PhilHealth is the country’s national health insurance. If you’re employed, a premium is deducted from your salary each month and matched by your employer. Here’s exactly how that amount is computed.
The simple formula
The premium rate is 5% of your Monthly Basic Salary, split equally between you and your employer:
Total premium = 5% × Monthly Basic Salary
Your share = 2.5% (your employer pays the other 2.5%)Your Monthly Basic Salary is your fixed basic pay — it excludes overtime, allowances, commissions, the 13th-month pay, and bonuses.
The floor and ceiling
The premium base is bounded:
- Income floor: ₱10,000 — salaries below this still pay as if they earned ₱10,000 (minimum total premium ₱500, so ₱250 from you).
- Income ceiling: ₱100,000 — salaries above this are capped at ₱100,000 (maximum total premium ₱5,000, so ₱2,500 from you).
So your share is always between ₱250 and ₱2,500 per month.
How much for common salaries
| Monthly basic salary | Total premium (5%) | Your share | Employer share |
|---|---|---|---|
| ₱10,000 and below | ₱500 | ₱250 | ₱250 |
| ₱25,000 | ₱1,250 | ₱625 | ₱625 |
| ₱30,000 | ₱1,500 | ₱750 | ₱750 |
| ₱50,000 | ₱2,500 | ₱1,250 | ₱1,250 |
| ₱100,000 and above | ₱5,000 | ₱2,500 | ₱2,500 |
Notice the shape of that table: between the floor and the ceiling, your share is simply 2.5% of whatever you earn, so it rises smoothly with your salary. Outside those bounds it goes flat. Someone on ₱8,000 pays the same ₱250 as someone on ₱10,000, and someone on ₱150,000 pays the same ₱2,500 as someone on ₱100,000.
Worked example: a ₱28,000 salary
Say your monthly basic salary is ₱28,000.
- Premium base — ₱28,000 sits between the ₱10,000 floor and the ₱100,000 ceiling, so it’s used as-is.
- Total premium — 5% × ₱28,000 = ₱1,400.
- Your share — half of that, ₱700, is deducted from your pay. Your employer remits the other ₱700 on top of your salary.
Only the ₱700 appears on your payslip. The employer’s half is a cost to the company, not a deduction from you — a distinction that trips up a lot of people reading a payslip for the first time.
Why PhilHealth is simpler than SSS
If you’ve looked at the SSS contribution table, PhilHealth will feel refreshingly plain. SSS maps your salary to a bracketed Monthly Salary Credit in ₱500 steps, so a ₱24,800 salary and a ₱25,000 salary can land on the same contribution. PhilHealth has no brackets and no rounding step — the 5% applies directly to your basic salary, so every extra peso you earn between the floor and ceiling raises the premium by exactly 5 centavos.
Pag-IBIG sits somewhere in between: a flat rate, but capped early, at a ₱10,000 fund salary. That’s why Pag-IBIG maxes out at ₱200 for most earners while PhilHealth keeps climbing to ₱2,500. See all three side by side on the contribution tables page.
Common mistakes
- Using gross pay instead of basic salary. The premium is computed on your basic salary. Overtime, allowances, commissions, and bonuses are excluded, so two people taking home the same amount can owe different premiums if one earns more of it through allowances.
- Assuming the employer’s half comes out of your pay. It doesn’t. Your payslip shows 2.5%, not the full 5%.
- Forgetting it lowers your tax. PhilHealth is deducted before withholding tax is computed, so the premium itself is not taxed. A ₱700 premium doesn’t reduce your take-home by a full ₱700 — part of it is offset by the tax you no longer pay on that amount. The Take-Home Pay Calculator shows the combined effect.
- Looking for a bracket table. There isn’t one to look up — unlike SSS, the premium is a straight percentage of your basic salary between the floor and the ceiling, so the only figures you need are the rate and those two bounds.
Frequently asked questions
Has the PhilHealth rate changed recently? No — it stayed at 5%, the rate reached in 2024 under the Universal Health Care law’s scheduled increases. The floor (₱10,000) and ceiling (₱100,000) also stayed the same.
What is the minimum and maximum PhilHealth contribution? The premium base is held between ₱10,000 and ₱100,000, so the total premium is never below ₱500 or above ₱5,000. Your own share is always between ₱250 and ₱2,500 a month, no matter how little or how much you earn.
Why did my premium not change after a raise? Most likely you were already at the ceiling — above a ₱100,000 basic salary the premium stops growing. The other possibility is that your raise came as an allowance rather than basic salary, which doesn’t enter the premium base.
Do self-employed and voluntary members pay PhilHealth? Yes, but they shoulder the full 5% themselves (there’s no employer to split it). This guide and calculator focus on the employed-member split.
Is PhilHealth deducted from my 13th-month pay? No. The premium is based on your Monthly Basic Salary only, which excludes the 13th-month pay and bonuses.
Compute your exact premium with the PhilHealth Contribution Calculator, or see your full net pay with the Take-Home Pay Calculator.