You can pay California estimated taxes online for free through the Franchise Tax Board’s Web Pay portal, which debits the installment directly from your checking or savings account. No account is needed for a one-time payment, though a MyFTB login lets you see your payment history later.1Franchise Tax Board. Pay by Bank Account (Web Pay) The key things to get right are the payment type, the installment number, and the amount — California’s quarterly schedule is not the federal one, and mislabeling a payment can generate a penalty notice even when your money arrived on time.
Using FTB Web Pay Step by Step
Start at ftb.ca.gov/pay and choose Web Pay for Individuals. The system will walk you through five short screens.
1. Choose the Right Payment Type
Select Estimated Tax Payment. Not “extension payment,” not “tax return balance due.” Picking the wrong category can cause the FTB to apply your money to the wrong liability and send you an underpayment notice for the quarter you thought you had paid.
2. Identify Yourself
Enter your Social Security Number or ITIN, last name, and first name. If you file jointly, use only the primary taxpayer’s information. Do not enter a spouse’s or registered domestic partner’s details on the same payment.2Franchise Tax Board. Help With Bank Account Payments (Web Pay)
3. Enter the Amount, Year, and Installment
Type in the dollar amount for the specific installment you’re paying, select the tax year the payment applies to, and mark which installment it is (first, second, or fourth — California has no third-quarter payment, covered below). Labeling a June payment as a first installment, for example, will show you as late on the second and overpaid on the first.
4. Enter Your Bank Information
Provide your bank’s nine-digit routing number, your account number, and whether the account is checking or savings. The routing number sits at the bottom left of a paper check; the account number is immediately to its right. A single wrong digit will cause the payment to reject, and by the time you find out, the deadline may have passed.
5. Schedule and Save Your Confirmation
You can schedule the debit for a future date rather than paying immediately, which is useful if you want to sit on the funds until the due date. Money typically leaves your account within one to two business days of the scheduled date, so don’t run the balance to zero.1Franchise Tax Board. Pay by Bank Account (Web Pay)
When you submit, Web Pay returns a confirmation number. Print the page or take a screenshot. If the FTB later says a payment didn’t arrive, that confirmation is your proof.
California’s Payment Schedule and Percentages
Before you enter an amount into Web Pay, you need to know which installment this is and what share of the annual total it should cover. California splits estimated taxes unevenly: 30% first, 40% second, nothing third, 30% fourth.3Franchise Tax Board. Estimated Tax Payments
- First payment (30%): April 15, 2026
- Second payment (40%): June 15, 2026
- Third payment (0%): September 15, 2026 — no state payment due
- Fourth payment (30%): January 15, 2027
If a due date falls on a weekend or legal holiday, it moves to the next business day. Paying four equal 25% installments the way the federal schedule works will underpay your June installment and can produce a penalty on that shortfall, even if your year-end total is right. Match your payments to the 30/40/0/30 split.
Figuring Out What to Enter
You owe California estimated tax if you expect your state tax bill to be $500 or more after subtracting withholding and credits ($250 if you are married or in a registered domestic partnership filing separately). The requirement only applies when your expected withholding and credits fall below both 90% of the current year’s tax and 100% of the prior year’s tax.3Franchise Tax Board. Estimated Tax Payments
The Safe Harbor Method
The simplest way to size your payments is to base them on 100% of the tax you owed last year, from a return that covered a full 12 months. Pay that full amount across the four installments and you avoid an underpayment penalty even if your actual tax this year turns out higher. If your prior-year California adjusted gross income exceeded $150,000 ($75,000 for married or RDP filing separately), the safe harbor rises to 110% of last year’s tax.3Franchise Tax Board. Estimated Tax Payments
The Current-Year Method
If your income is climbing fast or you had little tax last year, project this year’s numbers instead. The worksheet in the Form 540-ES instructions walks through it: expected income, minus deductions and credits, times California’s rates, to get your annual liability.4Franchise Tax Board. 2024 Instructions for Form 540-ES Estimated Tax for Individuals Then split that total 30/40/0/30. Those per-installment amounts are what you’ll type into Web Pay.
Annualized Income Method
If your income arrives unevenly across the year — a windfall in the fall, say, after a slow spring — the annualized income installment method recalculates each installment based on the income you had actually earned by that point. It can reduce or eliminate a penalty on earlier installments. You’d complete Form FTB 5805 with your annual return; once elected for one period, you must use it for all four.5Franchise Tax Board. 2024 Instructions for Form FTB 5805
Other Ways to Pay Online
Web Pay is free. The alternatives are not.
Credit Card
The FTB accepts credit card payments through a third-party processor, but there’s a 2.3% service fee.6Franchise Tax Board. Pay by Credit Card On a $5,000 installment, that’s $115. Most rewards programs return 1% to 2%, so unless your card earns unusually well, you’ll lose money against Web Pay.
Tax Software
Some commercial tax programs let you schedule an electronic funds withdrawal when you generate Form 540-ES through their interface. This is the same bank debit Web Pay uses, just initiated from inside the software. Convenient if you’re already there — check whether the software provider charges its own fee before choosing this route.
If You Miss or Mislabel a Payment
California’s estimated tax penalty is essentially interest on the shortfall, currently at a 4% annual rate.7Franchise Tax Board. Interest and Estimate Penalty Rates It’s calculated on each installment separately, running from that installment’s due date until you pay or file, whichever comes first.
If you underpaid, submit a corrective payment through Web Pay as soon as you notice. The penalty accrues daily. If you overpaid, you can’t pull the money back through Web Pay — claim the excess as a credit when you file Form 540.
The FTB may waive the penalty if the underpayment resulted from a casualty, disaster, or other unusual circumstance where the penalty would be inequitable. A waiver is also available if you retired after age 62 or became disabled during the current or prior tax year and the underpayment was for reasonable cause. Either request goes on Form FTB 5805 with your return.8Franchise Tax Board. 2025 Instructions for Form FTB 5805
The Federal Payment Is Separate
Paying California online does not pay the IRS. If you owe California estimated taxes, you almost certainly owe federal ones too, and the federal system has its own $1,000 threshold, its own safe harbor, and a different quarterly split: 25% each on April 15, June 15, September 15, and January 15.9Internal Revenue Service. When Are Quarterly Estimated Tax Payments Due? The September federal payment surprises Californians who’ve gotten used to skipping September on the state side.
The federal underpayment rate has been running between 6% and 7% in recent quarters, higher than California’s 4%.10Internal Revenue Service. Quarterly Interest Rates For the federal side, IRS Direct Pay works much like Web Pay: free bank debits, scheduled up to a year in advance, at irs.gov/payments.11Internal Revenue Service. Payments
Keep the Confirmation
Save your Web Pay confirmation page and the 540-ES worksheet you used to calculate the amount. A MyFTB account will show your estimated payments and credits online before you file, so you can catch a mismatch between your records and the FTB’s before it becomes a filing problem rather than after.12Franchise Tax Board. MyFTB Features