The income spans adjust annually to keep pace with inflation, and the brackets and rates can change periodically as a result of legislation. This is what those tax rates and brackets looked like from 2011 through 2022, and how they’ll be adjusted for 2023.

How To Use Tax Bracket and Tax Rate Information

Tax rates and brackets fall into two categories that are often confused: average tax rate and marginal tax rate. Your average tax rate is the percentage of your overall income that you pay in taxes. Say your taxable income is $50,000 and you owe $6,000 of that money in taxes to the U.S. government. Your average tax rate would be 12% ($6,000 divided by $50,000 works out to .12, or 12%). But that doesn’t mean that every one of your $50,000 dollars is taxed at a 12% rate. Your marginal tax rate is that which is imposed on your uppermost dollars of income. The first $11,000 of your taxable dollars will be taxed at 10% in the 2023 tax year if you’re a single filer, then your income from $11,001 through $44,725 would be taxed at the rate of 12%. Only the last remaining $5,275 would be taxed at 22%, which is your marginal rate.

2023 Tax Brackets and Rates

The following table outlines the tax brackets for the 2023 tax year.

2022 Tax Brackets and Rates

The taxes you pay in early 2023 are for 2022 income. The rates below would apply to that income. Likewise, the tax brackets for those who qualify for the head of household filing status are more generous than those that apply to single filers. Qualifying as head of household means the individual is considered to be unmarried, pays more than half the expenses of keeping up their home, and supports at least one dependent. 

2021 Tax Brackets and Rates

2020 Tax Brackets and Rates

2019 Tax Brackets and Rates

2018 Tax Brackets and Rates

One notable change that came about affected alimony. Prior to this year, alimony was taxable to the spouse who received it. The paying spouse could deduct the amount from their income. Alimony began contributing to the receiving spouse’s taxable income for divorces that became final after Dec. 31, 2018. So 2018 was the last year in which receiving spouses could dodge this tax bullet. Alimony has contributed to tax bracket income thresholds ever since.

2017 Tax Brackets and Rates

2016 Tax Brackets and Rates

2015 Tax Brackets and Rates

Overall and comparatively, the changes in tax year 2015 were minimal. Only income thresholds were adjusted, while bracket percentages remained the same.

2014 Tax Brackets and Rates

The upper threshold for single filers rose by $150 from what it was in 2013. But head of household filers were again limited to a $200 increase from what the threshold was the year before.

2013 Tax Brackets and Rates

2012 Tax Brackets and Rates

2011 Tax Brackets and Rates

Taxes Before 2021

The legislation mentioned above played a role in changing tax brackets and tax rates, but they weren’t the only ones to have significant impacts on taxpayers. Most notably, President Ronald Reagan signed the Tax Reform Act in 1986, introducing some of the greatest changes to the tax code in more than 30 years. It was just the third major upheaval to tax law since 1918. It included more than 300 changes, and it took the government three years to ensure all of the rules were in place.