2022 North Carolina Tipped Minimum Wage
The 2022 North Carolina Tipped Minimum Wage is $2.13.
Effective 2022-01-01Source: Minimum Wage in N.C. (North Carolina Department of Labor)Verified 2026-08-30
Compared with 2021
Every figure on this page is unchanged from 2021.
| Item | 2021 | 2022 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Minimum cash wage | $2.13 | $2.13 | +$0 (+0.0%) |
Who it applies to
Employers with tipped employees in North Carolina
What changed this year, and why
The 2022 tipped minimum cash wage in North Carolina is $2.13 per hour.
Common questions
- What is the tipped minimum wage in North Carolina?
- The minimum cash wage an employer must pay a tipped employee is $2.13 per hour. The employer may take a tip credit toward the state minimum wage. If the employee's tips do not bring total compensation up to the state minimum wage, the employer must make up the difference.
- What conditions must an employer meet to take a tip credit?
- The employer must notify the employee in advance of the tip credit, allow the employee to retain all tips, and keep accurate records of tips received.
Who counts as a tipped employee
Under federal law, which governs tipped wages in North Carolina, a tipped employee is someone who customarily and regularly receives tips above a modest monthly threshold. If your job involves receiving tips as a regular part of your work — for example, as a server, bartender, or bellhop — you likely meet that definition. Once you qualify, your employer in North Carolina may pay you the minimum cash wage of $2.13 per hour and count a portion of your tips toward the full minimum wage. If tips are only occasional or incidental to your role, you are not a tipped employee and your employer must pay you at least the full minimum wage in direct wages, without relying on a tip credit. North Carolina's minimum wage page addresses employers who have "tipped employees" and the conditions under which the tip credit applies, but it defers to federal standards for the underlying definition of who counts as tipped.
For employers who have “tipped employees,” employers are permitted to take a credit for a certain amount of tips earned by their employees toward the employers’ payment of the minimum wage.
Minimum Wage in N.C. (North Carolina Department of Labor)
What a tip credit is, and the cash wage underneath it
Under federal law, which North Carolina follows, the tip credit is the difference between the direct (cash) wage the employer pays you and the full minimum wage. In other words, your employer counts a portion of your tips toward its minimum-wage obligation. In North Carolina, the minimum cash wage that must be paid directly to you is $2.13 per hour. That cash wage is the floor: no matter how many tips you receive, your employer cannot pay you less than $2.13 an hour in direct wages. If your tips for a given workweek do not bring your total hourly earnings up to the full minimum wage, your employer must increase its cash payment so that you receive at least the minimum wage overall. The tip credit is not a bonus to the employer; it is a mechanism that lets the employer count your tips as part of the wage it owes, subject to the requirement that you actually keep those tips.
However, for an employer to be able to count tips as wages and take a tip credit towards the minimum wage, the law requires that tipped employees be notified in advance and be permitted to retain all tips, and requires that the employer maintains accurate and complete records of tips received by each employee and such tips must be certified by tipped employees monthly or for each pay period.
Minimum Wage in N.C. (North Carolina Department of Labor)
When the tips do not get you to the minimum wage
In North Carolina, an employer MUST pay at least $2.13 an hour to tipped employees as long as each employee receives enough in tips to make up the difference between the wages paid and the minimum wage ($7.25). This means the state sets a floor on what you must be paid in cash, but if your tips do not bring your total earnings up to $7.25 for the hours you worked, the employer is responsible for closing the gap. In other words, your employer cannot rely on tips alone to satisfy the minimum wage — the cash wage is guaranteed, and the employer must ensure you walk away with at least the full minimum wage when tips and cash are combined.
In North Carolina, an employer MUST pay at least $2.13 an hour to tipped employees as long as each employee receives enough in tips to make up the difference between the wages paid and the minimum wage ($7.25). Employers MUST pay more than the $2.13 hourly cash wage if the tipped employee earns less than the credit in tips per hour, as it is the employer’s responsibility to make sure that all tipped employees earn at least the minimum wage in cash wages and tips.
Minimum Wage in N.C. (North Carolina Department of Labor)
The notice an employer owes you before it takes the credit
In North Carolina, before an employer can take a tip credit — that is, before it can count your tips toward its minimum-wage obligation — it must tell you in advance. The state's page on minimum wage makes clear that the law requires tipped employees be notified in advance and be permitted to retain all tips. The notice must cover the amount of cash wage the employer will pay you, the amount of tip credit the employer will claim, and the fact that the tip credit cannot exceed the tips you actually receive. The employer must also explain that you have a right to keep all of your tips (unless a valid tip pool is in place) and that the tip credit will not apply unless you have been given this information. If your employer in North Carolina fails to give you this notice before it starts paying you the reduced cash wage of $2.13 per hour, it cannot legally take the tip credit and may owe you the full minimum wage for every hour you worked.
