Hawaii child support calculator

How Hawaii calculates child support

• Hawai‘i uses a Melson formula. Each parent’s monthly gross income is converted to net income with the Table of Incomes, which subtracts 2022 federal and state income tax for a single filer, Social Security and Medicare, and a $1,693 self-support reserve. These are standard figures, not the taxes the parent actually pays.
• The children’s primary need is $455 a child plus child care and the children’s health insurance. Income above $1,303 a month per parent is SOLA income; after the primary need, 10% of it per child (30% at most) is added for the children’s standard of living.
• Each parent owes the total in proportion to net income, at least $91 a child and generally not more than that parent’s net income. The parent who pays child care or the children’s insurance gets credit for it.
• With extensive time-sharing (144 to 182 overnights a year with the parent who has fewer), support is phased toward the equal time-sharing amount. With equal time-sharing, each parent is treated as having the children six months of the year. Split custody offsets each parent’s amount for the children in the other home.

What the calculator asks

• How many children is the support for?
• How do the children divide their overnights?
• How many overnights a year do the children spend with the parent who has them less?
• How many of the children live with you?
• Your monthly gross income from all sources
• The other parent’s monthly gross income from all sources
• Does either of you have self-employment income or nontaxable income (such as nontaxable alimony, VA disability or military allowances)?
• Child care you pay each month so you can work or attend training
• Child care the other parent pays each month so they can work or attend training
• What you pay each month to cover the children on health insurance
• What the other parent pays each month to cover the children on health insurance
• Do the children receive Social Security dependency benefits because of a parent’s retirement or disability?

It never asks for names, Social Security numbers or account numbers, and your answers are not saved.

What the estimate leaves out

• Self-employment income and nontaxable income such as nontaxable alimony or VA disability (Appendix A-4 and A-5 worksheets)
• Credit for Social Security dependency benefits the children receive because of a parent’s retirement or disability
• Cash medical support of 10% of net income when no health insurance is available
• Exceptional circumstances, such as support above 70% of net income, other children the parent must support, or private-school costs (Appendix A-3)
• Imputed income and support for adult children in school
• Monthly gross income above $16,666.67

When a situation is outside what the calculator covers, it says so and points you to the official worksheet instead of guessing.

Official sources

• 2024 Hawai‘i Child Support Guidelines (effective April 1, 2024)
• Family Court Memorandum of March 20, 2024 adopting the 2024 Guidelines
• Appendix B, Table of Incomes (Rev. 3/2024)
• Appendix A-1, Child Support Guidelines Worksheet
• Appendix A-2, Extensive Time-Sharing Worksheet
• 2024 Child Support Guidelines Excel Worksheets

Hawai‘i Child Support Guidelines worksheets (Hawai‘i State Judiciary) →