Is a minijob taxable?
Yes, in the strict legal sense — minijob wages are income, and income is taxable. What makes a minijob feel tax-free is who pays that tax and how. In the overwhelming majority of cases, your employer settles the tax as part of a flat-rate package, and it never touches your own wage. Your gross pay and your net pay end up being the same number.
A minijob is capped at €602 a month (€7,224 a year). This earnings limit — not the tax treatment — is what actually defines a minijob. The tax rules below apply because you're under that cap, not the other way around.
How the flat-rate tax actually works
For a standard minijob, your employer pays a bundle of flat-rate contributions to the Minijob-Zentrale that typically adds up to roughly 30% of your wage. Tucked inside that bundle is a flat-rate wage tax (Pauschsteuer) of around 2%, which covers income tax, the solidarity surcharge and church tax all at once, regardless of your actual tax class or church membership.
Because it's a flat percentage paid by the employer rather than withheld from you, it doesn't matter whether you're a student, a second earner in a household, or already employed elsewhere — the 2% rate is the same, and your payslip shows no deduction for it.
| Employer type | Flat-rate tax | Who pays it |
|---|---|---|
| Regular employer (business, shop, office) | Around 2% of gross wage | The employer, bundled into their overall contribution |
| Private household (Haushaltsscheck-Verfahren) | Around 5% of gross wage | The private household employing you |
Minijobs in private households — cleaning, childcare, gardening — run through a separate, simplified procedure with lower overall contributions but a higher flat tax rate than a regular employer pays.
If your employer taxes you individually instead
Employers can choose individual taxation instead of the flat rate, applying your actual tax class and allowances rather than the fixed 2%. This is uncommon for straightforward minijobs, but it does happen — most often when a minijob is your only source of income and the employer expects the basic tax-free allowance to cover it entirely, meaning no tax is withheld either way.
The practical difference only shows up at the margins: under individual taxation, your minijob income is recorded against your tax ID like any other wage, which matters slightly for the tax return question further down.
Two minijobs at once
The rules change as soon as a second job enters the picture, and it depends on what kind of second job it is.
- One minijob alongside a regular main job: the minijob stays tax-free under the flat rate, unaffected by your main salary.
- A second minijob alongside a main job: only your first minijob gets the flat-rate treatment. Any additional minijob is combined with your main salary and taxed at your marginal rate under tax class 6, the class with no allowances at all.
- Two or more minijobs with no main job: the Minijob-Zentrale adds their earnings together. If the combined total exceeds €602 a month, none of them count as minijobs any more — they become ordinary employment subject to standard social insurance and tax rules.
This is the single most common way people accidentally lose minijob status: taking on a second small job without checking what the combined earnings do to the first one.
Minijob vs. short-term employment
A minijob (geringfügige Beschäftigung) is defined by earnings. A separate category, short-term employment (kurzfristige Beschäftigung), is defined by duration instead, and the two are easy to confuse because both are common for holiday and seasonal work.
| Rule | Minijob (geringfügige Beschäftigung) | Short-term (kurzfristige Beschäftigung) |
|---|---|---|
| Defined by | Monthly earnings, capped at €602 | Duration, generally up to around 70 working days or three months a year |
| Earnings cap | Yes, €602 a month | No fixed monthly cap |
| Typical tax treatment | Flat-rate tax, around 2%, paid by the employer | Can be taxed at a flat rate too, or individually, depending on how it's set up |
| Social insurance | Flat-rate contributions plus your own pension top-up | Generally exempt if genuinely short-term and not done regularly |
A student working full days for three weeks over the summer, for example, is more likely to fall under short-term employment than under the minijob rules — the days worked, not the monthly wage, decide which category applies.
Do you need to file a tax return because of a minijob?
On its own, no. Flat-rate minijob tax is final (abgeltend) — once your employer has paid it, the matter is closed as far as your personal income tax is concerned, and the earnings don't appear on your income tax return at all.
If you already have to file a return for other reasons — a main job, freelance income, or investment income above the allowance — your correctly flat-taxed minijob earnings generally stay outside that return. The exception is a minijob taxed individually rather than at the flat rate, which does show up against your tax ID and should be checked against your other income when you file.
Comparing a minijob to other small-job categories? See our guide to minijob, midijob, working student and apprentice rules for how the earnings thresholds compare side by side.
Frequently asked questions
Is a minijob taxable in Germany?
Technically yes, but almost always your employer pays it, not you. Most minijob employers use a flat-rate wage tax bundled into their overall contributions, so nothing is deducted from your payslip.
Do I pay tax on a minijob out of my own wage?
Usually not. If your employer applies the flat-rate tax, your gross and net pay are the same. Tax only comes out of your own wage if your employer chooses individual taxation and your allowance doesn't cover it.
What happens if I have two minijobs at the same time?
One minijob alongside a main job stays tax-free; a second one is combined with your main salary and taxed under tax class 6. Two or more minijobs with no main job are added together, and if the total exceeds the minijob limit, all of them lose minijob status.
Is a minijob the same as short-term employment (kurzfristige Beschäftigung)?
No. A minijob is defined by a monthly earnings limit. Short-term employment is defined by duration instead, generally capped at around 70 working days or three months a year, with no fixed earnings ceiling.
Do I need to submit a tax return because of my minijob?
A minijob taxed at the flat rate doesn't by itself create a filing obligation, since that tax is final and doesn't appear on your income tax return. It generally stays outside a return you file for other reasons too, as long as the flat rate was applied.