’t the only requirement. Federal law requires that your work be at an “acceptable level of competence” as determined by your agency before the increase is granted.9Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 5 USC 5335 – Periodic Step-Increases In practice, your most recent performance rating can’t fall below the passing threshold. If it does, the step increase is denied and pay stays frozen until you earn an acceptable rating.
Leave Without Pay and Your Timeline
Extended periods of unpaid leave push your step increase further out, with thresholds tied to the same step groupings as the waiting periods:10U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Effect of Extended Leave Without Pay (LWOP) on Federal Benefits and Programs
- Steps 2 through 4: Unpaid leave beyond 2 workweeks extends the waiting period by the excess.
- Steps 5 through 7: The threshold rises to 4 workweeks.
- Steps 8 through 10: You get up to 6 workweeks before the extension kicks in.
Take 10 workweeks of unpaid leave while waiting for Step 3, and the 8 weeks beyond the 2-week threshold get added directly onto your 52-week wait. People returning from extended FMLA or military leave sometimes discover their step increase has slipped for this reason.
Quality Step Increases
A Quality Step Increase is a one-step raise that skips the normal waiting period. It’s a reward for exceptional performance rather than a tenure milestone, and it requires the highest possible rating under your agency’s appraisal system, typically “Outstanding” or its equivalent.11eCFR. 5 CFR Part 531 Subpart E – Quality Step Increases
Two limits apply. You can’t receive more than one QSI within any 52-week period, and a QSI resets your waiting-period clock for the next regular step increase. If you’re already at Step 10, no QSI is available because there’s nowhere higher within the grade. These are discretionary. Some offices use them regularly to retain top performers; others rarely grant them at all.
Getting Promoted to a Higher Grade
Moving to a higher grade is the biggest single pay jump in the system, and it doesn’t happen automatically. Promotions generally require applying for and being selected for a position classified at a higher grade, either through a competitive vacancy announcement or through a career ladder where the position is designed to promote through predetermined grades as you gain experience.
Time-in-Grade
Before competing for most promotions, you need at least 52 weeks at the grade below. For positions at GS-12 and above, those 52 weeks must be at the next lower grade. For positions at GS-6 through GS-11, the rules depend on whether the job series uses one-grade or two-grade intervals; in a two-grade-interval series, you can potentially jump from two grades below.12eCFR. 5 CFR 300.604 – Restrictions
The Two-Step Rule for Your New Salary
When you’re promoted, your agency doesn’t drop you at Step 1 of the new grade. Federal regulations use what’s commonly called the two-step rule to guarantee a meaningful raise.13eCFR. 5 CFR 531.214 – Setting Pay Upon Promotion The calculation:
- Take your current GS base rate and add two within-grade step amounts for your current grade.
- Apply the applicable locality rate or special rate supplement to that bumped-up figure.
- Find the lowest step in the new grade’s pay table that equals or exceeds that figure.
Without this rule, an employee at a high step in a lower grade could be promoted to Step 1 of the next grade and barely see a raise, or in some locality areas actually lose money. If the calculated rate exceeds the maximum for the new grade, you’re placed at the maximum step.
Pay Caps at the Top
However high your grade, step, and locality combine, pay hits a ceiling. For 2026 the basic pay cap for GS employees is tied to Level IV of the Executive Schedule, which is $197,200.4Federal Register. January 2026 Pay Schedules This most often affects GS-15 employees in high-cost locality areas. A GS-15, Step 10 in the Washington, D.C. area would mathematically earn more than $197,200 after the 33.94% locality adjustment, but pay is capped at exactly $197,200.7U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Salary Table 2026-DCB
A separate, broader limit applies to total compensation, meaning salary plus bonuses, awards, overtime, and similar payments combined. For most GS employees, total compensation in a calendar year cannot exceed the Level I Executive Schedule rate of $253,100 for 2026.14U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Salary Table 2026-EX Amounts over the limit are held back and paid out the following year if room allows.15eCFR. 5 CFR Part 530 Subpart B – Aggregate Limitation on Pay This rarely affects employees below GS-15, but it can catch high-step GS-15s who receive large performance awards or work significant overtime.
Special Rate Jobs
For occupations where the standard table can’t compete with private-sector salaries, the Office of Personnel Management can authorize higher pay under Special Salary Rate tables.16Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 5 USC 5305 – Special Pay Authority These apply to specific job series and locations where the agency is struggling to hire or keep qualified people.
Information technology and cybersecurity positions in the 2210 job series are among the most common special rate occupations, along with certain medical, engineering, and scientific roles. The 2026 special rate tables incorporate the same 1.0% base increase applied to the rest of the system.17U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Special Rates When a special rate applies, it replaces the standard locality-adjusted rate if the special rate is higher. You don’t receive both. Rates are reviewed periodically and can change as labor market conditions do, so checking whether your job series qualifies is worth doing early in a job search.