For employers who have “tipped employees,” employers are permitted to take a credit for a certain amount of tips earned by their employees toward the employers’ payment of the minimum wage. However, for an employer to be able to count tips as wages and take a tip credit towards the minimum wage, the law requires that tipped employees be notified in advance and be permitted to retain all tips, and requires that the employer maintains accurate and complete records of tips received by each employee and such tips must be certified by tipped employees monthly or for each pay period.
Minimum Wage in N.C. (North Carolina Department of Labor)
Your employer, your manager and your supervisor may not keep your tips
In North Carolina, the law requires that tipped employees be permitted to retain all tips. That means your employer, its managers, and its supervisors may not keep any portion of the tips you receive, whether those tips were left in cash, added to a credit card charge, or distributed through a tip pool. The employer also may not use your tips for any other purpose — for example, to cover a register shortage, to pay for broken dishes, or to offset the cost of a uniform. The employer's role is limited to collecting accurate records of the tips you receive (which you must certify monthly or each pay period) and, if it is taking a tip credit, counting a portion of those tips toward its minimum-wage obligation. Any tips beyond what the employer counts toward the tip credit remain yours. If a manager or supervisor in North Carolina takes a share of your tips, that violates the rule and you may be owed additional wages.
However, for an employer to be able to count tips as wages and take a tip credit towards the minimum wage, the law requires that tipped employees be notified in advance and be permitted to retain all tips, and requires that the employer maintains accurate and complete records of tips received by each employee and such tips must be certified by tipped employees monthly or for each pay period.
Minimum Wage in N.C. (North Carolina Department of Labor)
Which tip pools you can be made to join
In North Carolina, tip pooling is permitted, but only within limits. For businesses covered by the state's minimum wage rules — generally those with less than $500,000 in gross sales — a tip pool may include only employees in occupations in which they customarily and regularly receive tips. The pool must leave tipped employees with at least 85 percent of the tips they receive. The employer must keep accurate and complete records of the tips received and the amount earned under the tip pooling arrangement. This means that in North Carolina, your employer cannot force you to share your tips with cooks, dishwashers, or other back-of-house staff who are not themselves customarily tipped, at least not under the state's own rules. Any tip pool that pulls in non-tipped workers or that leaves you with less than 85 percent of your tips runs afoul of the state requirement. The employer also may not take a share of the pool for itself; tips in the pool must stay among the eligible tipped workers.
In businesses that are covered by NCDOL for minimum wage (generally businesses that make less than $500,000 in gross sales), tip pooling is permitted as long as the tipped employees retain at least 85 percent of the tips they receive, which means the employer must maintain accurate and complete records of the tips received and the amount of tips earned under the tip pooling arrangement.
Minimum Wage in N.C. (North Carolina Department of Labor)
Doing two jobs for one employer
Under the federal rules that North Carolina follows, an employee who works in two different roles for the same employer — for example, serving tables part of the time and doing kitchen work the rest — is a tipped employee only with respect to their employment as a server. This means the employer can take the tip credit only for the hours you actually spend in the tipped occupation. If you spend a substantial amount of time doing non-tipped work, the employer may not pay you the reduced cash wage of $2.13 per hour for those non-tipped hours; it must pay you the full minimum wage for them. In North Carolina, the state does not have its own separate dual-jobs rule, so the federal framework applies. The practical effect is that your employer must track which hours you spend in the tipped role and which you spend in the non-tipped role, and it must pay you accordingly. If it fails to separate the two, or if it pays you the tipped cash wage for time you spent doing non-tipped work, it may owe you back wages for the difference.
Employers MUST pay more than the $2.13 hourly cash wage if the tipped employee earns less than the credit in tips per hour, as it is the employer’s responsibility to make sure that all tipped employees earn at least the minimum wage in cash wages and tips.
Minimum Wage in N.C. (North Carolina Department of Labor)
How each figure was verified
Each number below was read from a stored copy of the document named beside it, and checked to occur word for word in the quoted sentence. The digest is of that stored text.
Minimum Wage in N.C. (North Carolina Department of Labor)
- Minimum cash wage
In North Carolina, an employer MUST pay at least $2.13 an hour to tipped employees
Other years
Every North Carolina Tipped Minimum Wage year · Tipped Minimum Wage in every state